I’ve done my share of tramping all over the wilderness, mostly in Wyoming, Utah, Idaho and Colorado. Backpacking, National Parks, Skiing and long road trips. Nowadays, I mostly hike in museums and on city streets. One of the few cities I haven’t really toured is Los Angeles ( I actually hitchhiked through once, sleeping on a beach, long ago).
My recent trip back there was a hike of a different nature, through the decades of Modern Art. It would be no surprise to anyone that LA has a lot of art. And a few days in Central LA would of course offer multiple opportunities to see it. The sheer amount of art museums there might still surprise many, however. The shock to most might be how much of it is free. The highlights:
The Broad Museum was a priority from the get go. A wonderful Building, designed by Diller Scofidio+Renfro with Gensler, it is open and expansive, and features a marvelous stairwell that offers views of storage, teasing you with glimpses of things not on view yet. What is on view is abundant, with most artists afforded entire galleries, some, such as Liechtenstein and Basquiat, getting two. Revelations for me included Murakami and Mark Bradford. Their Kiefer was exemplary, and a gigantic Kara Walker across from it was stunning.
MOCA Emblematic of LA’s art abundance is the MOCA, right across the Grand Avenue from the Broad ( also the Gehry Disney Center, also free to tour). A roomful of Rothko and a wonderful Miro and several Ruscha pieces would normally signal a spectacular experience, but here slightly overshadowed by the Broad. Their store was an allowance- buster.
Marciano Collection Just down Wilshire on the Metro, this was even more contemporary than the Broad, with a very unique Koons- judge for yourself; Koons is everywhere in LA, like Ruscha- and a wonderful library with a great show by Venezuelan Magdelena Suarez-Frimkess. Everything in the library made me jealous of Angelenos: The colorful and comfy foam furniture, the beautiful Suarez-Frimkess drawings drawing on iconic comics and animation, and the mural by original designer Millard Sheets, plus the voluminous shelves of art books by contemporary artists, which I need to spend time with, as many were unfamiliar to me. This was the only place I saw a Raymond Pettibon- which surprised (and disappointed) me. Pettibon was an important linkage between avant gard art and LA punk rock music. But of course, time waits for no one, and neither does the Marciano, the most aggressively contemporary of the museums we saw.
LACMA, a bit farther down the Wilshire Blvd D line, is a mind boggling place, not least because it’s four mind boggling places. The new Geffen Galleries, designed by Peter Zumthor, an architectural and curatorial flight of fancy that spans both Wilshire Blvd., and four Oceans, the theme of the exhibits (which we did not get half through). As eyeballs glazed, what remains vivid in my memory is a juxtaposition of African contemporary quilting by Natsui with American rustic quilts, and African bark paper drawings. This is an example of the sorts of alchemical improvisations everywhere here. A very vivid George Innes and Reginald Marsh, underrated ashcan school painter, stick in my mind.
We scooted over to the Resnick Gallery, where I saw a highlight of the visit- a very creative and informative show on Block Printing. Durer, Kirchner, Donald Judd linked in printmaking Valhalla, along with, no surprise, Edo period Hiroshige and Hokusai. They have a nice group of Kees Van Dongen canvasses, an artist you don’t often see in multiples.
The Broad Contemporary Art Museum ( everything in the LA museum landscape seems to be named after the Broads, or David Geffen, which can be confusing), like the Resnick, designed by Renzo Piano, and like the downtown Broad, given to roomsful of single artists, such as Picasso. Here, in the last hour of our desperate tour, the death march began, and all pretense of art history edification gave way to a kaleidoscopic blur of famous names. It was here I finally saw two David Hockney canvasses, I was expecting to be inundated everywhere I went.
We did not see The Japanese Museum at LACMA ( presumably more Hokusai woodcuts, I grieve), nor the Armand Hammer, farther down Wilshire. Nor the Gettys, which like the Broads and Geffens, is actually plural museums. We did not see the Huntington Library (who have a Gutenberg bible), and I later learned that Vincent Price’s collection has spawned a well respected museum. We saw many other smaller museums, shows on contemporary clay and Chinese history, etc. We rarely left sight of the Wilshire Blvd Metro line. Again, most of these were free. Even the LACMA(s) were only $25 or so. We spent the money saved on Korean and Indian food. It was nonetheless, a surprisingly cheap vacation.
Outside, heading for the Metro, a Nara and a Chris Burden were the last, gigantic eye-poppers of an eye popping visit. I’ve seen art and museums in most cities I’ve visited. It’s been a travel priority for decades. But for Modern and Contemporary art, I now have to say, “See LA, and die”.
#Artmuseums #LAart #culturaltourism #Broad #LACMA #Liechtenstein #Murakami #Wilshireblvd
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