I've long wanted to blog a tribute to urban cougar P-22, the SoCal Puma (American Wild Cougar, Mountain Lion) who lived in Griffith Park at least since February 2012. I have no wise or poetic words of my own, so I'm posting pictures and tributes from others.
• This head shot is from Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, 23 April 2019.
• Large Map showing scale of P-22's range
• P-22's location in Griffith Park
• P-22 billboard!
• P-22 graffiti!
• Poster from Tongva artist Weshoyot Alvitre
• From LA on the Move at Union Station last October. The exhibit explores how wildlife and people travel through shared landscapes and follow paths that overlap; a picture of P-22 was essential.
• Tribute from Mountain Lion Foundation
• Tribute from PBS SoCal
• Tribute from Save LA Cougars
• Tribute from LAist
Getty Tuesday: Photography and the Black Arts Movement, 1955-1985
The Getty doesn't have fancy frappes, so I started my visit with an iced mocha latte accompanied by a small bag of Garden Salsa Sun Chips.
One of these ducks hovered around my table while I snacked; a few minutes later I noticed both of them basking in the warm early March sun.
"Pictures told, for those who could not see themselves, of the strength and the beauty of the people, of the hostility and anger of the opposition, and of the promise of a world free of racism."
Julian Bond, 1940-2015
The National Gallery of Art in Washington DC, organized the exhibit and showed it there before it traveled over to here.
I didn't imagine counting how many photographs or how many rooms it all encompassed. Although I did imagine the Getty website would say something about that, it didn't, so I'll say it was extensive. I found the detailed but not endless descriptions most helpful
A lot of the pictures featured well-known leaders of the civil rights movement. It's no surprise most of the photography was black and white. Some were done in a private venue or by a regular person – participant or observer – with an unnamed camera and unidentified film; most were from newspapers, a few for magazines. I'd guess a press cameras (such as a Speed Graphic) captured most of the people and events, and the newspaper shots would have been printed at a resolution around 200 ppi or less. That overall style propelled the viewer back in time.
To end my day off, I'd planned and counted on Subway to celebrate Tuna Tuesday and continue the Sun Chips theme, but when I got there the small shopping center was closed because of a water main not draining, so I got El Pollo Loco instead. It tasted great and even provided leftovers!
Clockwise from upper left:
• Tree outside social hall at Saint Mary's Mariposa
• Wall collage at California African American Museum
• Cherry Blossoms
• Purist Still Life by Roy Lichtenstein at The Broad
• Black History Month
• Tuesday 3rd California African American Museum • This is the DC-8 outside.
• Tuesday 10th Armand Hammer Museum • The bookstore!
• Saturday 14th • Valentines Day
• Sunday 22nd • Pink Trumpet Trees
• Tuesday 24th • The Broad Museum
• Friday 27th • Cherry Blossoms
• The Broad website. Full of information!
Across the street from MOCA and across a different street from Disney Hall Where LA Phil Plays, The Broad offers well-known approximately mid-century conceived and born in the USA art. I also learned about and enjoyed some less familiar (translation: previously unknown to me) paintings, and I discovered Japanese artist Takashi Murakami whose work I might have seen had my life not had such a long ellipsis. Or maybe not. That remains in the grace-filled "I'll never know" category.
I'm blogging some of my favorites.
Ed Ruscha
• Angry Because It's Plaster Not Milk, 1965
• Psycho Spaghetti Western #5, 2010
• Heavy Industry, 1962
• Bloated Empire, 1996-1997
Roy Lichtenstein
• Female Figure, 1979
• Purist Still Life, 1976
• Perfect Painting, 1986
• Imperfect Painting, 1986
• Non-Objective I, 1964
Robert Rauschenberg
• Untitled, 1965
Jasper Johns
• Flag, 1967
The series has become sufficiently famous to qualify as iconic, and this isn't my favorite pair of soup cans by Andy Warhol, but they're here because of the irresistible titles:
• Small Torn Campbell's Soup Can (Pepper Pot), 1962
• Campbell's Soup Can (Clam Chowder Manhattan Style) [Ferus Type], 1962
Jean-Michel Basquiat, 1960-1988
• Wicker, 1984
• Horn Players, 1983
Takashi Murakami
• Hustle 'N' Punch by Kaikai and Kiki, 2009 (detail)
• Tan Tan Bo A.K.A. Gerotan Scorched by the Blaze in the Purgatory of Knowledge, 2018 (detail)
After my art immersion, I had a mid-afternoon burrito bowl lunch at Chipotle. Of course it was really really good, because I chose the ingredients.
My day off ended with a Hazelnut frappe at the Olympic and Doheny Starbucks in Beverly Hills. I love that Doheny Drive begins and ends in a cul-de-sac. And I love that they made my frappe in an old-fashioned glass glass because I told them I'd be enjoying it in the store.
