Category: News

LA ART FAIR ROUNDUP
More fairs, Au Revoir PARIS PHOTO

Art fairs, and yet more art fairs in January. There was the usual roundup—photo l.a. (Jan. 22–24), L. A. Art Show with all its components (Jan. 27–31), and Art Los Angeles Contemporary (ALAC, Jan. 28–31)—plus newcomers Fabrik (Jan. 29–31) and Startup (Jan. 29–31) and the breakout of the Los Angeles Fine Print Fair (Jan. 22–24) from the LAAS into its own at Bonhams in West Hollywood. First up was the 25th edition of LA’s longest running fair, photo l.a., which managed to get a goodly crowd at the opening and over the weekend. The fair has an especially robust programming component—what with workshops, seminars, and the Point of View exhibition of works selected by collectors. (Disclosure: Yours Truly writes up the text blocks for that special exhibition, looking into how collectors get into collecting photography and why they chose the print on view.)

Galleries have been polarized between photo l.a. and Paris Photo LA—the former getting smaller galleries and more experimental and projects-based work, the latter getting big, high-profile galleries. So it’s good news for photo l.a. that its competitor has just (finally!) announced that it’s giving up on our fair city. Jean-Daniel Compain of Reed Exhibitions France, which runs Paris Photo, said in a press release, “Despite the impressive mobilization of the city of Los Angeles, its galleries, cultural institutions, and collectors, and notwithstanding its great potential for cultural development, the absence of a mature market in terms of art fairs of this scale and scope has driven us to make this difficult decision.” Truth is, it was clear that Paris Photo LA had lost much traction last year—a number of those big, high-profile galleries did not return for the third edition of the fair. There were sales, but lots of grumbling—dealers simply were not selling well enough to warrant paying for PPLA’s ultra-expensive space on the Paramount backlot. One dealer at photo l.a. said her costs for participating this year were a fraction of participating at PPLA—less than half. 

 

 

The L.A. Art Show has continued splitting the fair up into sections—that’s smart, as the fair is now too big to comfortably cover in one go, and serious collectors really just focus on one or maybe two areas of collecting. Officially, one part (the larger part) is the L.A. Art Show with its focus on Modern and Contemporary art, and the other part is the Los Angeles Fine Art Show with its traditional painting, jewelry, icons, etc.

My favorite section of LAAS is Littletopia, with about a dozen smaller galleries featuring lowbrow and Pop Surrealistic art, often drawing a younger, hipster crowd to gawk. This year it was set off by a custom-built archway. One exhibitor, with a hand-painted sign saying “Killduff’s Bakery,” was selling small paintings painted on the spot by an artist—crude but luscious paintings of croissants, cakes, loaves of bread. Further along was more bakery-inspired art at Think Tank Gallery, which featured a mini-funhouse by Scott Hove. Walking in, you were faced with mirrors and surfaces dizzily trimmed with pastel icing and piped decoration—the kind you might find on a wedding cake. (These are Hove’s own concoction of paint mixed with spackle.) On the walls outside were some of his “cakes”—cakes in the shape of guns, cakes with a threatening set of incisors snarling at you. This installation was a tempting taste of his upcoming show at Think Tank Gallery in downtown LA.

 

Also in Littletopia were the weirdly wonderful paintings and assemblage works at Red Truck Gallery. Since the last fair I had a chance to visit the gallery in the French Quarter in their hometown New Orleans, where it was wonderful to see an extended selection. Another return was artist Kazuhiro, who brought his latest creation, a showstopper. He’s become known for making oversized busts of famous people—“People I admire,” he tells me. This time it’s Frida Kahlo, in all her intense monobrow beauty, held up by two giant metallic hands. Kazuhiro was a special effects makeup expert in the movie business, and now plies his trade on these astonishingly realistic heads—painstakingly inserting individual hairs, creating skin pores, painting the skin in living color. In the past he’s done Dali, Warhol, Abraham Lincoln, and when asked if he would ever do a woman, he had said that a big woman’s head would seem grotesque. Well, now he’s done one and I think he’s at the top of his game—this Frida has intelligence flaring from her liquid brown eyes, and exudes extraordinary magnetism.

 

 

GALLERY MOVES

We are so very sad to hear that Offramp Gallery is closing. For years Jane Chafin has provided a comfortable venue for mid-career and established artists who made work well worth seeing (and collecting) but may not have been trendy enough for the Culver City galleries.

 

One door closes, several more open… we have more new galleries for our art-viewing pleasure—DTLA continues to experience a boom, with two new galleries opening at the end of January. Jason Vass moved from the West Side and opened on East Sixth Street with a show by Mark Dutcher. Parrasch Heijnen opened with a survey of the work of Ken Price, who was one of our leading artists working in ceramics. Since 1986 Franklin Parrasch has been a fixture in the New York art scene and now he’s partnered with Christopher Heijnen, who has been a rep for him in these parts since 2012. It took them a year to find suitable space, and it is a 5,000 square-foot building on 1326 South Boyle Avenue, includes a sculpture garden and parking. The focus will be on LA artists and those with a connection with those artists and/or LA art—that covers a lot of territory.

 

 

LET THEM EAT CAKE

Think Tank Gallery has transformed their 7500-square-foot events space in DTLA into a colorful funhouse and lounge, for an ambitious month of programming with “Break Bread” (Feb. 13–March 13). “Break Bread” is an art show, an eatery, and a performance space.  There will be work by Scott Hove and Baker’s Son, with Jacob Patterson organizing. Hove produces the luscious cake-decorated objects and installations mentioned here—that piece from the LAAS will be reinstalled, with expanded rooms to tour, some with a decidedly darker bent. (Artists do so like to be naughty… ) Baker’s Son paints sublime watercolors of food—bread, cake, even Aunt Jemima bottles—Baker’s Son is African American, and says that his family used to collect those items with gusto. Interspersed will be special dinners, brunches and performances by star chefs (Jonathan Tran, for example, formerly of award winning Uchi) and Cirque du Soleil artistes—these have different pricing levels, while the art show is open free during posted hours. They are in the bustling Garment District, look for the entrance midst retail stores—which I’m told ’twill be well marked for the event—they’re on the second floor. Check all it out at http://www.breakbreadla.com.

The Broad Is Here
Inaugural Show is a Highlights Survey

Here comes The Broad! The striking white cube with diagonal perforations holding the contemporary art collection of Eli and Edythe Broad finally opened to the public on Sept. 20—after a delay of nearly a year due to fabrication difficulties for the “skin” of the building. (The components are made of fiberglass-reinforced concrete.)  While some grumps find the collection to be too predictably Big Works by Big Names (including Koons, Basquiat, Sherman, Fischl), it’s a most generous gift to Los Angeles from the Broads. They have called this city home for over five decades. At the preview, Eli Broad said that LA was “the center of the contemporary art world.” Mayor Eric Garcetti added, “Few dispute the best creatives are here.”

The Broad Foundation owns some 2000 works of art, and the inaugural show is a highlights survey, over 250 works in all media, including the installation of Yayoi Kusama’s ever-popular “Infinity Mirrored Room.” Admission is free. Yes, that’s right, free. There’s an online booking system (check out ticketing.thebroad.org/general-admission), or you can try your luck and show up. I met one visitor from Japan who couldn’t get online booking (as of this writing, the next available tix are a month-and-a-half away), and waited an hour to get in. She was glad she made the effort. Currently, some 3,000 people a day are touring the Broad—and that sounds like success.

Opening week was jammed with a large press conference drawing journalists from New York, Europe and Asia, and two swank dinners which drew from both the art world and the Hollywood world—even Bill Clinton showed up on Friday! I was impressed with how patiently and tirelessly Liz Diller, of the New York architectural firm Diller Scofidio + Renfro, talked about their design of the museum. In addition to providing exhibition space, they also had to design storage for the collection. They decided, Diller said, “to turn a liability into an asset.” So the collection is stored in the core of the building, which can be glimpsed through apertures in the central stairwell. The “skin”—what she calls “the veil”—of the building prevents direct sunlight from hitting the art, while giving it a sense of porosity. “Over time I’ve become less ironic, and more earnest about Los Angeles,” the architect admitted.

 

NEA Commissioner Chu visits LA

In September the head of the National Endowment for the Arts, Jane Chu (pictured above), came for a whirlwind tour to see some of the projects benefiting from NEA grants, especially those given to the Department of Cultural Affairs. The latter grants are meant to help establish “a series of site-specific cultural events that address the goals of improved educational opportunities, economic development, neighborhood safety and livability.” Chu crisscrossed the city, from a tour of the Great Wall of Los Angeles with Judy Baca and Debra J.T. Padilla to a tour of the Neutra VDL House in Silver Lake, where grantee Design of East La Brea sometimes hold its events. A look at the list of recent grant recipients shows the range of NEA support—from small organizations like Design of East La Brea and LAXART to Inner-City Arts, East West Players and LA Opera.

 

The NEA will be celebrating its 50th anniversary next year—some thought it would never make it, as over the years it has been target for arch-conservatives who don’t believe the arts should receive public funding. (Artists are really deviants, right?) Chu is a very personable bureaucrat, with degrees both in music and in business administration. She was born in Oklahoma of Chinese immigrant parents, and speaks with a soft but definite Midwest accent. Yes, there were past problems, she acknowledged, “but the NEA is on pretty solid ground these days.” Her agency will be announcing some new initiatives for the anniversary, so stay tuned!

 

GALLERY MOVES
Downtown and Down South

More are joining the cultural exodus to Downtown LA. Last time we mentioned that Manhattan gallery Maccarone was establishing an outpost here (well, Boyle Heights, actually, which is downtown adjacent), and the news actually made The New York Times (Sept. 16), which is finally paying some serious attention to culture on the Left Coast. Also in September,  Royale Projects from Palm Desert opened at 432 South Alameda, with a show by Ken Lum. Next up is a solo show featuring Phillip K. Smith III (opening Nov. 21)—he of the now-famous lit-up homestead cabin, “Lucid Stead,” out in the deserts of Joshua Tree that Yours Truly wrote about a couple years ago. It’s not clear what will be in “Light + Shadow Works,” Smith’s first solo in LA. The press release says, “Their pure white forms rely unabashedly upon the minimalist interplay of ambient light and shadows to create their visual impact.” Hmmm…  Anyhow, welcome, Mr. Royale!

 

After moving out of the Pacific Design Center earlier this year, Jae Yang opened up a pop-up in the Arts District in September as well. She installed her Artmerge Gallery in a cool warehouse space on Seaton Street. “Myself/Them” a solo by South Korean artist Jin Young Yu was the opening show. Yu made whimsical and unique sculptural work using press-formed plastic and featuring a sad-eyed, anime-like character that apparently resembles the artist herself. Each grouping of figures included a pet dog or cat that seems especially sympathetic to her owner’s plight in modern life.

Meanwhile Fabien Castanier Gallery is making a bigger jump, across hemispheres, literally. Having done well in its Culver City location (since May 2014), the gallery announced that it’s time for expansion—to Bogotá, the capital of Colombia. Their second gallery is located in San Felipe, the city’s emerging arts district, and they want to build relationships with Latin American artists and a new clientele. Their first show there is a group show, “Dando Papaya,” with Ludo, JonOne, RERO, Speedy Graphito, Fidia Falaschetti, Tilt and Mark Jenkins.

 

 

Photo Time in LA
Paris Photo and photo independent

Paris Photo (May 31–June 3) hit its third year—the final year of its lease agreement with Paramount Studios, wherein it takes over several soundstages and the “New York” backlot for an art fair. This year there were 79 exhibitors (that includes galleries and art-book stores), close to the 81 last year, although it was apparent some of the big hitters were missing. Gagosian was gone, Fraenkel Gallery was gone. Instead, some smaller galleries, including Los Angeles ones, got in—ones that would never see the light of day at PP in Paris.

More than one return-gallerist remarked on a lighter crowd, and wondered if it was worth the high expense of coming. Several expressed disappointment over sales, but nobody wanted to be quoted. After all, some might want to go to PP in Paris, still the number one photo fair in the world.

 

One gallery that did very well was Fabien Castanier, featuring the photography of Diana Thorneycroft. The artist recreates scenes from movies, sometimes conflated with famous paintings, using Barbie and Ken dolls—then photographs them. In Nighthawks (What would Jack Bauer do?), Barbie tries to ward off an attack of crows, swans and buzzards. She’s dressed in green like Tippi Hedren in The Birds, and the backdrop is provided by Edward Hopper’s painting Nighthawks. It was dizzily hilarious, but then, I happen to be fascinated by both film and painting. Also riveting were works by Edward S. Curtis presented by Bruce Kapson Gallery, including prints and, most astonishingly, the original copper photogravure plates used to print Curtis’ limited edition volumes of The North American Indian. These had been thoroughly cleaned and polished to a coppery shine and enclosed in a Plexiglas frame—gorgeous to behold, but somehow saddening that they weren’t going to a museum or public collection. (Or maybe, if we’re lucky, some will.)

Others of special interest included Art Lexing of Miami, showing the works of Pierre-Elie de Pibrac and Quentin Shih; Galerie E.G.P featuring“Fragments,” a solo by Swiss artist Rachel Rom; and the quite haunting prints made from the archives of Richard J. Arnold. Arnold had a photography studio in San Luis Obispo in the late 19th century, and his portraits captured a slice of life in long ago Central California—especially poign -ant are the original and retouched images presented side by side. Life was hard in them days, and it shows in these weatherbeaten faces.

So is the fair coming back or not? The new director of PP, Florence Bourgeois, insisted, “Yes, we are definitely coming back.” When pressed by moi, she admitted they had not yet signed the new agreement, but quickly added that details were being worked out. While the location at Paramount Studios is a novelty venue that attracts visitors, it’s also a very expensive one. So don’t be surprised if PP does come back to LA next year—but perhaps elsewhere.

Again, Photo Independent (June 1–3) piggybacked on PP, back at Raleigh Studios across Melrose. This time there were two sound stages with photographer-run booths (the original idea), plus a tent that was filled with galleries and exhibitors. It’s fun to talk to photographers whose work you become intrigued by—and of course, the ones who come here are ready to talk. Predictably, there were plenty of landscapes and nudes, plus a certain nostalgia about the rock star era, the heyday of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, in the photography of Kevin Goff and the Morrison Hotel Gallery.

You meet photographers on a mission here, people driven to create a body of work because the subject matter has captured them. Eric Politzer of Los Angeles has spent the last couple years working on his series, “Las Transformistas,” portraits of gay men and transgender queens who work in cabarets in Cuba—who says glamour is dead? These ladies with their gossamer gowns and big hair would do Dolly Parton proud. Politzer tells me his book is coming out later this year—look for it!

Two other photographers whose work caught my eye were from the Southern Hemisphere. Nigel Swinn of New Zealand shoots portraits of aboriginals with face tattoos, staring straight out at you from 6-feet-high portraits. Or sometimes their eyes are closed, as if dreaming. The young and impressively talented Dylan Coombe hails from Australia, and specializes in shooting a single decaying leaf at a time. He blows them up into very large prints which highlight their gorgeous details. They traveled a long way to get to Los Angeles—hope it was worth it, mate!

Gallery Moves
Closing, Opening, Online

A few galleries bit the dust this spring: Western Project closed their doors, although they continue an online presence; Jancar in Chinatown; and the short-lived Glike Gallery in Culver City.

Edward Cella happily moved from Wilshire Boulevard into the Culver City arts corridor. On May 9, a buoyant and congratulatory crowd came to the opening of his first show at 2754 South La Cienega: “Unbound,” featuring eight artists including Joshua Aster, Ruth Pastine and Jeffrey Vallance. Merry Norris took over the project space there for a “Shevening,” featuring two exceptional artists, Tanya Aguiñiga and Nancy Baker Cahill. Their work had a special dialogue with each other—and in fact they talked and saw each other’s works while preparing for the show. Aguiñiga created elaborate wall hangings using rope, some of it unraveled, and Cahill made a series of abstract, sinuous drawings.

Meanwhile, Gusford gallery has finally found a new space, at 616 North La Brea, a stone’s throw from its current location. “When I first opened,” says owner Kelsey Lee Offield, “I was looking to purchase a new space for longevity, but I couldn’t find what I wanted and settled on Hollywood.” That was two years ago, and she was happy with how the area was developing. Last year she bought the former retail space, with a footprint of 4,200 square-feet, and 6,500 square-feet of space, including an apartment upstairs where visiting artists might stay. Since then they’ve been pulling permits, bringing the building up to code, and renovating. “I’m excited to have a permanent space,” she says. “It allows us to do even more programming, live performances, dinners and lectures—it offers lots of flexibility.” This September the new space will launch with a solo by Swiss-born artist Andrea Hasler. Congrats, Edward and Kelsey!

SNEAK PEEK
Open House at The Broad on a Sunday Afternoon

I was lucky enough to get in on the one-day preview of The Broad, the new museum in LA that will house the important contemporary art collection of power philanthropists Eli and Edythe Broad. There was a viewing for invitees (such as moi) in the morning, then open to the general public via email registration from 3 to 10 p.m. The latter was “sold out” within minutes of online availability, which bodes well for interest in the museum when it finally does open this fall.

Upon arrival, we were quickly ushered from a corner of the unfinished lobby to the third floor gallery—a vast, squarish space canopied by the lacy “blocks” which New York firm Diller Scofidio + Renfro have designed as carapace for the building. Problems in fabricating these blocks are to blame in the delayed opening of the museum, which was supposed to have opened at the end of last year. The blocks are oblong and have an ovoid aperture in them, allowing in daylight—from the front along Grand Avenue and from overhead. However, to protect the art, there is no direct sunlight, and the roof blocks also have an adjustable system controlling in the amount of overhead light coming in.

And yes, it was glorious, as there were no walls, just a vast unobstructed expanse, with the cylindrical elevator popping up in the middle—not yet operational. We had ascended via a big utility elevator on the side.

 

Architect Elizabeth Diller of DS+R was there, fielding questions and acknowledging praise for the almost cathedral-like effects of the space. She seemed as awed as the rest of us. “I’m still seeing things, noticing things here,” she said, looking around to a far corner. When completed, the building will offer 120,000 total square-feet, including in-house storage and some 2,000 artworks in the permanent collection. Doors open to the public Sept. 20, and admission will be free—thank you for that, Eli and Edythe!

TEMPORARY SPACE
Testing Ground for a New Kind of Gallery

 

Richard Shelton is mad as hell at the art establishment, and he won’t take it anymore. So he decided to set up his own exhibition space. “I want to cut out the middle man,” he says during the opening of Temporary Space, temporarily in a storefront on Wilshire Boulevard, “and let artists have direct contact with the public.” A boisterous crowd is milling around us, enjoying the flowing drinks and examining the drawings and paintings, and otherwise hanging out on a Saturday night in a new addition to LA’s art scene. Tonight Shelton is wearing at least two hats—one, that of the man launching a different kind of gallery, and two, that of the artist first featured in this new kind of gallery.

His sense of mission is palpable. “I’m fed up with the art establishment,” he says. He feels it is run by art dealers and collectors—people who don’t have the interests of art or the artist at heart. He compares his efforts with that of the French Impressionists, who started up their own salon in the late 19th century, thumbing their collective noses at the stuffy French Academy.

His own career spans five decades—and his work reflects his fascination with the figure, including what he calls “Nude Expressionist” and “Nude Geometric.” His drawings and paintings reflect an adept hand, and a gift for composition. In the middle of the large space, a couple smaller rooms have been divided off to demonstrate a new software for displaying (and selling) artwork. Using an iPad, you can tap on small, thumbnail pictures—the drawing or painting selected quickly appears projected on a screen before you, so you can examine the work in detail.

Temporary Space aims to focus on mid-to-late career artists, the forgotten ones. Shelton believes that commercial galleries are overly obsessed with the new and emerging, while the truth is that any artist with a long career has an inventory of art that could be brought out and shown—and, hopefully, sold to collectors. His own show runs through June, followed by Margaret Nielsen and Scott Grieger (July 18–Aug. 29). In this new, artist-centric model, artists also stand to make more money—75% of the sales, versus 50% or so with commercial galleries. To further liven things up, they will be programming poetry readings, performances and panel discussions.

Temporary Space LA is at 5522 Wilshire Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90036. Hours are: Monday thru Saturday from 10 a.m.-8 p.m.
For more information, check out temporaryspacela.com.

FILM STAR SHOWS IN U.S.
Ha Jung-woo at PYO

This spring PYO Gallery LA had the first U.S. solo exhibition for Ha Jung-woo—the tall, matinee-handsome man is a household name in South Korea where he’s a versatile leading man (The Yellow Sea, The Berlin File) and film director (Chronicles of a Blood Merchant), but here in LA he was being featured for his art-making. “Art helps me deal with my life,” he says a few days after the dust has settled from the jammed Feb. 28 opening, where scores of fans crowded around trying to get a selfie with him. “I find it a kind of meditation.”

Around us are a series of vibrant drawings and paintings. The work is unexpected—it has closer affinities with street art and folk art than Korean art, old or new—people with green hair and blue lips, faces scored with lines, triangles and whorls. There are stylized animals, often fish and birds, and there are crosses—some Christian, some Celtic, some Greek. “Yes, I am a Christian,” he says. Bright colors fill in the spaces he’s defined with heavy lines (he generally draws with a marker). The show is already a hit—all of the smaller drawings and several paintings have sold.

Ha is self-taught, and took up art as a release from his highly pressurized life in the movies. He travels with paper, unstretched canvas and art supplies. “I work on my art whenever I have time, sometimes on the set during breaks and when I come home at night.” He spends part of the year in Hawaii, where he decompresses by working on art, and even in his borrowed LA apartment, he was working on new canvases right up until the opening. At the end of this interview, he excuses himself—to go back to work on more paintings.

Los Angeles was treated to some remarkable public conversations this fall. In early October The Broad conversations series presented a fascinating dialogue between artist Kara Walker and filmmaker Ava DuVernay. A few weeks later the Hammer Museum offered up a scintillating exchange between Connie Butler, chief curator at the Hammer, and Helen Molesworth, the newly arrived chief curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles.

The latter was both structured and spontaneous, instructive but relatively free of art-world vanity. And sometimes quite quite funny. Turns out that Butler and Molesworth have known each other for two decades—in fact, Molesworth credited her colleague with her first museum job. She had been in academia, and Butler recommended her to a headhunter for a museum position.

“Helen and I were formed intellectually at about the same moment in New York in the early 1990s,” Butler began, “and I think this has everything to do with how we do our work and the choices that we make.” Political movements deeply affected both of them. “It was a political moment in the art world —of AIDS, Act Up, and of WACK, and the now historically important Whitney Biennial of 1993.”

The two went on to discuss a few shows they had curated over the years.Molesworth said that all her shows “start with a problem.” And in “Work Ethic” at the Baltimore Museum of Art, she explored what kind of work is involved in different types of artwork. Especially poignant, I thought, was when she mentioned a time “when artists really and truly believed they were capable of changing the world—and in many ways they did, because they changed museums and they changed the culture of museums, and I think they changed curators, critics and art historians to think about art in new ways.” Butler brought up the landmark, if unwieldy, exhibition “WACK! Art and the Feminist Revolution” that she organized for MOCA in 2007. Before leaving for New York’s MoMA, she had been curator at MOCA for 10 years.

It was refreshing to hear that both curators continuously self-examine what they do and how they do it. During the closing Q & A, one audience member asked Butler about charges that “Made in L. A.” was predominantly white. Butler gave an answer which reflected her mulling the issues. Her group shows, she said, have always considered diversity, and some of the charges in a Sesshu Foster article—the September article published on atomik aztex on wordpress—were “untrue.” That review starts off by saying, “It’s okay that the artists are all white, even the nonwhite artists (2?) are kind of white.” Rose Salseda’s much more thoughtful piece about the show at www.academia.edu/8569732/The_Myth_of_White_Art provides a rebuttal to that, although she doesn’t exonerate the curators from a certain white bias in selecting the artists. For the record, there were indeed more than two nonwhite artists in the show, and one of them, Jennifer Moon, won the $25,000 Audience Recognition Award. Also, neither writer mentioned Magdalena Suarez Frimkess—of Michael and Magdalena Frimkess, who work in ceramics and were featured prominently in “Made in L.A.” Suarez Frimkess was born and raised in Venezuela.

The conversation at the Writers Guild theater between Kara Walker and Ava DuVernay was equally engaging, perhaps in an even more personal way. Walker, who is collected by The Broad, spoke at length about her monumental and controversial installation “A Subtlety, or the Marvelous Sugar Baby” which was presented for two months at the former Domino Sugar Factory in Brooklyn through the auspices of the organization Creative Time.

Walker had never done a large-scale public art project before. When Creative Time approached her about doing one and took her to see the factory, she was seized by the challenge of using the whole space. “I felt like this was it, I didn’t know what I was going to do, but I knew this was the moment,” she admitted. “It was one of these moments you have to face your own ambition, or ego.” And Walker did fill the entire space, with a work people are still discussing.

The cavernous space was dominated by the 35-foot-tall figure of a black woman, naked and on her hands and knees, in a sphinx-like pose. Coated with 30 tons of crystalline sugar, she was a reference to the building and to the dark legacy of sugar cultivation and manufacturing in North America—think: canefields, plantations, slavery, factory work. Walker explained that “a subtlety” was a Medieval term for a sugar sculpture, and added, with a laugh, “Of course, the term ‘a subtlety’ is somewhat ironic.” Her interests lie in exploring contradictions, and the contradictions of power, she said, and “where do we possess it, where are we dispossessed of it.”

For me, the figure she created forced viewers to confront the mythic Madonna/Whore paradigm, as embodied in the pernicious stereotyping of black women. As Creative Time curator Nato Thompson has written, “She has the head of a kerchief-wearing black female, referencing the mythic caretaker of the domestic needs of white families, especially the raising and care of their children, but her body is a veritable caricature of the overly sexualized black woman, with prominent breasts, enormous buttocks, and protruding vulva that is quite visible from the back. If this evocation of both caregiver and sex object—complicated by her coating in white sugar—feels offensive, it is meant to.”

One of the most offensive aspects of the installation, however, were visitors taking photos of themselves acting up or inappropriately touching “Sugar Baby.” Walker initiated a documentary showing visitor behavior called An Audience. In her art practice, controversy is part and parcel of her longtime strategy—and race is still a hot and controversial topic in this country, especially in regards to African Americans because of the terrible history of slavery. Walker makes us face uncomfortable histories, the ones many would rather forget. She may be one of those artists who still believe that they can change the world, even if a little bit at a time.

In Memoriam
MICHAEL BARTON MILLER
(1949–2014)

 

Artist, humanist and professor Michael Barton Miller died on November 14, 2014, at his home in San Luis Obispo.

Michael was born on March 17, 1949, in Buffalo, New York, the second of seven siblings. He arrived in this world with the eyes, ears and hands of an artist—gifts that can appear daunting, to a young child, but that would steer the course of his life. Michael learned the concepts of justice, fairness and compassion at home, as most children do, but those concepts in this young artist’s mind became the foundation for his personal and artistic explorations.  

Michael earned his first bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Arizona State University, then left for California, to join a film collective in Berkeley. While in northern California, Michael was commissioned to create several murals, including many at the Mendocino County Courthouse. He earned his second bachelor’s degree with Honors in 1986 from UC Irvine, followed by an MFA at the University of Southern California.

Over the last 25 years Miller taught at Pomona College, California State University, Long Beach and at several other institutions in the Los Angeles area. Michael relocated to San Luis Obispo in 1997 where he became a full-time professor at Cal Poly in the Department of Art and Design. He taught drawing, critical art practice and intermedia. One of Michael’s achievements at Cal Poly was the growth of a cultural exchange program with Silpakorn University in Bangkok, Thailand.  He built relationships with many Thai artists, growing out of a friendship he established in the 1980s with Rikrit Tiravanija. Thailand had become a place where Michael met peers who melded their art and humanity into a kind of social impact that is seldom realized.

Michael’s art was exhibited in solo and group exhibitions at POST Gallery in Los Angeles, Los Angeles Center for Photographic Studies, The California Museum of Photography at UC Riverside, The Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum, The Art Center at Silpakorn University, The Torrance Art Museum and Patricia Sweetow Gallery in San Francisco, as well as many other venues.

Michael had a way of touching people with his art, language, enthusiasm and love of the absurd. His insights were both tender and concise. Influences as diverse as poetry, history, critical theory, politics and social anthropology along with the practice of meditation informed his esthetic and ethic. His work explored connections between cultural practices, art and language.

Michael taught compassion and kindness because those were the lessons he learned from his spiritual teacher, Sant Ajaib Singh Ji, the man who introduced him to the practice of meditation and a way to find beauty when it appeared the most elusive. It was Sant Ji’s teachings that he found so meaningful and that he sought to infuse into his art work and teaching.

Michael learned of his brain cancer diagnosis on a trip to his beloved Thailand, a trip intended to be an exchange of art and scholarship. His first surgery was in a Thai hospital, where he experienced medicine as a blending of art and humanity. He spoke of his surgical team, the hospital staff and the University staff with the deepest love and admiration.

Michael is survived by his wife, Tera Galanti, daughter Mariah Miller and stepson Thomas Matzinger, along with his mother, Sarah Gehrandt, sisters Becky Friedlan and Sally Voita and brothers Ted Miller and David Miller.  Michael is also survived by a generation of students who received his thoughtful guidance, as Michael strategically planted seeds of beauty and wonder.
—Mary Artino

Gallery Moves
It’s a Californian Kinda Thing
By Scarlet Cheng
 
It’s hard to keep up with the rash of new and relocated galleries this year—is this because of the economic rebound, or because Los Angeles continues to become more important in American’s cultural configuration? Or maybe, as Thomas von Lintel who moved from New York and took over Nye + Brown’s space on La Cienega Boulevard says, “I moved here to be here, in Los Angeles.” That is, he likes the spaciousness and the availability of space, and of course, the weather. To get into the groove, they inaugurated their new space in last March with a show featuring California artists, including Ed Ruscha, Cathy Opie and Melanie Willhide. So far, so good. “The traffic has been lovely, the response has been enthusiastic,” says gallery director Dana Sorman.

While von Lintel moved his business lock, stock and barrel, Sarah Gavlak opened an LA outpost on Highland
Avenue in June—keeping her Palm Beach gallery running, especially in the winter months when Florida is swarming with snowbirds (collecting ones). Gavlak also handles several Angeleno artists, including Lisa Anne Auerbach and Mungo Thomson.

Recently several LA galleries decided to move into new—bigger and improved—spaces. In May, Kohn Gallery opened a new 12,000 square-foot gallery designed by architect Lester Tobias on Highland Avenue. With 22-foot ceilings, skylights and a large window, the space offers plenty of natural light. In September David Kordansky opened on a more unusual stretch of real estate— on South La Brea, below Wilshire Boulevard. Specifically, it’s on the corner of Edgewood and La Brea—not far from Kayne Griffin Corcoran—and boasts 20,000 square feet in a redesign by Kulapat Yantrasast of wHY. I think that number counts the outdoor courtyard, but it does include two voluminous exhibition spaces with very high ceilings. Kordansky seems prescient in knowing where the “hot spots” of the gallery scene are—he started in Chinatown in 2003 during the Chinatown art boom, then moved to Culver City in 2008. 

In early October Various Small Fires gallery debuted their new space on North Highland, moving from Venice Beach to a space designed by the noted architectural firm of Johnston Marklee, which is designing the new building for the Menil Drawing Institute in Houston. It’s a modest (compared to the previous two, anyhow) 5,000 square feet, with 3,000 of that in the gallery space, the rest an open courtyard. That seems to be the trend now, to have some kind of courtyard or open space, suitable for outdoor sculpture and of course the spillover party that is part of the opening festivities. On opening night about 100 people milled about outside, enjoying generic beers, while the gallery itself was trying to close down for the night.

Then there’s more to come, with Spruth Magers of Berlin and London about to open at the end of the year, and of course Hauser Wirth & Schimmel of Zurich, London and New York, which purchased a former flour mill on East 3rd Street earlier this year—it’s a 100,000-square-foot complex, slated to open sometime in 2015. The press release describes its future as a “dynamic multi-disciplinary arts center” that will include public programs along with exhibitions, naturally.
Next year there will be more movement afoot as the two galleries (Edward Cella, Steve Turner Contemporary) and the A+D Museum on Wilshire, across from LACMA, have been given notice to leave next spring. They’ve known of the move for some time, as Metro will be tearing down the block and using it as a staging area for a new station, but now the move date is firm—probably. It’s a boon for LACMA, but has proved difficult for those who have to find suitable next homes.
Cella has been looking since the beginning of the year for a somewhat larger space than they have now (substituting something over 2,000 square foot) with proximity to other galleries and reasonable foot traffic. He’s looked in Culver City, Highland/West Hollywood, downtown, “and as far as Frogtown,” Cella says, adding. “The LA real estate market is pretty hot right now.” Which means everything is more expensive, and harder to get favorable terms on long-term leases. Still, he says, “I’m excited by the possibilities of the move, of a new space.”

I COULD HAVE DANCED ALL NIGHT
LAXART’s First Biannual Gala at Greystone
By Scarlet Cheng

Art events are veering more and more towards the aesthetics of “happenings,” and it’s hard to decide what’s good or what’s bad—instead we end up just measuring what engages us. Or not. The first LAXART Biannual Gala at the Greystone Mansion in Beverly Hills proved well-planned and highly engaging, sufficiently crowded for a party atmosphere but not thronged like the PST event Lauri Firstenberg, director of LAXART, helped organize at the same location a few years ago. Some 30 artists participated in the one-night bash, some with newly commissioned pieces, which contributed to the sense of discovery, and some with pre-existing work moved to this venue. The raw pottery vessels of Galia Linn (Shulamit Gallery) were placed in the Motor Court, and a Brian Bress diptych video (Cherry and Martin) was inserted into two windows in the back of the mansion.

In the Powder Room was Molly Surno’s “We of Me.” Seated before a large mirror, three young women with long tresses were slowly and narcissistically brushing their hair—that brush was wired up and created a thunderous, rather intolerable noise in the room. In the mansion’s former office Odeya Nini performed an improvised dance with an amazing vocal accompaniment in “VOICED.” The room’s walls and ceiling were covered with video footage she had shot of ocean and rocky shore, and one felt engulfed by those images as she moved through the space, emitting sounds of birds and perhaps the wind.

In the pantry, attendees were offered slices of Matt Merkel Hess’ “head”—bread loaves baked in the shape of his head. Served up with butter and jam, these slices gave a literal definition to “consuming” art—yes, it was creepy.  Outside by the reflecting pool, a harpist played while a video of a female form, sometimes being touched by a hand, was projected onto a nearby screen in Lauren Merage’s “Prelude to a Ritual.” Also outside, near the koi pond, “I Am Pink” was a meditation led by Kathryn Garcia, which proved quite restorative.

Perhaps the most elaborate and enjoyable performance piece was Liz Glynn’s “Waltz No. 9 (Blindness).” In a hallway guests were invited to dance with costumed actors—then blindfolded with a black kerchief and led into a darkened room where the waltz was playing. Okay, the waltz is difficult enough when you haven’t done it in eons, doing it blindfolded is a challenge. “So, go one-two-three,” my partner said, and I eventually got into the rhythm. Enough so that he gave me several twirls and spins—and even a dip at the end. Fortunately, I had had a massage the night before and was more limber than usual. We managed not to crash into other dancers—you could hear them shuffling about—or into the wall, and it was rather fun once I realized I was not going to trip and fall. My bottom line is that I think they should bring back the waltz, it’s a wonderful socializing ceremony and good exercise, too.

Moving Pictures
Laemmle Theaters Paint the Town
By Charles Rappleye

The crowd milled anxiously outside the seven-plex movie house in North Hollywood, waiting in the cool of a September evening for the star to arrive and the curtain to rise.

But when Artillery’s own Mary Woronov took the stage it wasn’t to reprise her work on the silver screen. The night was devoted to celebrating Woronov’s other oeuvre, 20 years of paint on canvas. This was another installment of Art in the Arthouse, a program offered by the venerable Laemmle theater chain to foster creativity and enrich the experience of a night at the movies.

The program was launched early this year by Greg Laemmle, third-generation scion of the chain clan and custodian of the family’s longtime commitment to culture. At a time when many family theaters fell prey to corporate multi-screen chains, Laemmle survived and thrives. They currently own and operate seven theaters with 34 screens, and plan to open in Glendale, Newhall and Inglewood.

“To be successful, independent theaters need to contribute to the cultural life of the community in a significant and relevant way,” says Laemmle, who was on hand for the opening. That’s been the guiding philosophy for the family chain, known for featuring foreign and independent films. “Now we are excited to do the same with fine art.”
Movie houses traditionally plastered foyer and corridor walls with posters of upcoming attractions, but Laemmle is switching over to digital poster frames, leaving blank space free for more expressive fare. Greg Laemmle drafted Los Angeles abstract painter Joshua Elias to curate the exhibitions, which feature artists from the area and stay up for three to four months—long enough for repeat patrons to get familiar with an artist or a particular work.

Exhibitors have included Dave Lefner, Bea Husman, Taylor Negron and Javiera Estrada; Woronov at the NoHo 7, and Xi Hou at the Pasadena Playhouse, are the current attractions.

BOON OR BUST
Post Rail Plan on Wrong Track at Bergamot

“They’re basically destroying Bergamot Station,” says Wayne Blank, who holds the master lease on the galleries and art institutions at the Bergamot Station arts complex. (He’s also the “Wayne” of Shoshana Wayne Gallery.) “If they continue along the same path, there won’t be any galleries here.” With the coming of the Expo Line to Olympic Boulevard and 26th Street, the city of Santa Monica has been looking to jazz up that valuable piece of real estate—it owns 5.6 acres of the 7.5 acres that is the arts complex. The remainder, including the land upon which the Santa Monica Museum of Art (SMMOA) sits, is owned by Blank.

 While Metro Rail has the potential of bringing more visitors to Bergamot, galleries are worried that construction—a new hotel, new museum, underground parking—will be disruptive to business. Even worse, that they’ll face unaffordable rents.

In November 2012 the Santa Monica City Council selected three teams to submit their redevelopment proposals: 26Street TOD Partner/The Lionstone Groups, Rethink/KOR, Bergamot Station Ltd/Worthe Real Estate. They submitted their plans last summer. Earlier this year the city’s economic development division recommended the 26Street proposal, as did SMMOA—and why not? That plan included the building of a new $7 million museum building with 20,000 square feet, plus a $10 million museum endowment from the developer. However, the Bergamot Station Gallery and Cultural Association, representing 40 tenants, said in a press release that the plan “threatens the operations and economic survival of the current tenants.” The City Council did not approve the selection of 26Street and said the plans had to be studied further.

In May the city held a community meeting to look at all three plans again. At that meeting Jason Harris, the city’s economic development manager, explained that the city had made the following requirements for all plans:

• affordable cultural arts space
• open space and amenities
• preservation of existing buildings
• inclusion of a variety of uses
• parking per LUCE guidelines
• fair market ground lease
• exceptional architecture
• coordination with the Bergamot Area Plan

Gallery owner William Turner, speaking for the tenants association, advocated a “go slow” approach—doing the redevelopment in stages to see how things work, rather than trying to do everything at once.

One unpopular aspect of the 26Street plan was the disrupted traffic, as well as the perception that it would encourage retail. Blank has been vocal against this plan, and was originally attached to the Worthe group, in which architect Frederick Fisher is participating. Jeff Worthe, president of the Worthe Real Estate Group, said that their focus was “to preserve the businesses.” They also planned to keep museum and galleries open even during construction (for example, by building the new museum first, then moving the old museum into the new one when completed). However, Blank has stepped back from participation in any formal group in order to speak freely. He too advocates a “go slow” approach. In a move that looks like retaliation against SMMOA, he recently upped the museum’s rent from $7,000 to $22,000. “It’s just what the galleries are paying,” he says, “the going rate is $2 per square foot.” The regular commercial rate, he says, would be closer to $4–5 per square foot.

Robert Berman, who has been a gallerist at Bergamot since its inception, says “When they ask, would you like to see a first-class restaurant? Yes, I would. A hip bar? Yes, I would. But a GAP? No, I wouldn’t.” And what about a hotel? The city seems bent on getting a hotel in there. “If they’re married to having a hotel, if that’s what they need, okay, but that’s not top of my agenda,” he replies. “If they want to have a museum and art gallery center, they have to be a little responsible for it.”
As of this writing, it looks like all three groups are still in the game, and the City Council will be discussing it further at its August 26 meeting. Stayed tuned.

The Huntington Gets Contemporary

 

Contemporary art has crept into the galleries at The Huntington Library in San Marino, best known for its staid collection of British art in the “grand manner.” Several years ago I noticed a room at the Virginia Steele Scott Galleries dedicated to postwar American art, including Warhol’s 3D Brillo box and a soup can painting, gifts from the estate of Robert Shapazian, who used to run Gagosian Beverly Hills. This July five rooms of modern and contemporary art were added to the Scott, filling out its still-nascent contemporary holdings by borrowing. This new direction has been made possible by gifts and by a fund which allows them, finally, to purchase postwar art. 

Kudos to curator of American art Jessica Todd Smith for making the groupings of work a pleasure to look at, not just an exercise in art history. Chronologically, you can start in one of the “old” rooms, which features early-20th-century work by the Ash Can and Social Realist artists. Off that, the first new room focuses on the American landscape, with work by Arthur Dove, Georgia O’Keeffe, Edgar Payne, Granville Redmond and Guy Rose. The famous Edward Hopper painting is here: The Long Leg (1930) shows a single sailboat, slightly tipped as its mainsail and jib are puffed with wind, coming around a bit of coast with a lighthouse in the distance. For me this painting has always evoked summer with its slow, drifting leisure. 

A small gallery is dedicated to Edward Weston, who made 500 prints for the Huntington in the late 1930s on a Guggenheim grant. A couple dozen prints are shown at a time in rotation, with the focus on California and Western landscapes. In one of the largest new galleries, Sargent Johnson’s monumental organ screen carved from redwood occupies a wall—this bas-relief features two children at the trunk of the tree of life, and was originally made for the California School for the Blind in Berkeley. Other artists included here are John Stewart Curry, Chaim Gross, Reginald Marsh and Charles White.

An adjoining gallery features Geometric Abstraction and Pop Art, including the Warhols mentioned, plus Ed Ruscha’s Hurting the Word Radio #2 (1964), loaned by Joan and Jack Quinn, and on loan from the Norton Simon Museum: Frank Stella’s Hiraqla Variation III (1969) and Louise Nevelson’s Vertical Zag I (1968). And finally, there’s a room of Robert Rauschenberg—with the Huntington’s own multimedia work, Global Loft (Spread) (1979) as the centerpiece.