Dorothy Parker allegedly said that Los Angeles wasn’t a city. It was “72 suburbs in search of a city.” Maybe it wasn’t Parker, maybe it was Aldous Huxley, or H.L. Mencken. Probably not Ray Bradbury, who argued vociferously for a monorail to connect the 72 suburbs instead of the network of freeways we got. Bradbury’s dream came one step closer Mother’s Day Weekend, when LA Metro unveiled three new stops on the D line subway. With the Wilshire/La Cienega stop, public transportation infrastructure has made an incursion into Beverly Hills for the first time since Judge Doom conspired to kill the Red Car line.
To celebrate this civically minded development, 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. Each drawing represents one meal, with the piece finished alongside dessert. This is very cool, a city boy’s version of painting en plein air. However, the drawings, when placed all together, can start to blend into one another. The sameness of a process-oriented practice isn’t for everyone.
Baseman draws the restaurants populated with his friendly animal creatures, Hollywood glamazons of the past, and everyday diners. A giant tiger eats at Liu’s Cafe next to a public domain Mickey Mouse and a Korean auntie. A black cat shares a vegan meal with Moby at Cafe Gratitude. For fans of the restaurants depicted, the drawings have a Where’s Waldo–esque reward for looking deeply. There’s the captain’s wheel table at Chez Jay! There’s the glowing ceiling of Canter’s! Baseman lovingly replicates the feeling of light pouring through the tiles of fake fall foliage at the venerable deli. The drawing glows from within. It makes sense he took such care, as his mom was a baker at Canter’s for thirty-five years.
Baseman has said the show is a “celebration of L.A. dining culture.” So what kind of spots does he want to celebrate? Canter’s, Musso & Frank, and Genghis Cohen are the most represented in the show. But there are more recent restaurants like Max & Helen’s, home of the four-hour wait for a $17 waffle. Langer’s is there, as is El Coyote. But also newer scenester spots like Melrose Hill’s Little Fish and Café Teragrama. Melrose Hill, a neighborhood name designed to inflate rents if I’ve ever heard one. The realty groups tried “EaHo” first, but it didn’t stick.
“Off the Menu” celebrates the community one can find in becoming a regular at a restaurant, one of life’s greatest pleasures. But it does so at the expense of people who can’t afford to eat out. The show pushed out Mid-Wilshire mutual aid group Community Solidarity Project from Johnie’s, which it had occupied since the 2016 election and their push for Bernie Sanders. Until recently, the Community Solidarity Project used Johnie’s to organize. They also used the former 99 Cents Only store next door to distribute mutual aid in their “Really Really Free 99 Store.” The org was asked to vacate the 99 Cents Only store ahead of a “punk rock” pop-up art show and anti-fascist zine fair that ran during Frieze Week. The irony of displacing a mutual aid org for your anti-fascist zine fair was not lost on many. The same thing happened to CSP ahead of “Off the Menu.” They are currently looking for a new space in which to organize. The question to me is, why can’t they come back once the art has been sold? Why should art be used to displace something less glamorous but more lasting? And why blame the art for what is, at its heart, a landlord’s decision?
After touring the Baseman show, I peeked through the plywood covering the windows of the old “Really Really Free 99 Store.” It’s bereft of art and mutual aid now. Just another empty building. LA isn’t a city. It’s 72,000 unoccupied buildings in search of a commercial vacancy tax.
