Los Angeles comes alive in the summer, from beaches to parks, community centers and backyard barbecues. Museums are no exception (and are a great place to beat the heat), and we’ve compiled a list of 10 performances that offer new ways to experience and think about art, from Carl Craig’s infusion of club culture in the Geffen Contemporary to the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), an awe-inspiring exploration of vistas at Forest Lawn, and Myrlande Constant’s breathtaking beadwork works that reflect the Voodoo and Catholic traditions of her native Haiti at Fowler. The Broad’s Keith Haring retrospective is brimming with the neon buzz of summer in the city, while the acid-free art book market returns to Blum & Poe with more than 90 independent publishers and booksellers, supplying the monograph or zine of perfect DIY for reading on the beach.
Acid-Free Art Book Market
The Acid-Free Art Book Market returns to Blum & Poe this summer after a three-year hiatus, with more than 90 exhibitors from the West Coast and beyond. A group of 19 Los Angeles-based independent publishers founded Acid-Free in 2018, shortly after the death of Shannon Michael Cane, the ambitious Printed Matter Book Fair organizer who launched a hugely successful LA version in 2013. The weekend-long event includes gallery publishers, university presses, underground publishers and artist-run projects, as well as a program of lectures and performances, offering something for all facets of the bibliophilic artistic community of Los Angeles.
Blum & Poe (acid-free.info)
2727 South La Cienega Boulevard, Culver City, CA
June 16-18
Carl Craig: Party/After-Party
Detroit techno legend Carl Craig bridges club and museum with Party/After-Party, recreating the flow of a warehouse party in a minimalist sound and visual installation. The looping compositions go from a mellow groove to a haunting bass climax to an ambient drone, augmented with colorful neon lights. The exhibition is accompanied by three monthly meetings dj sets friends and collaborators of Craig, artists who helped shape electronic dance music as we know it. To learn more, read Hyperallergic Insight a spectacle.
The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA (moca.org)
152 North Central Avenue, Downtown, Los Angeles
Until July 23
Consume Everything: The Art and Essence of Food
More than just a supply of food, food helps shape our identities, telling the story of where we come from and who we want to be. Consume All presents an assortment of taste depictions spanning 500 years of Norton Simon’s collection of European art, from tantalizing scenes of plenty to moral parables of gluttony and hunger. Twentieth-century photographs by Edward Weston and Manuel Alvarez Bravo offer modern visions of food production and consumption in the fields of California and the streets of Mexico.
Norton Simon Museum (nortonsimon.org)
411 West Colorado Boulevard, Pasadena, CA
Until August 14
Myrlande Constant: The work of radiation
Myrlande Constant’s dazzling large-scale beaded textiles depict scenes from Haitian life and culture, incorporating Catholic tradition and Voodoo practices. This 30-year retrospective, which includes 28 works and an accompanying short documentary, is the first major museum exhibition in the United States dedicated to a contemporary Haitian artist.
Fowler Museum at UCLA (fowler.ucla.edu)
308 Charles E. Young Drive North, Westwood, Los Angeles
Until August 27
Grand Views: the immersive world of panoramas
Panoramas are massive paintings, often presented in the round, depicting panoramic views of landscapes or historical events. They enjoyed great popularity in the 18th and 19th centuries, providing an immersive pre-cinema experience. Organized in collaboration with the Panorama of Velaslavasay, Grand views features archival photographs, ephemera and, of course, panoramas, including “Panorama of the Valley of Smoke” (2000), Velaslavasay Panorama founder Sara Velas’ conception of early 19th century Los Angeles century. Adjacent to the museum is the Hall of Crucifixion-Resurrection, which houses Jan Styka’s “Crucifixion” (1890s), which is nearly 200 feet long.
Forest Lawn Museum (forestlawn.com)
1712 South Glendale Avenue, Glendale, CA
Until September 10
Light space surface
In the 1960s, a group of Southern California artists began working with new industrial materials like resin, fiberglass, polymers, and even automotive paint, to create their own brand of minimalism that captured a slice of sunny west coast atmosphere. The Light and Space movement is characterized by polished surfaces, simple volumes and a fascination with perception and optics. Light space surface draws from LACMA’s collection to show the variety of approaches taken by these artists, including the transparent boxes of Larry Bell, the curved lenses of Fred Eversley, the radiating totems of Helen Pashgian, the reflective paintings of Mary Corse, and more.
Los Angeles County Museum of Art (lacma.org)
5905 Wilshire Boulevard, Mid-Wilshire, Los Angeles
Until October 1
Keith Haring: Art is for everyone
Keith Haring: Art is for everyone is a complete celebration of the prolific artist who began to cover the subways and streets of New York City with his unmistakable bold line art and captivating characters. The exhibition encompasses Haring’s public works, paintings, sculptures and political graphics supporting HIV/AIDS activism and the apartheid protest in South Africa. An immersive black light gallery with a soundtrack of hip hop and other period music channels Haring’s vibrant creative energy that extends far beyond the confines of the canvas.
The wide (thebroad.org)
221 South Grand Avenue, Downtown, Los Angeles
Until October 8
Alice Neel: it feels like home
Painter Alice Neel is well known for her expressionist portraits that insightfully capture the essence of her friends and colleagues. Feels like home highlights the relationships between individuals and the importance of kinship and community in his work. The exhibition features 40 paintings depicting his children, pets and family, as well as groups of people in New York, a place made up of many chosen families.
Orange County Museum of Art (ocma.art)
3333 Avenue of the Arts, Costa Mesa, CA
June 23–October 22
West imagined
The image of “the West” looms large in American consciousness, an idea fabricated over decades by popular media and politics. With over 250 works of art, artifacts, toys, clothing and other examples of material culture, West imagined examines how our conception of the American West has been constructed, what stories we choose to tell, and what stories are left out of the narrative.
Autry Museum of the American West (theautry.org)
4700 Western Heritage Way, Griffith Park, Los Angeles
Opening June 25
Mercedes Dorame: Woshaa’axre Yaang’aro (Looking Back)
Mercedes Dorame’s Getty Center Rotunda Commission is interested in the history of the Gabrielino Tongva Indians of California, whose historic homeland is the Los Angeles Basin and coastal islands. Title Woshaa’axre Yaang’aro (Looking back), it refers to the Getty’s view of Catalina Island, once home to the Tongva people, of which she is a member. His installation features paintings of coastal landscapes and carvings of abalone, a creature important to the Tongva, and imagines what this community would look like if they looked at the mainland.
Getty Center (getty.edu)
1200 Getty Center Drive, Brentwood, Los Angeles
From June 20 to July 28, 2024
