Saturday BCAM Opening at the LACMA

Saturday's grand opening of the Broad (pronounced Brode) Contemporary Art Museum, a new wing of the LACMA, was an all-out extravaganza with magicians, stilt walkers, musicians and live performances, DJs spinning tunes and a pair of gigantic swans dancing around the grassy park.



The swans danced for hours on end

This seemed as much a celebration of the open spaces in the park as it was of the new building. Visitors were encouraged to place little red flags in the ground, creating a connection between the older buildings and the new.


Red flags connected to old and new buildings

Plenty of places to relax and enjoy the beatiful weather

The new building sits between the main grouping of buildings (the main gallery, Japanese Pavillion, etc) and the old May Company building (children's gallery). This space was previously separated by a city street, making the LACMA somewhat disjointed.


I really like the red staircases, although I was surprised by the general lack of windows on any face other than the roof and the North side. The building was designed by Architect Renzo Piano, who re-envisioned this project from a previously planned destruction of the older buildings on the campus.


Accompanying the new building is a new permanent installation, Chris Burden's Urban Light. Burden collected old street lights from a number of different swap meets, flea markets, and collectors; the old caste-iron kind that have been removed from around town over the years. They are collected here and are sure to become a landmark on the campus.



The collection inside the new BCAM is the private collection of Eli Broad (private = no photos allowed), and consists of a large number of big name artists such as Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Ellsworth Kelly, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. The works featured are all amazing in their own right but there is some debate about the connection between the works other than that they were all purchased by Eli Broad. I don't pretend to be as enlightened as most art critics as to the juxtaposition of themes and period pieces, I was just grateful that I got to see many amazing works by Warhol and Kelly up close. And I wouldn't shake my head at Eli Broad's donation of $50 Million and another $10M for acquisitions along with his private collection as such an act of pure capitalism; his collection is a great asset to this city and his promotion of the LA art scene has been exemplary. And I, the lowly guest in someone else's house, get to enjoy all of this for free!