Dear fellow LACMA Lover,
Thank you for joining more than 3400 concerned citizens who have signed the petition urging the Los Angeles County Supervisors to reconsider their approval of the Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for LACMA's redevelopment plan.
Life has changed so much since our last update. Angelenos—at least those of us fortunate to have a home—are sheltering in place to avoid the spreading coronavirus. Many of us have lost work and don’t know how we’re going to pay our bills. The future is uncertain, and frightening. We hope that you are safe and well, and that you stay that way.
And yet as the Los Angeles Times reports almost nothing has changed at LACMA.
Despite strong directives from Governor Newsom and Mayor Garcetti that Californians and Angelenos must stay home and avoid spreading and contracting the coronavirus, LACMA’s administration is steaming ahead in its rush to demolish the 1965 Pereira campus.
While The Academy Museum and Lucas Museum have put their construction projects on hold due to the public health emergency, LACMA continues to endanger construction workers and everybody they encounter in their travels to and from work, and in their homes.
LACMA has also refused to rope off Chris Burden’s Urban Light, or to turn the lights off. Disturbing social media posts show people touching the light poles, which could be spreading coronavirus from hand to hand.
And as Angelenos learned about the museum’s refusal to send work crews home, the new building’s lead donor David Geffen Instagrammed a photo of the $590 Million yacht on which he is quarantining in The Grenadines. Shame on him for being so selfish, and so oblivious to how people are suffering. But we are glad he is showing us who he is, because it only strengthens our argument that the LACMA building project is a bad idea promoted by people who are out of touch with reality.
Today, venerable art collectors journal Apollo published a two-part feature, asking “Has LACMA lost its way?” The first part, by journalist Matt Stromberg, lays out the history of this contentious building project, and public opposition to it. The second part, by LACMA’s recently retired chief curator of European painting and sculpture, J. Patrice Marandel, is a stunning rebuke of everything that will be squandered if the museum goes ahead with its radical plan.
Marandel tells us that LACMA will no longer have an “M” in its name, because director Michael Govan is not building a Museum.
But it is not too late to Save LACMA. Tomorrow, the Los Angeles County Supervisors will have their first meeting since the pandemic crippled Los Angeles, throwing millions out of work and in desperate need of immediate assistance.
The Save LACMA non-profit is calling on Museum Associates and the Supervisors to do the honorable, ethical and social responsible thing and pause plans to demolish LACMA’s campus. The money promised by the County can be better spent to deal with the humanitarian crisis facing Los Angeles.
If you send an email by 5pm, you can make public comment to the Supervisors. Please consider asking them to halt the demolition work at LACMA for the health and safety of the construction workers and others they come in contact with.
View the agenda here: http://bos.lacounty.gov/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=Wx-1WEBbSR8%3d&portalid=1
Send your email to: executiveoffice@bos.lacounty.gov
Deadline: 5pm Monday 3/30/20
Subject: Agenda Item 5: Hard-Hiring Freeze and Freeze on Non-Essential Services, Supplies and Equipment Purchases (20-2038)
Please keep sharing the petition link (http://chng.it/PBQw6hhzdX) with your friends who love LACMA and want it to remain at the heart of our city's culture and community. And stay tuned for updates as we have them.
Yours for Los Angeles,
Kim Cooper & Richard Schave
The LACMA Lovers League