Best Spring 2015 Art Exhibits In Los Angeles
When spring has sprung, so has a number of fresh opportunities of the artistic kind in the City of Angels. From outstanding offerings in the major art museums to showings in smaller, more intimate venues, the best exhibitions the world has to offer are on tap for Angelenos as well as for visitors to our cultured city. Consider the following five spring 2015 events of this enthralling nature, sure to captivate your creative spirit.
'Nature and the American Vision: The Hudson River School'
Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)
5905 Wilshire Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90036
(323) 857-6000
www.lacma.org
Date: Through June 4, 2015
The 19th century is clearly represented in this exhibition that comes from the New York Historical Society. Some 44 American landscapes by such luminaries as Thomas Cole, Asher B. Durand and Albert Bierstadt tell the tale of the outdoors in America at that time. Other painters also contributed to this thematically themed exhibition but it's Thomas Cole’s "The Course of Empire (1834-1836)" that captures the most attention is this masterpiece done by way of five large-scale paintings that give incredible insight into the challenges of our fledgling country, which at the time were vast.
'Bernhard Willhelm 3000: When Fashion Shows The Danger Then Fashion Is The Danger'
MOCA Pacific Design Center
8687 Melrose Ave.
West Hollywood, CA 90069
(310) 289-5223
www.moca.org
Date: Feb. 7 - May 17, 2015
For the past 15 years after the stunning debut of his first collection in the City of Light, fashion designer Bernhard Willhelm has been what has been dubbed "moving in-between chaos and diversity." He and his crew, which includes veteran collaborator Jutta Kraus, now L.A. based, take over with this futuristic installation that acts as sculpture but feels like fashion sensibility. Displays include object d'art, ephemera, video and photography Willhelm considers "a meditation on the future of commerce and a 'thinking-forward exhibition.'" Be sure to attend as you go back to the future with this artistic soothsayer.
'Louise Nevelson in L.A.: Tamarind Workshop Lithographs from the 1960s'
Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)
5905 Wilshire Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90036
(323) 857-6000
www.lacma.org
Date: Jan. 17 - May 17, 2015
Lace, cheesecloth and regular old rags were artistically manipulated by sculptor Louise Nevelson to produce nearly four dozen innovative prints on display at LACMA. The resulting multiple works used in the number of series on display were dubbed as "constructions" and were said to "explore notions of seriality and reflection."
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'Sturtevant: Double Trouble'
The Museum of Contemporary Art
250 South Grand Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90012
(213) 626-6222
www.moca.org
Date: March 31 - July 27, 2015
Elaine Sturtevant, who died this past May in Paris, always took an out-of-the-box approach to pop art, creating what some call "reproductions" of the famous works of others, up to and including such big -- and diverse -- greats as Roy Lichtenstein, Jasper Johns and Andy Warhol, all of whom were her artistic contemporaries. Sturtevand, usually referred to by just her last name, explained, "What is currently compelling is our pervasive cybernetic mode, which plunks copyright into mythology, makes origins a romantic notion and pushes creativity outside the self. Remake, reuse, reassemble, recombine - that's the way to go." She was, indeed, a true chameleon with a brush who then plugged into her own sensibilities, putting them on all kinds of canvas. "Sturtevant: Double Trouble" comes to L.A. by way of New York's esteemed Museum of Modern Art.
'Bari Kumar: Remembering the Future'
Charles White Elementary School Gallery
2401 Wilshire Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90189
(213) 487-9172
www.lacma.org
Date: Jan. 30 - June 13, 2015
For a truly interesting exhibit, LACMA, as part of an ongoing community engagement, features Bari Kumar's "Remembering The Future." Located in its satellite gallery at the Charles White Elementary School, the exhibit features Kumar's work along with a truly mesmerizing selection of objects from the ninth through the early 20th century. Inspired by Los Angeles, Kumar's canvases feature collage-like pieces which offer up fragmented words, symbols and pictures. Also, part of the work by Bari Kumar and the students at this extraordinary outpost are borrowed from the tradition of rangoli, which is the art of combining colored powders, applying them, and then erasing for full effect.
