On a bright, hot day in August, more than 100 people gathered around a large, stone, obelisk-shaped plaza that had been carved into the ground next to the Los Angeles River. A sculptural installation by artist Michael Parker called The Unfinished, the work mimics an ancient monument that had been......
The Los Angeles art world has been saying a collective "hallelujah" since the arrival in January of Philippe Vergne as MOCA's new director. Although some East Coast commentators condemned the appointment — citing in particular a budget crisis scandal in which Vergne resorted to selling off a number of works......
With so many artists living in L.A. and the local art schools churning out hundreds of eager graduates every year, new alternative art venues are opening all the time. In the past year, for example, 356 S. Mission Road (a downtown exhibition hall, community space and indie bookstore opened by artist Laura Owens......
In the latest celebrity assault on that trendy-but-widely-misunderstood medium known as performance art, actor Shia LaBeouf can currently be seen at Cohen Gallery on Beverly Boulevard, performing a piece called #IAMSORRY. The performance, an apology for recent acts of plagiarism, has LaBeouf welcoming visitors while sitting silently with a paper......
The Mohn Award launched in 2012 as Los Angeles' first $100,000 art prize, given to an outstanding artist in the Hammer Museum's biennial "Made in L.A." survey of local, contemporary art. Now it's back and, like any good Hollywood sequel, it's sporting some extra bells and whistles. For this year's......
Certain places at certain times seem to exert a gravitational pull. Last year, the small, cutting-edge Night Gallery raised their game by taking over a warehouse in the farthest reaches of downtown Los Angeles. That same industrial corridor on eastern Washington Boulevard recently welcomed two more avant-garde art spaces: The Mistake......
After five years of turmoil - during which the museum battled near-fatal financial troubles while enduring the widely criticized tenure of mismatched director Jeffrey Deitch - MOCA needed to score a perfect 10 in the long awaited hiring of its new director. With faith in the organization so seriously eroded,...
A flurry of excitement went through the Los Angeles art world late last week following the announcement of the artists selected for the 2014 Whitney Biennial, which remains the largest and most watched survey of contemporary art in America. Out of a total of 103 artists or artist collectives, 26......
L.A.'s hippest new art gallery launches this week, and with a flourish. Tif Sigfrids, formerly director of the prestigious Thomas Solomon Gallery in Chinatown, is opening her own space in the burgeoning Hollywood arts district with a solo show by provocative L.A.-based artist Joe Sola. Known primarily for his edgy......
These days, a lot of people want to get in on the game of exhibiting contemporary art in Los Angeles. Talk of soon-to-open venues is proliferating, from Eli Broad's museum downtown and the Hauser Wirth & Schimmel gallery co-headed by former MOCA curator Paul Schimmel to a new space housing......
