Michael Govan has given a lot of thought to Los Angeles’ identity as a center for culture. While it may go without saying the opportunity to reshape an institution brought him to LA in 2006, if he is successful in revitalizing the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, he will by extension elevate the city’s reputation as an international draw for art and culture. In his nine years as director, Govan has fostered significant programmatic changes to transform LACMA into a net exporter of exhibitions and acquisitions have grown substantially. He has also invited artists to collaborate on exhibition design, bringing vital energy into the conversation about museum practices.

Yet, even as Govan leads the museum into its 50th anniversary celebration this year, he appears at a crossroads. He’s staked the future of LACMA—and perhaps his future with it—to a major new building project that would further transform the institution. 

I met Govan at his office on the LACMA campus early this spring. An elegant glass entry conveys a sense of openness and gives the impression that one could simply wander into Govan’s modestly appointed, if comfortably-sized office. As I entered, Govan appeared to be immersed in a catalog. He looked up, and, flashing a smile, drew himself out of his reading and walked over as we were introduced. We moved to a seating area where a sofa and armchairs were arranged around a coffee table piled with art books. Black paneled drawers and flat files line the southern wall of the trapezoidal room and a large window looks out onto Wilshire Boulevard. 

I began by asking what he thought of LA’s place in the art world. “LA,” he said, “is a very young city by comparison [with Athens, Rome, Paris and New York], and I think its future is undetermined. I don’t think you can say with certainty today that LA will eclipse Paris or New York. But I think part of the reason it’s on the move is that so many artists have said, ‘I don’t need to go to New York. I can stay in LA.’” When John Baldessari famously told his students to go to New York, and then later advised otherwise, Govan noted, “It wasn’t that he changed his mind; it’s that LA changed.” Govan remembers telling his trustees in one of their first few meetings, “Isn’t it exciting to be in the game of building a city to imagine it might be at that level of the top rung of great cultural cities through history?”

It is a profound ambition to reshape the life or the destiny of a city. Yet clearly, this is what Govan aims to do. He plans to deepen LACMA’s commitment to originating and exporting unique shows, expand acquisitions and further develop its focus on LA in the context of the Pacific Rim. But the programming doesn’t stand alone. The elephant in the room, so to speak, is the LACMA construction plan. In part, he has linked the overall success of his initiatives to his ability to replace the current Pereira campus with an architecturally significant international cultural landmark—the “black flower” or “blob,” depending on one’s point of view—designed by Swiss architect Peter Zumthor. 

The magnitude of the proposed project, the level of public funding it requires and the impact on Los Angeles make it of vital importance. However, the plan is still in flux and many details have not yet been developed. Challenged by questions about less costly alternatives and the suitability of appropriating county funds for the LACMA rebuild, Govan’s success in Los Angeles hinges in no small measure on his capacity to bring Zumthor’s design to completion.

The lack of vigor in the civic debate over the project is surprising. Two years ago, Govan offered the public a close look at the architectural models of Zumthor’s proposed design in an LA exhibition, “The Presence of the Past: Peter Zumthor Reconsiders LACMA.” The discussion of the proposed Zumthor building and any controversy that surrounds it—and whatever anyone might say, there is controversy—is one Govan seems a bit tired of. He told me, “It’s controversial a little bit.” 

He emphasized the development of LACMA’s programs over architecture. He also expressed a certain amount of ennui with the prospect of a large construction project. “I’ve built a lot of buildings. It’s kind of been there, done that.” Even so, Govan said, he believes that architecture is destiny. Grand buildings with enough light and space are necessary to stage great art. “You learn this from artists like Robert Irwin, or James Turrell, or Maria Nordman, or even Helen Pashgian. Half of the experience is what you project out… the experience is shaped by the environment. So, yes, buildings are important, and also what they speak [to] in terms of the values of an institution, because buildings are signs. They’re the most external signs.”

Although buildings by internationally recognized architects can enhance a city’s cultural capital, Govan has laid much of the case for razing LACMA’s Pereira buildings on the issue of fiscal responsibility. “My big complaint is that we’re being really dragged down by the ailing facilities, just the leak budgets. So my feeling is if we can raise the capital to create a fresh facility that functions really well and is—of course it’s going to be beautiful, I hope it’s beautiful.”

On the morning I met Govan a few strategically placed plastic tubs dotted the ground floor hallway leading to Govan’s office in the Art of the Americas building. A recent Southland rain had exposed familiar leaks, and Govan joked about the aroma of mildew in the stairwell that leads up to the exhibition galleries. It was not a particularly heavy downpour, yet the structure—one of the newer ones on the old campus—that opened as the Anderson Building in 1986 was showing its age.

There are some who contend demolishing the Pereira buildings is a significant loss; although, of those arguments, more are based on cultural history than architectural significance. Govan cited one in particular, “People say, ‘Yes but I went there as a child,’ and there’s a nostalgia.” For his part, Govan seemed uninterested in refurbishing the old buildings, although, he said, “I didn’t come with an absolute idea that it had to be [new construction]. In fact, I thought maybe you’ll re-skin it or do something else to make it up-to-date.” When people argue the Pereira buildings are important because of their history in LA and that for 50 years they have represented LACMA, Govan counters, “Peter Zumthor nicely said, ‘You can have nostalgia for things that are ugly or nonfunctional.’” 

There are a few notable examples of critical public comment. Los Angeles Times art critic Christopher Knight wrote that the museum and the public would be aesthetically and fiscally better served building an industrial-style warehouse. Govan did something similar with the Dia: Beacon, which is housed in a former factory on the Hudson River. Cheap warehouse space is not Govan’s strategy here.

In November of last year, the curator and architecture critic Greg Goldin, reviewing the public finance of the project in CityWatchLA, voiced concern about the public resources that will be poured into the project and advocated for stronger public oversight. He reported that the County Board of Supervisors gave LACMA $425 million in support, which will ultimately cost taxpayers a great deal more since it is a bond issue.

In late March of this year, Los Angeles Times architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne reported major changes to Zumthor’s design, which retained the bridge over Wilshire Boulevard but added pop-ups where galleries broke through the single level roof line. Hawthorne indicated that more than a few anxious LACMA curators still haven’t learned exactly how the galleries will be designed. 

By far, the strongest and most comprehensive criticism has come from Joseph Giovannini, a New York–based critic and architect. He challenged the proposed “black flower” design and the architect selection process last year in an essay in the Los Angeles Review of Books (LARB), after Zumthor published his bridge revision to the initial design. Giovannini questioned the lack of a “transparent, public process” to select Zumthor and argued Zumthor’s design does not adequately address LACMA’s need to spatially and visually connect its collections and exhibitions within the new galleries. He contended this is exactly where Pereira’s design also fails, with a series of buildings that isolate the museum’s exhibitions. Just last month, Giovannini updated his critique with a new article in LARB after a panel discussion at Occidental College on the Zumthor design moderated by Hawthorne. In this expanded critique, Giovannini evaluated nearly every conceivable aspect of the design, as well as the questions of public funding, the implications of museums of this size needing to expand about every 10 to 15 years, the lack of responsiveness to curatorial concerns and, not least, the fiduciary responsibilities of the board. Giovannini essentially called for a time-out in order to allow for a thoughtful and critical review process to address what he considers the deficiencies of the plan.

One of the biggest questions is how much the project will actually cost. Right now, Govan projects $650 million. Goldin raised the possibility that the price tag might be closer to $1 billion, and given the way construction projects go, he might not be far off. 

Whether Govan can raise the $650 million, or whatever the number ends up being, is a big question. In December 2010, two years after the financial crisis, Connie Bruck reported in The New Yorker that LA ranked 41st in charitable giving among American cities, behind Minneapolis and, improbably, Detroit. (Last year, The Chronicle of Philanthropy ranked LA 28th based on percentage of income given to charity. It is an astounding number for the country’s second-largest city.) I asked Govan what he thought of the culture of giving in LA and whether that needed to change before LA could compete internationally.

“The question is, does that determine the future of giving,” Govan stated. It is, for him, the $650 million question. “That Los Angeles hasn’t been so generous yet doesn’t mean it won’t be generous in the future. And I live by that question and premise that it will be generous in the future every day.” 

Govan allowed that Angelenos have actually done better comparatively when giving to education and health care, “but culture seems to lag in a serious way.” He theorized that the scant giving to cultural institutions is because LA is a young city that lacks the kind of multigenerational philanthropy and mentorship in philanthropic culture that exists in other places. He mentioned New York, for example, “where pretty much everybody assumes that one of the most important things they can do is contribute to a museum.” That is also true in Chicago, he said, but, “It’s not the case here. It’s not considered one of those absolute values. Yet.”

Does philanthropic giving need to be more broad-based than it is? Govan noted that most cultural philanthropy in the United States and around the world comes from the wealthiest individuals. He mused that perhaps it is the very notion of self-invention associated with LA that inhibits the cultural milieu that would undergird broad participation in philanthropy. “One of the best things about Los Angeles is the sense of personal creative freedom, the sense that you can remake yourself in Los Angeles, you can work as an artist undisturbed, you can be in your own space, right?… It is diametrically opposed to certain cities and places where there is great collective action, working together on things like that. There’s great generosity, but then everybody feels that part of the reason some people go to LA is to get out of that.”

Govan’s pragmatic argument for the Zumthor plan seems to be rooted in the failed 2001 Rem Koolhaas plan to redesign LACMA. “I studied that closely,” he said. “There wasn’t enough study of the older facilities to show to the opinion-makers how absolutely [necessary it was]; you had Rem saying, ‘They’re no good!’ out of the blue. So what we did since we got here is we’ve done systematic surveys and studies and two cost estimates. We actually studied the possibility of restoring them.” Govan has been very strategic in promoting his vision in a wide range of forums, folding the case for new construction into lectures about new possibilities for exhibition design and public interaction with museum collections. 

His efforts seem to have paid off. “I think even the board was a little divided in the past. They may have voted [for it], but I know they were divided. And local media was divided. So I’ve been around talking to local media for eight years about the real issues, the pragmatic issues. So, one, we’re better prepared; time has passed so there’s been time for the idea to sink in. Two, one of the biggest objections, really, that people were just up in arms about: ‘You’re going to close the Los Angeles County Museum of Art for five years.’ I remember that. I was here watching that. And that was a really big objection. With the Broad building [BCAM] and the Resnick building and the outdoor space having been developed first, we have 100,000 square-feet [that will be open during construction].” Govan added, “I’m not getting big pushback. I think it’s 9 to 1 in letters and comments that I get.”

In the same breath that he advocated construction based on cost studies, Govan referred to the museum’s mission. “What we’re talking about is a kind of action of principles: focus on scholarship and research of Southern California art associated with the museum, build collections and then extend that. We’ve also had really strong strategic initiatives and acquisitions in Latin America and Asia. We’re trying to create an identity for a place: Chris Burden, Mike Heizer, Robert Irwin, Barbara Kruger (the big sculptures). I’m trying to create a very strongly Los Angeles global institution so it has global reach, but that its center is more local, versus a LACMA that was founded mostly on having examples of European and American art and traditional art, like those East Coast museums, in smaller quantities. So, that idea of principles: everything we’re trying to do we’re trying to drive out of strategic principles so it’s not random. So when you look at the building project, you think, okay, you have to replace the buildings. It makes no sense, it’s a wash, it might even be more expensive to renovate the old buildings by the time you get into it and deal with the seismic retrofit.”

This last statement has to be broken down into two components. The first is the assertion that renovating the old buildings will equal the cost of new construction. On its face, this doesn’t seem realistic. The museum’s own studies estimate the cost to repair the existing Pereira buildings at $317 million. But it is unclear exactly what is in that figure. 

The second is Govan’s assertion that the new construction is driven out of enacting its principles. What Govan is proposing is a rebranding of the institution. While he seeks to accomplish this programmatically, at the same time it seems this is a not-to-be missed opportunity to comprehensively rebrand LACMA from both the inside and out. His success may hinge on accomplishing both simultaneously. 

But if Govan is interested in creating an identity for LACMA centered in Los Angeles and extending to Latin America and Asia, why select a Swiss architect? Why not instead look to an up-and-coming architect from Latin America or an established architect from Asia? Govan is clearly excited about his collaboration with Zumthor, and he asked me if I’d ever been in one of Zumthor’s buildings. (I haven’t.) One explanation could be Zumthor’s architecture seems a cousin of James Turrell’s phenomenological light-and-space sculpture, to which Govan has demonstrated a remarkable and long commitment, starting at the very least with his tenure at the Dia. And, Govan said, “You tend not to build big buildings with very young architects either. It’s just not recommended, in the sense that you’re making major expenditures in very conservative, not conservative, but very central places; the risk tolerance is low and… we wouldn’t pick a 30-year-old architect to rebuild LACMA. You pick a 70-year-old architect or 60-year-old architect.”

Govan’s ambition is for the collections and the programs of the museum to have a far-reaching cultural impact, to create opportunities for scholarship and for the museum to actually export programming. “That was a very specific strategic point for me when I got to Los Angeles. Eighty percent of the shows we took or we had here were from somewhere else. Now it’s the reverse. And it’s changed the sense, because now we’re exporting. Or originating and exporting.” Govan pointed out that, even when the museum is bringing in a show, like the Pierre Huyghe exhibit, they work closely with the artist to make sure it is unique to Los Angeles. Doing shows like this is expensive and takes a lot of time, he said, but it signals that LACMA is staging shows that are specific to LA. 

While LACMA remains an encyclopedic museum, it now seems to be focused on contemporary art. “I definitely wanted to put a contemporary face on LACMA,” Govan said. “If you look at it statistically, how much money have we spent on contemporary art versus other fields in collecting? Contemporary art is 7%. It’s tiny.” But perception is also destiny. The museum continues to collect broadly while putting a more contemporary face forward and embracing Los Angeles’ position on the Pacific Rim, as a neighbor of Latin America and Asia. 

As LACMA has become a creator and exporter of original and unique programming, the museum has also been buying work that is important to LA. Acquisitions also make it easier to travel the shows. “As we’ve been doing these shows: Ken Price, Helen Pashgian or James Turrell, we’ve been trying to buy the work so that we are a repository.” Turrell is a significant example. The artist grew up in Pasadena, studied at Pomona College and earned his MFA at the Claremont Graduate School. He is an alumnus of LACMA’s early Art and Technology lab. The recent retrospective was a signal opportunity. “When I got to LA, we had one photograph,” Govan said. Now the museum owns 12 of his works, and it’s working on three other acquisitions. It is a welcome change. For a long time, it was impossible to see Turrell’s work in LA. “You could never see it,” Govan said. 

Govan then surprised me by volunteering nascent plans to develop alternative LACMA venues in some of the cheap warehouse spaces in LA. “My sense is that—you know, I’m well known for factory conversions and finding inexpensive alternative spaces to do large things, whether it’s Mass MOCA or DIA: Beacon, and I think that that is in our future. I am specifically trying to assemble collections. I mean, why did we buy Helen Pashgian’s piece that takes a 90-foot gallery? I think there is room for those kinds of projects in LA.” It is premature, Govan said, to detail any specific plans. “I have to get the home base fixed first,” he reiterated. “These buildings are falling apart. When it rains—I can show you if you want to go see the rotted-out steel… if you go into our art storage, it’s just giant buckets and rotted-out steel.” 

It is intentional that the public face of the museum has become synonymous with contemporary art. It is also synonymous with artists who came of age in the 1960s. “I’m very proud that the biggest sign for LACMA right now is not a building, but Chris Burden’s Urban Light.” Govan said that kind of commitment will continue with the new building. And what does the museum plan to do to engage with emerging artists? Govan outlined the recent developments: “If you go up to the third floor of BCAM and see the tremendous energy in the last four or five years of gifts and acquisitions… I mean Analia Saban has four pictures upstairs, and she is the one addressing my Director’s Circle and giving lectures and talks. And we’re now giving grants in our Art and Technology lab to young artists.”

Govan expressed a great deal of optimism about his mission, saying “this place has the makings of a really, really important metropolis in the history of culture.” He extended this thinking into the historical context of museum practice. “I think the idea of reshaping an institution is what brought me here. Because we’re the last of these animals: big general museums with collections that span thousands of years. And so it seemed like both an opportunity and a serious responsibility.” He paused for a moment and reconsidered. “I should reverse that: a serious responsibility but a big opportunity in terms of thinking about museums in the 21st century.”