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| "The Expanding Field" with Jasper Johns' Map, 1962, and Andy Warhol's Telephone, 1961 |
"Why can't MOCA show its best pieces?" If you've ever asked that, MOCA is presenting a greatest-hits survey of its permanent collection. It's a two-parter, with "The Expanding Field: MOCA's Collection from the 1940s to 1970s" now on view at Grand Avenue (through Sep. 20, 2026.) It is to be followed by an installation of more recent art at MOCA Geffen.
"The Expanding Field" fills seven rooms with works made prior to MOCA's founding in 1979. The arrangement is mostly chronological, ranging from Mondrian to Pattern & Decoration. It starts with a bang, eight Rothkos in an Isozaki chapel. This is followed by Arshile Gorky's Betrothal I; L.A.'s best Jackson Pollock drip painting; a gray Jasper Johns Map; a selection of Robert Rauschenberg combines; an Andy Warhol Telephone.
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| Rothkos in "The Expanding Field" |
The first rooms skew New York and white male. The installation combines these artists with their more diverse contemporaries, such as Jay DeFeo, Bob Thompson, Hélio Oiticica, Corita Kent, Joan Brown, Anne Truitt, Agnes Martin, Betye Saar, Charles Gaines, and Lucita Hurtado. Unfortunately, many of the works that MOCA owns by the latter are modest compared to the artists' most ambitious work. (I'll make an exception for the one great Corita Kent because prints were her thing.)
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| Corita Kent, the handling is in your hands, 1966 |
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| Arshile Gorky, Betrothal I, 1947 |
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| Jackson Pollock, Number 1, 1949, 1949 |
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| Robert Rauschenberg, Inlet, 1959 |
Rauschenberg combines are shown adjacent to a Gee's Bend quilt, two Jacques Villeglé torn-poster pieces, a Betye Saar assemblage, and a Joseph Cornell box. The shared interest in making something new from castoffs is obvious to an 8-year-old, yet these artists are rarely mentioned in the same art history or displayed on the same museum wall.
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| 1970s conceptualism, mostly. The suspended red sculpture is Hélio Oiticica's Relevo espacial no. 12, 1959/1998, from the Duker Collection |
Southern California collector Betty Duker specializes in the Brazilian Neo-Concrete movement. A few loans from the Duker collection fill some significant gaps in MOCA's collection.
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| Lygia Clark, Casulo, 1959. Duker Collection |
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| Franklin Williams, Four Made My World, 1972 |
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| Anne Truitt, Brunt II, 1974 |
In 2024 Robert and Daryl Offer donated two Anne Truitt paintings in honor of Alan Hergott. Here the brooding plum hues recall
Rothko's Black on Dark Sienna on Purple.
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| Foreground: Mary Ann Unger's Benchmarks, 1977 |
Another 2024 acquisition is Mary Ann Unger's Benchmarks (1977), a gift of Geoffrey Biddle and Eve Biddle. Unger, a contemporary of Eva Hesse and Richard Serra, used corroded iron to suggest spooned intimacy.
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| Agnes Martin, Untitled #2, 1977 |
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| John Divola, Zuma #20, 1978 (image) and 2006 (print). Partial and promised gift of Philip Greider |
Comments
> show its best pieces?"
A bit of snark: It's because their building(s) contains so much square footage, they have more wall and floor space than art objects to install in them. Call it the Govan/Geffen effect.
Also, because their budget is so huge they can spend it on special, temporary exhibits. They're rolling in so much money, it also allows them to host special shows that feature generally obscure artists (eg, contemporary-art versions of the Met's current Raphael exhibit), not the big names (eg, on display at the annual LA Art Show). Or what municipal art galleries in city A or city B do all the time.
I sure hope Govan and his board don't try to take over MOCA. They already have enough on their plate trying to make up for over 60 years of "oops" or "CYA."
Meanwhile, good thing the Broad is right across the street and the Lucas is a few miles away. In 1965, the pickings were so slim, the sound of banjo music could be heard floating throughout LA.
@ W. Poundstone - that Geffen permanent collection show is not showing in their future exhibition schedule anymore. 🤔
https://www.christies.com/-/jssmedia/images/features/articles/2026/04/13-30/lacma-david-geffen-galleries/lacma-david-geffen-galleries-main.jpg
MOCA has a history of "Johnny-come-lately" and LACMA does too. A lack of enough money, interest and tradition in a city doesn't help. However, things like that gallery in the Geffen are analogous to an NFL team that doesn't mind the appearance of grade-school students playing for both its offense and defense.
In 2023, they were in the red by over $1 million, while in 2024 they were at least in the black by around $3 million. Several weeks ago, I read something about Michael Govan again interested in taking them over.
Eli Broad stepped in the last time and prevented that from occurring. But in 2026 I'm guessing the margins (of both money and influence) in LA are now iffier. Just one person in a community can make a big difference, and the city's number of philanthropists in 2026 is even more a game of whack-a-mole.
I read the huge fires last January took out even more potential financial (if not also logistical) support.
Speaking of "Geffen":
contemporary_confessions, Instagram:
Had a lovely Sunday wandering around LACMA’s new galleries. They are grouped by material or aesthetic rather than strictly time period, which I found very stimulating. I think the MET’s costume exhibit took a similar approach this year. Is this a new thing in museum exhibition?...
The Impressionism room was one of my favorites. Instead of entire walls or rooms dedicated to one artist, nearly every work in the room represented a different artist. At big museums, I do think people tend to zone out - after the first 15, 20, 50 Manet’s, they all start to blend together. But here, like scrolling on your FYP, the next thing is always different from the last, holding your attention.
I didn’t really like the light in galleries, very harsh for looking at art I think. But what do I know. I think they should have put in a King Taco instead of an Erewhon. But again, what do I know. [End quote]
I agree with "people tend to zone out - after the first 15, 20, 50 Manet’s, they all start to blend together." Even though places like the Museum of Fine Arts Houston have a traditional presentation down pat (better than Pereira's LACMA ever did), and evoke the look of "major league museum" (eg, travertine floors, tall stone-walled halls, period rooms [in a Minneapolis or Cleveland, etc], enfilade doorways), I don't know if visiting them seems too much like weekday homework compared with the (quote, unquote) fun of a weekend camping trip.
But King Taco? Uh, er, I don't think so. lol.
Another visitor a few weeks ago wrote that if LACMA were just the Geffen, and not also BCAM and the Resnick, then it wouldn't cut it. I think that person prefers a more formal style and format, so in her mind a Peter Zumthor has to be paired with a Renzo Piano.
Which is why I can see out-of-town visitors dropping by the Geffen and still thinking, "I prefer my own city's art museum." I was hoping that over 60 years since 1965, that opinion could be put to rest. But before 2020, that reaction was even more of a given.