A one-day showing of what is being called a rare Pablo Picasso etched plate will take place Saturday at Carmel's Bohemian House, to raise money for an Ukrainian orphanage for young victims of the Chernobyl disaster. The plate is from "Suite 347," a series of erotic pictures Picasso did over seven months in 1968. It shows a nude woman with a dove, and a painter with a pipe watching her.

"What makes it so fascinating is that this is the actual plate, not a print, and this plate is not supposed to exist," says Jon Zellhoefer, who owns Bohemian House with his wife, Olga. Typically, etched plates are destroyed after a limited number of prints are made. But apparently Picasso gave away some of the plates from Suite 347, perhaps to annoy his family, Zellhoefer suggests. He cautions that the plate's provenance has not been proved, but local artists who have viewed it told Zellhoefer "it is consistent with Picasso's work," and the current owner acquired it in 1969 when a friend gave it to him "for safekeeping."

Zellhoefer says the owner is willing to show the work in Carmel for fundraising purposes, but wants to make sure enough people will show up--otherwise, Zellhoefer says, it's not worth it to him to move the picture and its complicated security arrangements to Carmel. If Saturday's show goes well, Zellhoefer will display the plate again for a week in early April. So if you want to see what all the fuss is about, and help out some children in Ukraine, show up at the gallery on 6th between Dolores and Lincoln, Saturday from 11am to 4pm. Free admission, with suggested donations going to the kids. Call 626-1100 for more information.

Call for Artists Extended

Art in Public Places, which gives local artists a chance to display their work in county government buildings, has extended its current "call for artists" until April 7. This past year's shows in the Monterey and Salinas courthouses have been very well received, and local artists are encouraged to apply for the next 12-month exhibition period, which begins in September. Applicants should submit 10 slides and a self-addressed stamped envelope, a resume and a non-refundable $10 application fee. Mail everything to Cultural Council of Monterey County, P.O. Box 7495, Carmel, CA 93921 or drop it off at the Cultural Council office at Sunset Center, room 5. For more information call 622-9060 or Susan Giacometti at 625-4134.

Conversations in Sound

Los Angeles and Korea meet in Pacific Grove on Friday, when KAZU's Up-to-Date Gallery presents the improvisational percussion duo Zen Din. Musicians Gustavo Alfredo Aguilar, from Texas, and Je Chun Park, from Korea, have cultivated a musical marriage fusing the sounds of the Americas with traditional Korean music.

Aguilar, a former faculty member at the Korean National University of the Arts and currently a professor at Del Mar College/Texas A&M Corpus Christi, has toured in South Korea, Austria, Australia and throughout the United States. His solo CD, Dreaming with Serpents, was released in 1999 on the Acoustic Levitation label. Je Chun Park graduated from Chungang University with a degree in music composition in 1986. His 1995 CD, Mol-e Mori, was the first to combine traditional Korean music with jazz. The two men met in Korea in 1995, and decided to work together.

Zen Din first visited the Monterey Peninsula during last summer's Big Sur Experimental Music Festival. They were so impressed with the beauty of the area, they say, that they decided to make the Central Coast a required stop during their current West Coast tour. Rendezvous with them Friday at 7pm at 167 Central Ave. in Pacific Grove. $5 donation.