Lucas Goes Green
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| Lucas Museum of Narrative Art. Photo: Hunter Kerhart Architectural Photography |
Urbanize Los Angeles has new aerial photos of the Ma Yansong-designed Lucas Museum of Narrative Art by Hunter Kerhart Architectural Photography. The roof garden is now largely in place and green (despite the city's record dry spell).
The museum is expected to open in 2026.
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| Lucas Museum of Narrative Art. Photo: Hunter Kerhart Architectural Photography |
Comments
As for the LA Natural History Museum to its east, the fact it once housed LA's main public art collection - as recently as 60 years ago - is a big reason the city earned a major black eye (ie, "cultural desert"). When even cities like Minneapolis in the early 1900s did better than that, something was really amiss.
The Lucas will probably rival all these figures in its first year. But that will compete with the opening of LACMA's new building, which will also boost attendance.
The most-attended museum-like institution in L.A. is the California Science Center, with about 1.67 million visitors a year. The Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County draws about a million (I suspect that includes the La Brea site).
The LA Times art critic described the Lucas's focus as "treacle," but he also described LACMA as "a de facto museum of contemporary art, but frankly...not a very good one." A happy medium between the two formats hopefully will be reached. So if the Lucas steps up its sophistication and LACMA steps down its "hip, trendy!" that will be a win-win.
Do I detect that you are appalled that 1900s LA could possibly have been more backwards culturally than a place like Minneapolis? [MINNEAPOLIS!?]
If I understood your words correctly, then you cannot know how, at that time, northern-tier US cities east of the Mississippi were in constant search of civic fame and cultural advancement for their citizens.
Travel to these places. See their amazing art treasures. Or armchair-travel through their online collection highlights, in Minneapolis, Chicago, Detroit, Toledo, Cleveland, Oberlin, Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Albany...a full list is endless.
The interior of this country is rich, rich, rich.
If, rather, you are just lamenting LA's long-drawn indifference for civic fame and cultural advancement for its citizens, then I think that strain still runs deep, notwithstanding the discreet but powerful latter-day contributions of a Getty, Simon, Huntington or Broad.
> indifference for civic fame
> and cultural advancement
> for its citizens
Not sure how to define, vis-a-vie the LA area, the word "indifference." I recall reading some time ago that people based in metro (tri-state) New York didn't necessarily partake in NYC's (largely Manhattan's) cultural entities and functions much more than their counterparts in other cities do.
Certain metros in the world attract more tourists than other places, so things like museums or cultural institutions, etc, in general based in them will cater to a larger pool of people. So cities like Paris, France are to the arts what a city like Orlando, Florida is to amusement parks.
*
I see by your Paris-Orlando trope that you are back. But I'm happy to address your interesting point about "indifference."
I take your point that most New Yorkers and those in the NYC environs don't give a flip about civic fame or culture generally. But my notion about LA's indifference in no way applies to New York's home-grown, local booster tradition that is visible in tens of thousands of credit lines on donated art works around the city. Even places like the Frick, where the poobahs there never needed or solicited gifts of artworks, is now enriched by fantastic donations. In the case of the Met, we see generation after generation of families continuing to donate their art works and sizable funds.
New York doesn't need tourists to rescue our art-loving and -nurturing community, though they do help to keep the lights on.
A case in point is the Brooklyn Museum, one of the country's great museum collections. Tourists do not have that place on their radar, but we locals flock there, especially for the many hot exhibitions they run. The attendance numbers there do not match the Guggenheim, Met or MoMA, for example, but they hover about 700,000 customers per year. Not shabby for a "local" place.
A lot of local traffic shows up at Sotheby's and Christie's. Locals attend and support the fine arts schools of higher education in a big way: Pratt, FIT and the Art Students League, as only a few examples.
Locals buy art at the more than 300 commercial art galleries in the City.
The support by New Yorkers seeking civic fame comes from not only the big, big names of old (Morgan, Havemeyer, etc.), but also from the donors who leave one precious painting long in a family to the Met, as we hear about in the press all the time. Or the countless unknown people (are they locals?) who go out and buy works specifically for the Met [If they're not locals, they are taking their cues from locals.]
Even local-area misanthropes have pulled their weight in advancing New York's civic fame. Jacob S. Rogers, the obstreperous railroad magnet, is a prime example. I borrow the quote to describe him: "Most people around here have heard of Jacob Rogers and some people live to regret it." He cared nothing of art, and only visited the Met to drop off his annual membership check. He died in 1901 and left the museum $5 million. The fruits of that gift are still in use today for Met purchases.
See his contribution discussed here:
https://www.metmuseum.org/perspectives/this-weekend-in-met-history-july-2
Los Angeles has been blessed by some extraordinarily generous benefactors. But nothing in the way of deep searching for civic fame exists there, as one would expect from a city of that size. LA simple does not compare with New York or with the many cities that I have referenced, above.
> Minneapolis, Chicago, Detroit, Toledo,
> Cleveland, Oberlin, Pittsburgh, Buffalo,
> Albany.
I hate to think that human nature (eg, interests, goals, ambitions, etc} in those cities is noticeably different from human nature in LA.