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| Qiu Anxiong, The Doubter, 2010. LACMA, gift of Yuz Foundation |
The Art Newspaper is reporting that Budi Tek and his Yuz Foundation have donated seven major Chinese contemporary works to LACMA. All are featured in "Legacies of Exchange: Chinese Contemporary Art from the Yuz Foundation," which closes next Sunday. The gift includes not only Ai Weiwei's Zodiac Heads (as previously reported) but Qiu Anxiong's The Doubter, Zhou Tiehai's Venus and Cupid, Yu Youhan's Mao in New York, and three works from Shi Jinsong's Blade series.
There is not much contemporary Chinese art in U.S. museum collections, and even the big modern/contemporary institutions tend to neglect it. With this gift, LACMA moves to the forefront of the field.
UPDATE: LACMA's Unframed blog says Circle of Animals will be installed outdoors after "Legacies of Exchange" closes.
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| Zhou Tiehai, Venus and Cupid, 2006 |
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| Shi Jinsong, Blade No. 1, 2003 |
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| Ai Weiwei, Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads, 2011, as installed in "Legacies of Exchange." Photo: (c) Museum Associates/LACMA |
Comments
Hey, that's white supremacy, LACMA! Or is segregation based on pro-diversity now a good thing? I'm so confused.
Of course, with the new Geffen building, Govan's museum will have less space for both new and old artworks.
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Re MoMA: don't get me started.
Back in 2020, after MoMA reopened from COVID, I went. Afterwards I received an email from them asking for feedback on my visit. I let them have it:
I don't know whether to laugh or cry, having visited MOMA yesterday for the first time since the remodel.
I entered MOMA and took the elevator directly to the Donald Judd show on the 6th floor.
The spaces were vast, and the art was well-spaced and easy to view, from near and farther away.
I thought, WOW, MOMA really got the message with its remodel. I laughed with glee.
Then I went to the 5th floor to see the permanent collection, and I said, aloud, "You have got to be kidding me."
There is still a warren of small rooms, with arguably the masterpiece of the collection, "Starry Night," in the first, crammed space. The room is the size of one-and-a-half subway cars, placed side by side.
The entire 5th floor is effectively a service corridor, with paintings thrown up so that viewers can be effectively jostled by passersby. This impractical layout could have been blown out with the remodel. But why do something right when MOMA has been doing it wrong for the past 40 years (since I've been visiting).
Virtually every room had only one means of access and egress. What would have stopped you from creating spaces with four means of access?
The only thing that didn't make me cry was when I was in room 501 and I wasn't mugged while viewing "Starry." Ditto when I viewed "Desmoiselles d'Avignon." But that's only because COVID has cut New York off from the world.
I said aloud to the assembled ten other people in room 501 but to no one in particular, "This is the first time in 40 years that I haven't felt like I'm in a Target, Costco and Walmart rolled into one, the day after Thanksgiving. What a treat. MOMA for New Yorkers."
NB- MoMA now has moved "Starry" to the adjacent, much larger gallery. Glory!
That's the purpose of the Broad Building. The biggest complaint about the Broad building was that Broad gave it to LACMA but didn't give it any artwork to fill it.
https://lacmaonfire.blogspot.com/2019/03/how-lacma-grew-and-shrank.html
> arguably the masterpiece of the collection,
> "Starry Night," in the first, crammed space.
> The room is the size of one-and-a-half subway
> cars, placed side by side.
> The entire 5th floor is effectively a service
> corridor, with paintings thrown up so that viewers
> can be effectively jostled by passersby.
The judgment of top decisionmakers at any institution - large or small - may be so poor, that I've lost faith in what they'll do. Or what they won't do.
Renderings of Zumthor's building show what appear to be snaking hallway-like galleries, with floor-to-ceiling windows on one side and concrete walls on the other. That setting sounds like it will be ideal for visitors into taking selfies and sharing images of cars zooming down Wilshire Blvd.
Come to think of it, Zumthor's design may be a better fit for the Petersen automotive museum across the street.
> LACMA to spread itself around the county
That will cost more money to manage and operate.
LACMA in one location - and operating out of buildings that go back decades - has had enough of a struggle in keeping its budget running without too much red ink.
The reason the Pereira-era campus for over 50 years was never properly or thoroughly renovated to begin with was because the museum has never had enough deep-pocketed supporters.
People like David Geffen are now going to have to cough up a lot more money.
https://unframed.lacma.org/sites/default/files/styles/article_full/public/field/image/unnamed_12.jpg?itok=pYAkZv-Z
However, in the age of TikTok and increasingly short attention spans, it will prove popular. It will be like a Six-Flags museum of art and theme park.
Thanks, Michael!
But suffused light in DC is not the same as LA's hypermelanoma death rays. Art isn't raisins.
I hope that glass is UVA to Z protective.
Whether it will be or won't be, plans are to install draperies in the galleries that face along the perimeter of the building.
Visiting the museum in the future will be less serious minded. Which fits the stereotype of the sun-baked Hollywood airhead. That's because the views from all those windows should be a nice distraction. Looking at art becomes a big yawn after awhile. Even more so when its crummy old relics. Who needs that?
The large wall of windows should be ideal for selfie moments on TikTok or images shared on social media.
The budget for window washing certainly will be higher in Govan's County Museum of Art.
Thanks, Michael!