Asco - Instant Mural | Photo: LACMA
Ed Ruscha - "Standard Station, Amarillo, Texas" | Image: The Getty Center
From October 2011 to April 2012, arts institutions across Southern California are celebrating the birth of postwar contemporary art in Los Angeles with an unprecedented collaborative event. Pacific Standard Time: Art in LA 1945-1980 is an initiative of the J. Paul Getty Trust, showcasing art made in LA during the four decades in which the city emerged as a major force in the art world. During the six-month long celebration, over 60 shows at museums, art galleries and performance spaces will display the best of quintessential California culture. Anchored by a namesake exhibit at The Getty Center, Pacific Standard Time will explore everything from California Mid-Century modern design at LACMA, to LA’s African American visual artists at the Hammer Musuem, to a survey of LA’s pop music scene at the GRAMMY Museum.
Asco: Elite of the Obscure, A Retrospective, 1972-1987
Sep. 4 - Dec. 4
www.lacma.org/art/exhibition/asco
This exhibition will be the first retrospective to present the wide-ranging work of the Chicano performance and conceptual art group Asco (1971-1987), which began as a tight-knit core group of artists from East Los Angeles: Gronk, Harry Gamboa, Jr., Willie Herron, and Patssi Valdez. Taking their name from the Spanish word for disgust and nausea, Asco used public performance art and multimedia to respond to turbulent socio-political developments in LA and around the world.
Dan Johnson - "Desk" | Photo: LACMA
California Design, 1930-1965: "Living in a Modern Way"
Oct. 1, 2011 - Mar. 25, 2012
www.lacma.org/art/exhibition/californiadesign
This LACMA exhibition, the first major study of California Mid-Century modern design, will examine the state's role in shaping the material culture of the entire country with more than 300 objects, comprising furniture, ceramics, metalwork, graphic and industrial design, film, textiles, and fashion.
Pacific Standard Time: Crosscurrents in L.A. Paintings and Sculpture, 1950-1970
Oct. 1, 2011 - Feb. 5, 2012
www.getty.edu/pacificstandardtime/exhibitions-and-events/crosscurrents/
The culmination of a nine-year research initiative organized by the Getty Research Institute, Pacific Standard Time: Crosscurrents in L.A. Paintings and Sculpture presents a focused examination of painting and sculpture produced in Southern California from the late 1940s to the early 1970s. The exhibition features works from nearly 50 artists, and will offer a fundamental reappraisal and reinterpretation of postwar Los Angeles art.
Now Dig This! Art and Black Los Angeles 1960-1980
Oct. 2, 2011 - Jan. 8, 2012
hammer.ucla.edu/exhibitions/detail/exhibition_id/196
This comprehensive exhibition examines the vital legacy of the city’s African American visual artists. Now Dig This! comprises 140 works from 35 artists that have rarely been shown in a museum setting and includes early pieces by now well-established artists, as well as works once considered “lost.” The exhibition connects the artists' work to the movements, trends, and ideas that fueled LA arts in during this period.
Under the Big Black Sun: California Art 1974-1981
Oct. 2, 2011 - Feb. 13, 2012
www.moca.org/museum/exhibitiondetail.php?id=433
This comprehensive survey looks at the exceptionally fertile and diverse California art scene in the mid- to late 1970s, a period bracketed by Richard Nixon’s resignation and the rise of Ronald Reagan. Under the Big Black Sun: California Art 1974-1981 will feature works by 125 artists working in a wide array of mediums and styles.
Naked Hollywood: Weegee in Los Angeles
Nov. 13, 2011 - Feb. 27, 2012
www.moca.org
In 1947, the tabloid photographer known as Weegee relocated from New York City to Los Angeles. Instead of photographing the grisly crime scenes for which he gained notoriety, Weegee trained his camera on Hollywood stars, strippers, naked mannequins and costume shops. Naked Hollywood: Weegee in Los Angeles is the first museum exhibition ever devoted to the body of work Weegee produced in Southern California.
"Exterior of the Pasadena Art Museum" | Photo: Pasadena Museum of History
46 N. Los Robles: A History of the Pasadena Art Museum
Nov. 18, 2011 - Apr. 8, 2012
www.pacificasiamuseum.org
For the first time, the entire development of the Pasadena Art Museum (1945-1974) will be traced, focusing on its years in the Grace Nicholson Building on North Los Robles Avenue, currently the home of the Pacific Asia Museum. The exhibition will present important modern and contemporary works shown at the Pasadena Art Museum in its groundbreaking exhibitions, along with installation photographs of the exhibitions and on-site photographs of the important individuals involved in the Museum.
Pacific Standard Time Performance and Public Art Festival
Jan. 19-29, 2012
Featuring 25 major performances and large-scale outdoor projects, this ten-day performance and public art festival will include new commissions, reinventions, and re-stagings inspired by the many radical and trailblazing works that were created by artists during the Pacific Standard Time era.
FREE VIP Museum Pass
Book a hotel room at a participating Los Angeles hotel and receive two complimentary, one-day adult general admissions to 18 museums ($250 value). For more information, please visit the discoverLosAngeles.com page.
