Articles tagged with art

Garcetti’s challenge. L.A. Mayor-elect Eric Garcetti will meet today with the man he’ll be taking over from on July 1st. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa calls Garcetti “a true leader”and says he trusts him to guide the city into a bright future.”
Garcetti is going to have some sensitive issues to deal with when he moves into the mayor’s office. At the top of the list, salaries …

Only a month ago, the Museum of Contemporary Art was in the headlines as the target of a possible takeover by LACMA.  The situation sounded dire: Without being rescued by another institution, could MOCA stay afloat?
Now, there’s a new mega-show about to open across two of MOCA’s facilities, the announcement of $75 million recently tucked into the troubled museum’s coffers by new board members. …

Two Los Angeles artists are turning voicemails into a public art project that you can appreciate anywhere you have reception. Jeff Foye and Gordon Winiemko are a pair of artists from Long Beach, better known as  JEFF & GORDON. The duo is known forproducing art that examines how human beings interact. Their work was been exhibited at the Sweeney Gallery at U.C. Riverside, and …

Museum moves. L.A.’s cash-strapped Museum of Contemporary Art has rejected a merger offer from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. A statement from MOCA’s trustees says “The… best future for MOCA would be as an independent institution.” The board acknowledged, however, that the downtown modern art museum will require a major financial boost to remain independent. LACMA had reportedly offered to raise $100 …

In Los Angeles, we mark our neighborhoods with symbols of ethnic and cultural pride. And murals are strong representations of those identities. From South L.A. to Venice, and from Boyle Heights to Hollywood, street art tells us a lot about the people who live in those parts of town.
Bricia Lopez brought in a pair of Oaxacan muralists known as Colectivo LaPiztola to paint the …

LA’s world-class Museum of Contemporary Art is still in financial trouble, and LA County’s Museum of Art has offered a $100 million merger.  Such a deal would be a bargain for LACMA, but could MOCA maintain its independence?  Will Eli Broad — with his own museum across the street from MOCA and a seat on both MOCA and LACMA boards — exercise veto power?  …

You might think of the Mojave Desert as empty and inhospitable. But homesteaders and miners began living in this dry, vast space east of Los Angeles in the early 20th Century.
And it’s always called to outsiders and artists like Noah Purifoy, an Angeleno who lived in Joshua Tree and created 10 acres of desert sculptures from junk.
Independent producer Brian Calvert went to the Mojave …

Artist Bettina Hubby woke up a year or so ago to an urban nightmare: That thumping sound of construction, right across the street from her house.
She lives and works on a well-trafficked thoroughfare in Silver Lake called Rowena Avenue, which has been dug up for what seems like forever in the name of upgrading the pipes.
At first she stewed, but then she got inspired. …

It’s been a year since the storms that felled thousands of trees around our region. At the LA Arboretum alone, 235 trees were lost. Artist-in-residence Leigh Adams was inspired by the destruction. “I’m an optimist,” she said today at a preview of the show, Forces of Nature: Art from Fallen Trees. Dozens of artists were allowed to have at the wreckage–after getting the okay from the …

After a nearly 40 year career as one of the greatest and most successful pop songwriters on earth, Carole Bayer Sager could sit back and do whatever she wanted. Like, relax. But this woman who’s written for everyone from Michael Jackson to Stevie Wonder to Barbara Streisand says that isn’t in her constitution. What she wants to do at this point is to paint. …

Santa Maria Tavehua is a tiny village in the hillsides of southern Mexico.  They are known for their ceramic arts made from an indigenous orange clay.  For centuries, the people of Tavehua made pots and plates, cups and bowls to barter and trade among themselves.  In the modern economy, their work shifted to decorative pieces, specifically these little bunnies playing instruments.  In recent decades, …

Hey all you people who hate going east of the 405: I’ve got three good reasons for you to make the trek.
1. The divine meadow adjacent to the Silver Lake Reservoir (take a picnic, and the kids, but not the dogs, and see for yourself some of the outdoor splendors we eastsiders enjoy!)
2. Across from the street from the Reservoir is the mid-century modern …

Back in 2005 the development company, Related Companies, negotiated a deal to build a commercial development on parcels east of the Walt Disney Concert Hall. As part of the deal, they agreed to pay $50 million for a public gathering space to be built on the site of a little used park on a hilly site connecting City Hall to Grand Avenue.
The commercial development has been …

UPDATE 7/7/12: Eli Broad, billionaire philanthropist and founding chairman of the MOCA board of trustees, tries to answer the question posed in our headline. He wrote an op-ed in today’s LA Times defending museum director Jeffrey Deitch and the decision to part with longtime curator Paul Schimmel.
Broad argues that MOCA needs to be more thrifty and populist with its exhibitions:
In today’s economic environment, museums …

News broke last week that chief curator Paul Schimmel is leaving LA’s Museum of Contemporary Art. It’s not clear whether he resigned or was fired. But it’s created a firestorm of discussion in the art world.
Joining KCRW’s Steve Chiotakis to discuss the news and what this says about the LA art world, and art funding in general, is art critic Hunter Drohojowska-Philp, and Mat …

“I understand that you are standing in the trench under ‘Levitated Mass.’ Look up and tell our listeners what you see and what you feel.” That’s the first question Warren Olney asked LA County Museum of Art Director Michael Govan today about the much-anticipated 340-ton rock sculpture that opens Sunday. Govan, who did the interview while standing below the rock, responded, “It does appear to …

The best free film in town just may be at the arrivals terminal named for Tom Bradley at LAX. Four hours of films by 17 video artists, collectively titled SEE CHANGE, are debuting this week on two video installations, all funded by the Percent for Art program, which dedicates a portion of the cost of construction (in this case, of Bradley) to the creation …

Avi Roth is possessed by coffee. Not just the need to consume it, but what he can create with it. He’s converted his studio in Pasadena into an art gallery to showcase work he’s been making for six years now: Lithographs from coffee. Or as he calls them, coffeegraphs.
I toured the gallery last week, where over 40 pieces are expertly lit and hung. (And …

Can’t wait till the end of June for the unveiling of Michael Heizer’s much-ballyhooed Rock at LACMA? Craving nature, but not able to get out of the city this weekend? Head to MOCA’s Geffen Contemporary in Little Tokyo on Sunday for the opening of Ends of the Earth: Land Art to 1974.
This show, years in the making, celebrates a movement in the sixties and …

Ever since the Southwest Museum closed its doors several years ago, supporters have been clamoring for the Mt. Washington landmark to reopen. Now they’re getting their wish– to a point.
Starting this weekend the Autry National Center will invite the public back to the 98-year-old museum – L.A.’s oldest – on a limited basis. The Autry took over an insolvent Southwest in 2003. Ever since, …