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Los Angeles, California
Oh Miracle Mile, where does it lead to?
We’re back in Los Angeles for a quick and easy weekend trip, and starting that trip at LACMA, somewhere (unlike the Getty) I don’t always visit but somewhere I usually enjoy when I do. These pictures include the old and new parts of the campus. The first picture is from the Japanese Pavilion designed by Bruce Goff, while the second picture is from inside the Renzo Piano Broad Contemporary Art Building, where the slot cars are running all over Metropolis II by Chris Burden.
LACMA is about to change and change a lot. Both of the buildings above are safe, but everything else is about to be torn up and replaced by a monstrously large black amorphous building designed by Peter Zumthor. This new building is black and it looks like it emerged from the tar pits (an… interesting... idea) and the whole building hovers over the site and crosses over Wilshire Boulevard, something that I think is a good idea but something I think Los Angeles is just not ready for yet.
A giant fake rainbow lands in front of the Thalberg Building at Sony (Columbia/MGM) Studios. I went on the tour which was... ok. They really don't have much of a backlot and most of the historic pieces were sold off, the 40 acre studio was once over 400. Guessing that most of the good stuff was in the parts now gone.
I ventured down to the DTLA Arts District to see Pacific Standard Time exhibits at Sci-Arc. I had never been to Sci-Arc (an independent architectural school) and visiting it is not easy. From the Gold Line you literally have to walk in a spiral past creepy warehouses and under the bridge downtown, where there's always a melancholy red hot chili pepper guy singing about giving his life away.
As for the picture, well I think it does a pretty good job explaining itself without my help.
Here’s a panorama showing the still under construction Eli Broad Museum and it's well established neighbor on Grand Avenue. The Broad Museum was designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro and consists of two parts, the vault and the veil. And since they haven't installed the veil part yet, this is what the naked vault looks like. This should all make sense in 2014 when the finished museum opens up to the public, veil and all.
I bet you just knew this one was coming. Try and visit Los Angeles and not stop by the Getty. I was nominally there to see the Pacific Standard Time exhibition, but even if I wasn’t, I’m sure I would find some reason to visit. Maybe it would be that I wanted to see how a new camera performed there, or maybe I would just use the gridlock level traffic on the 405 as a reason to get out of the car for a while. And even though the weather wasn’t that great, I could always say that I wanted to see what it looked like with low haze in the distance.
Regardless, here are some pictures of the Getty Center, as expected.
