The Los Angeles art world is far from monolithic, but if there’s one thing you are certain to overhear at every gathering, it’s an expression of wonderment at the onslaught of new galleries opening across the city. And they’re right, it’s a lot. It feels like for every physical space we lose to its internet-only avatar, two new storefronts or warehouses announce an inaugural. Leaving aside...
Ceramics is real-world alchemy, where a material mined from the earth is magically transformed by human ingenuity. I love the fact that the result can be rough and reveal the grit and minerals embedded in clay, or it can be highly refined as a smooth white porcelain vase. So I make regular visits to the American Museum of Ceramic Art in Pomona, just south of the 10 Freeway, a museum that shows...
5 Car Garage is located in an alleyway in a residential neighborhood in Santa Monica. While it is not far from Bergamot Station, visitors to 5 Car Garage make the trek because the experience is homey and friendly, and the art on view is often engaging in unexpected ways. The gallery space is a transformed five-car garage with ample light flowing in from the alley when the garage doors are rolled...
Los Angeles, being what it is—a big, sprawling desert grid with almost as many art galleries these days as there are Starbucks—can seem overwhelming when it comes to actually hopping in the car and making the point to go and see some art. Let’s face it, we sometimes spend more time on the freeway getting to the gallery or museum than we do actually viewing the work itself! That said, the amount...
There is still a sense of shock over racially charged policies out of Washington that feel out of line with the West Coast’s progressive ethos. Los Angeles’ major art institutions are trying to counteract this as best they can by presenting more exhibitions by people of color (POC), increasing representation and amplifying voices once silenced in historically white spaces. In the past year,...
Cubist, geometric, abstract, and seminal—together those words sum up the exhibition of Lee Krasner’s work, “A Through Line” at the Kleefied Contemporary Art Museum. The exhibition traverses Krasner's vibrantly colored path, showcasing her wide range of painted works...
Many of the works featured in Nancy Monk's exhibition "Walk + Wood" at Craig Krull Gallery are of small scale and draw from a restrained palette. Looking at the works, the viewer sees things that, at first glance, appear whimsical and childlike. However, on closer...
Keegan Monaghan's paintings feel like the moldy nooks and crannies of a house or a well-worn shoe, rendered in epic and compact proportions. Their compositions shiver with an eerie affection akin to the apparitional creaking of my old, poorly insulated apartment. The...
Augustina Wang's fantastical world evokes a style of magical realism that is uniquely hers, embracing the immersive aspects of fantasy that function as a means of escapism, allowing more playful, nuanced, and expansive notions of identity to flourish. The femmes that...
Geophysical reality and machine dreams meld together to often mesmerizing effect in Refik Anadol’s revelatory exhibition at Jeffrey Deitch. The show is at once an ode to the elemental forces shaping the earth’s outdoor spaces (and the human mind’s internal ones) and...