Design Lofts 2007!

I sent my AWESOME staffer out to check out the Design Lofts event. Here is what he reports:

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When I first started college, I basically thought that contemporary art was anything that was being shown at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in Downtown Los Angeles. However, since that time I’ve come to realize that contemporary art extends much farther than the institution of the museum and has an even stronger presence in the independent gallery. Over the past five years, I’ve made an effort to visit the many galleries dotting the Los Angeles landscape in order to expose myself to the variety of artists and styles from every corner of the art world. So when I found out that curator Seth Carmichael was putting together a showcase of the best contemporary art from around the world, I jumped at the chance to go check it out.

Located in the Biscuit Company Lofts’ Supreme Penthouse, and organized in association with LA Magazine’s Design Lofts 2007, Art Loft 2007 delivered on what it promised: great art from current artists in the US, Europe, and Asia. From the moment I walked into the loft, I was surrounded by the art. There were paintings on the walls, sculptures hanging from the ceiling, and even live painting in one of the side rooms. Creativity was in full blossom. However, while there was a lot of good art to see, there were too many other things going on to truly appreciate it. A lot of the pieces were hidden behind PA equipment or tables, and others were displayed in places that were very awkward for extended viewing (such as the staircase). I can only hope that Carmichael noticed this and adjusted the placement of some of the works after the opening.

With all of the work that was on display, a few pieces stick out in my mind as I sit down at my laptop. One, which just happened to be the first piece I saw that night, was Kenji Harata’s Doh Mi Fa Ro So. The painting has a very logical control of form and color and almost seems like it was generated by a computer. The scale and proportions of the composition are very balanced, so much so that that it would be just as successful if Harata had decided to execute it at a different scale. Another work that I enjoyed was Justin Lyons’ Arise. Here, Lyons uses a variety of materials and a simple color palette to create a piece that is at once stark yet inspirational. Perhaps it is the central character’s gaze beyond the barbed wire in front of him, but when I think of Arise, I can’t help but be motivated to do something great. The last work worth mentioning is Memory Palace: The Element of Crime by Birgette Moos. Now, I’m not sure if this was part of a series because there were many similar paintings around the loft, but this was the only one to have an ID tag next to it. In short, her painting(s) reminded me very much of the work of Rothko, but with much more mood. If Rothko blurred the boundaries between edge and frame, Moos takes that idea and explores the ideas of revealing and concealing these elements.

In addition to the art on display in the Supreme Penthouse, LA Magazine invited some designers to display their interpretation of what it meant to live in a loft in Downtown as part of the Design Lofts 2007 show. While the designs were based primarily on quirky wall coverings and custom furniture, the real show stoppers were the original details of the building itself, such as hardwood floors, copper windows, and exposed brick walls. I would have liked to have seen the regular lofts and compare them to the penthouses, but I gathered that they share the same sense of mixing the rawness of the old building with the updates of the new construction.

All in all, Art Loft 2007 was worth the visit, but I’d definitely want to make a second trip down there to really take in the art, especially from those artists to whom I was introduced for the first time. The penthouse is fantastic and I’m sure it would look even better with natural light flooding the quadruple height space. My advice would be to spend one cycle looking at the art and one cycle looking at the loft. Take your time to see how the light changes as you move up through the penthouse and how the placement of the art affects your experience of the space.

MethaBoliCon
www.myspace.com/methabolicon

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