LACMA has several new exhibits; here are highlights from my Tuesday day off outing.
Textile Alchemy: The Art of Reiko Sudo & NUNO featured large format textiles and several videos that showed the production process. Given the bright energy of so much contemporary Japanese design, I was surprised the colors, textures, and patterns were so bland I'd banish them from my wardrobe and living spaces, but the descriptions and the environmental stewardship involved were good to know about.
These pics are from the on-site retail shop that was beautifully arranged and had a few offerings I might enjoy, after all.
Home of the Future, 1925-1985: Designing Domestic Utopias
brought together everything: design; engineering; culture; history; imagination, life. And it had a sub-show, The Kitchen and its Discontents. I don't know if that was disCONtents or disconTENTS. All of it was North American and Western European.
They had real examples of various home furnishings from the represented decades (more chairs than anyone could count), some small scale model houses, about a dozen short videos, and they admitted the kitchen hasn't become more automated but everything we do in the kitchen has become more complicated. You've likely seen or used some of the older kitchen appliances and phones, entertainment objects like record players, CRT televisions, and transistor radios. I had to add in the radio because I had a couple of cool ones I still miss.
I'll close with three posters. This one is from the USA's Rural Electrification Administration that I need to read more about.
General Electric Tomorrowland Carousel of Progress
Danish artist Aage Sikker-Hansen (1897-1955) declares the kitchen Denmark's biggest workplace, repositioniung domestic work as a professional pursuit. Circa 1950s
• Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind at The Broad Museum ends on Sunday 11 September, so it was time to experience it for this week's Tuesday outing.
• 1960-2016 were the dates for Add Colour Refugee Boat that was part of the Yoko exhibit, but people had kept adding blue to the walls, the floor, and the boat, so somewhere I need to learn more of its history.
• Because The Broad is expanding they'd closed some of the usual galleries. I'll end this Broad section with a pair of industrial photographs by Thomas Struth.
• Semi Submersible Drilling Rig, Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering (DSME) shipyard on Geoje Island, South Korea, 2007
• Neutral Buoyancy Lab, Johnson Space Center, NASA, Houston, Texas, USA, 2017
• After leaving The Broad, I crossed the street for:
• In These Times: Recent Acquisitions at MOCA
• Silverlake Hillside, 2025 • Hilary Pecis
• Dick Tracy Variation (empty speech), #1, 2015 • John Sparagana
• Abolish ICE • Andrea Bowers, 2018
• The Ogre's Wife, 2022 • Christina Forrer
• Secret Circle, 1990-1991 • Viola Frey
• Z.E.E.P. series, 1969-1970 • Sir Eduardo Paolozzi
• Only details from Numbers and Trees, Tanzania Series 1, Baobab Ogiek, 2024 by Charles Gaines because I couldn't capture the whole thing and it's too hard to describe, but it was elegant and unusual.
• Subway Tuna Tuesday
• Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf exterior and a Hazelnut Frappe
Despite many recent visits to the Getty Center, I hadn't spent time in the gardens since Before Covid (BC). This past Tuesday that changed; here's some of the beauty.
Looking at LACMA from Wilshire Blvd on Sunday, 29 January 2017
Intro
September 8th being the second Tuesday of the month might mean a visit to LACMA, the internationally renowned art museum whose name is an everyday noun in this town. But I'd already seen the current exhibitions and my two tries at viewing some of the Geffen Gallery that opened last spring had overwhelmed me.
Therefore? Because there were several new things to see at the Getty, that's where I headed. As usual, when my Metro bus got close to Wilshire and Westwood where I'd catch one to Brentwood and beyond (Van Nuys, Sylmar, generic San Fernando Valley), I went to the Getty website to book my arrival time. I always wait because by then I know my ETA within 20 minutes or so. But the Getty was closed for the day! My best guess is because Mondays usually are dark, this week they took Tuesday for maintenance and cleaning because Monday was Labor Day and a federal holiday. I'm excited about next week at the Getty, so stay tuned to this blog.
Therefore? I turned around and headed back to LACMA with a plan to find a wall of ocean-themed lithographs I'd loved my last time at the Geffen Galleries and that for an unknown reason I hadn't even written down the name of the artist. Strange, because I'd made a mental note of their location relative to the elevator and then I left for the day.
After getting off the eastbound Metro bus I booked my LACMA visit, crossed the street to check in, and headed upstairs in the new gallery. it took a while, but I found the ocean art.
June Wayne
What a discovery! June Wayne (1918-2011) is the artist's name, and she achieved near-legendary status in LA. She founded Tamarind Workshop, the first ever for fine art lithography; Citrus Editions, Gemini G.E.I., and Self Help Graphics followed in Tamarind's wake. Tamarind now belongs to the University of New Mexico with the tagline Where lithography lives. You can see some of June's art on Tamarind, and here's her website. You can learn more at her extensive wikipedia and she has an Instagram.
Demented Tidal Wave II, 1972
Lithograph printed by William Law III
Seventh Wave II, 1971
Lithograph printed by David Trowbridge
Tidal Wave, 1974
Lithograph printed by Edward Hamilton
Tidal Wave, 1972
Lithograph printed by William Law III
Black Tidal Wave, 1973
Lithograph printed by John Maggio
White Tidal Wave II, 1972
Lithograph printed by William Law III
Outro
Do you realize (of course you do) we don't try to sample every dish and flavor on any restaurant menu because our appetite and our budgets make it impossible? Whether it's a rock concert or a symphonic feast, linear time limits how much music we take in at once. So why did I imagine needing to sprint through the Geffen Galleries and see almost everything, when I could pick and choose a certain section or era or style or artist?
