Results tagged “artsandculture”

If it's a day with the folks tomorrow, you might want to head out to Heritage Square Museum as anyone over 65 gets in free ($10 if your a youngin'). And if they know something about Los Angeles in the 1940s or before, they may participate in an oral history project too. "Old-Timers" Day aims to bring together true Los Angeles veterans from 12 to 4:00 p.m. at the museum located in Highland Park (if they are enthusiastic walkers, take the Gold Line to the Heritage Square/Arroyo Station or Southwest Museum Station!).

Forget medical marijuana storefronts, the feds have found a new kind of place to storm into -- museums. Today, four Southern California museums, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Bowers Museum of Cultural Art in Santa Ana, the Pacific Asia Museum in Pasadena and the Mingei International Museum in San Diego, were raided in an attempt to bust an "alleged illegal smuggling of Southeast Asian and Native American artifacts."

The search warrants, which were executed shortly after 7:30 a.m., gave agents the authority to search the museum's galleries, storage areas offices and computers. The targets of the investigation are Robert Olson, an alleged art smuggler, and Jonathan Markell, the owner of Silk Roads Gallery in Los Angeles, which also was raided Thursday.

Continue reading "Federal Agents Raid LACMA"

Los Angeles philanthropist, Eli Broad (rhymes with road), has decided not to give his massively large and impressive private collection of art to museums, rather, keeping the collection in house under control of a private foundation according to the New York Times. One of the assumed recipients of the art was LACMA, where the new $56 million Broad Contemporary Art Museum is scheduled to open next month. However, even with Broad's name on the museum, there would be no gaurantee that any art he donates from his private collection will be on display 100% of the time.

“We don’t want it to end up in storage, in either our basement or somebody else’s basement,” Mr. Broad said. “So I, as the collector, am saying, ‘If you’re not willing to commit to show it, why don’t we just make it available to you when you want it, as opposed to giving it to you, and then our being unhappy that it’s only up 10 percent or 20 percent of the time or not being shown at all?’” [New York Times]

However, despite what the Times says may be a "potential embarrassment" to LACMA, the museum director, Michael Govan has a good and positive spin/outlook on the situation: "I don't think most people care when they walk in the door whether the museum owns the works or not, as long as they don't lose them."