Articles
LA’S SUMMER THAT WAS A Parade Through the Valley of Ashes
In 1969, just months before Neil Armstrong allegedly walked on the moon, Queen Elizabeth rang in London’s brand-new,ten-mile-long Victoria tube line with a ceremonial ride in thetrain’s front car. Her celebration was warranted: the line was the first of its kind to be...
The Rock Makes a Parade
Every morning, I look for two things on my drive down 6th. The first is a girl curled on her apartment building’s alley stoop, smoking a morning cigarette and swiping on her phone. She never looks up. The second is Levitated Mass (2012) by Michael Heizer. Over the...
IN SEARCH OF A CITY September/October 2026
A few weeks ago, Pilar Zeta and I visited the new David Geffen Galleries at LACMA, where on a clear day, one can almost see Venice, California, with his back turned to Francis Bacon’s Three Studies of Lucian Freud (1969).
COLLECTING THOUGHTS Tim Zeleny
What started with just collecting Mars Volta concert posters and work from underground graffiti artists that I met at hip hop shows, led me down a rabbit hole of collecting art from all over the world.
ART DAMAGED Puppeteer's Iron Hand
STAYING SANE(ish) WITH DR. TRAINWRECK Advice
This month is a tough one. Because this month, I, your trustworthy bona fide font of wisdom and advice, have got nothin’. Yes, I still have my degrees and my experience and years of making mistakes so you don’t have to. But I am also someone’s daughter. Or I was....
AN ARTIST ANSWERS QUESTIONS Jacob Rosenberg
Tell us about yourself in 50 words or less. Mid life. Heavy on nostalgia. Direct and tell stories, make photographs, make books, make commercials. Documented an incredible movement in skateboarding in the early 1990’s; somehow that always keeps coming back. I saved a...
The Horror of Time A Short Story
In 2012, Daniel Zalewski profiled Christian Marclay and The Clock (2010) in The New Yorker. The piece includes a single, throwaway reference to an assistant: “One fellow, who offered little but gunshots and ‘guys getting their heads chopped off,’ was fired.” Over the next month, The Clock returns to LACMA. –TC
IN SEARCH OF A CITY July/August 2026
A few weeks ago, Pilar Zeta and I visited the new David Geffen Galleries at LACMA, where on a clear day, one can almost see Venice, California, with his back turned to Francis Bacon’s Three Studies of Lucian Freud (1969).
DUELING REVIEWS: DAVID GEFFEN GALLERIES Two takes on the David Geffen Galleries at LACMA
Following what felt like an eternity of delays—budget-related, structural and otherwise—LACMA opened its new Peter Zumthor-designed David Geffen Galleries this spring, finally unveiling its long-awaited proposal to reinvent the encyclopedic museum.
How Disrupted Can an Art Fair Actually Get?
Days before the opening of the 61st International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale began, there were news reports of protests and disruption due to the Biennale’s inclusion of pavilions from Russia and Israel, two countries that are each involved in highly unpopular wars.
Best and Worst of the Biennale The Best Exhibition and the Best and Worst Country Pavilions Ranked at the 61st Venice Biennale
Turns out that there is bad art everywhere in the world, even at the Biennale. There was some good, some bad, some boring, and much of it was expected (cue lots of video art and fabric hanging from the ceiling). Here are our top picks of the best (and worst) of the (Venice) Biennale.
ARTIST TAKEOVER: PATRICK MARTINEZ
Signs of Life in the Ruins of Movieland On the Values and Architecture of Hollywood
Today, Hollywood is like a ghost ship, an empty dream factory with abandoned equipment. Unmoored and directionless, Los Angeles shivers in the void of the fantasy it can’t forget.
GARY BASEMAN at Johnie's Coffee Shop Restaurant
Gary Baseman hosted a pop-up show in the long-shuttered Johnie’s Coffeeshop, kitty-corner from the Wilshire/Fairfax stop. Which is fun, because Baseman is big into kitty cats. “Off the Menu” shows a collection of drawings Baseman has done on menus of restaurants across Los Angeles.
EREWHON AT LACMA
Every year for decades, legions of tourists have flocked to the same SoCal landmarks: Hollywood Boulevard, the Griffith Observatory, Disneyland (or Universal, if you swing that way). For a certain subcategory of traveler straddling the line between hippie and yuppie, however, another attraction has recently been added to the mix: none other than grocery paradise Erewhon.
JORDAN WOLFSON for Prada Spring / Summer 2026
I have always felt uncomfortable around birds. I often trace my repulsion to a family viewing of Hitchcock’s The Birds during my tender years, when anything could feel like a personal reference. In that sense, I may be biased—but when a PR pitched me a preview of Prada’s new Spring/Summer 2026 campaign, I knew immediately I didn’t like it.
JOHN GIORNO at Marciano Art Foundation
John Giorno seems like a fun guy to have been around. Lively, ready for hijinks. I mean, anyone who’d turn his slumbering nakedness over to Andy Warhol’s camera for six hours must be pretty game.
NANCY HOLT at MAK Center
Who could ask for anything more exquisite and tasteful than Nancy Holt’s rhythmic and spare documentary artworks, installed in R.M. Schindler’s Kings Road house, a place that LA loves to love so much? The land art goddess fits right in among its sun-dappled redwood joists and tilt-up concrete walls.
KELLY AKASHI & PHIL PETERS for Los Angeles Nomadic Division
Over Memorial Day weekend, I trekked up to Altadena to visit “Field Set,” a two-day exhibition of works by sculptor Kelly Akashi and sound artist Phil Peters. I was hesitant about visiting Altadena. The sheer emptiness of the area is oppressive and as a longtime fan, but never a resident of Altadena, I was worried my presence was more interloper than exhibition visitor. The exhibition was located on the remains of Akashi’s home.