'Made In LA' distills the city's enormous art scene into one exhibit

Every two years, the Hammer Museum puts on one big exhibit showcasing the work of L.A. artists, both emerging and long-established in the “Made in L.A.” biennial.

This year’s co-curators, Essence Harden and Paulina Pobocha, set out with the goal to see as much work as they could, without predetermined ideas of what the show would be in the end.

“For me, it was really like, damn, I have never driven 80 miles in a day, but I'm about to do that and see all the kinds of really cool, dope small artist communities that exist in this place,” Harden told LAist.

“I mean, I know they exist, but in doing that kind of density of visits, you're like, man, people are really out here still being incredibly creative, thoughtful, working towards the collective, working in garages and reuse of space,” they said.

Harden was struck by the ingenuity of L.A. artists in creating work with limited resources.

“The kind of understanding of assemblage, not just as this output in terms of material objects, but also as a way of negotiating the city where reuse and recycling, and re-contextualizing is really principled to so many ways that folks are working.”

After spending nearly a year exploring L.A’s art scene, only 28 artists were selected.

Gabriela Ruiz's "Collective Scream."

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Courtesy Sarah M Golonka

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Hammer Museum

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Various works by Brian Rochefort and Greg Breda.

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Courtesy Sarah M Golonka

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Hammer Museum

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Freddy Villalobos's installation "waiting for the stone to speak, for I know nothing of aventure."

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Courtesy Sarah M Golonka

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Hammer Museum

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Various works by Pat O'Neill and David Alekhougie.

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Courtesy Sarah M Golonka

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Hammer Museum

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Ali Eyal's "And Look Where I Went."

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Courtesy Sarah M Golonka

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Hammer Museum

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L.A.’s car culture inspires automobile art

We spend a lot of time in vehicles in Southern California, so the influence of our car-centric lifestyle is seen starting before you even enter the museum.

“Buggy Bear Crashes Made in L.A.,” a 25-foot-tall inflatable sculpture by artist Alake Shinning is currently perched on the northwest corner of Wilshire Boulevard and Glendon Avenue in Westwood.

“The bear is actually extracted from this painting that's also inside of the museum that Alake made,” Harden explained. “She works with animal characters who are very cute but they also have this kind of sadness or stress or anxiety. So now you have this bear driving kind of unwieldy, seemingly on a road. And it looks really stressed out and it's as if it's merging onto, or about to crash onto Wilshire.”

This work by Alake Shilling, titled "Buggy Bear Crashes Made in L.A.," was commissioned specifically for the exhibit.

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Courtesy Sarah M. Golonka

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Hammer Museum

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“In LA, you're in your car a lot, and so the art that you can see from your car is principle to how murals work here, and civic engagement works here,” Harden said.

Museum-goers are immediately greeted in the lobby by “Eye on ’84,” recreations of three murals by the late Alonzo Davis, commissioned by the city of L.A. for the 1984 L.A. Olympics.

The 110 freeway used to be home to Alonzo Davis's murals.

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Courtesy Sarah M. Golonka

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Hammer Museum

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Davis chose the walls of the 110 Freeway for his public works. “Put the art where most people can see it,” Harden said. “A lot of people don't go to museums and they don't get to see art. And so Davis was like, this is an answer to that.”

And if there is one unifying principle of the exhibit, it is that all the artists have produced work in their own dialogue with Los Angeles, both in its culture and architectural structure, freeways included.

“That kind of mythology of L.A. as a state of failure or a state of absolute success is what a lot of people are kind of working through here,” Harden said. “I think you find that thematic throughout much of the exhibition, people kind of dealing with L.A. as a subject.”