We thought we were the only people madly in love with a joke that doesn't sound like a joke—until a press release for FOCA's new exhibit "StoneFace" stumbled into our inbox. For a minute, I thought they were putting me on.

Located in a little nook in Chinatown, the Fellows of Contemporary Art is a non-profit champion of fresh weirdness,  and is staging a grant-funded project that celebrates deadpan humor as (and we love this) a "method of critique enacted through pleasure" enabling the "critical ambivalence of blankness that allows conflicting positions to co-exist."

We knew there were sushi snobs and cigar enthusiasts, but it tickles us to know that people who passionately examine deadpan comedy exist in this world.

Artists John Baldessari, Dan Graham, Jesse Aaron Green, Rachel Mason and others contribute wry paintings, drawings and sculpture to the exhibit, while a video monitor rotates clips of deadpan icons: Steven Wright, Buster Keaton, and our personal hero, Gary Shandling.  You can also pick up FOCA's pamphlet on pokerfaced comedy, which we imagine will have us tittering gayly, while trying not to upset the straight-faced mood.

StoneFace opens with a reception on Thursday Sept 6, from  6- 8 p.m., and you can catch its ironic splendor runs through November 9 at FOCA.

Alie Ward is Events editor for Metromix Los Angeles.

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