Review: Picasso season arrives in L.A. with two smashing museum shows
The L.A. art world is well-positioned to celebrate the legacy of Picasso, and both shows in the city come with a fair share of hype and speculation: Is it a big deal that the world’s greatest art collector has taken an interest in such a famous artist? (Well, actually, who cares?) And is it a big deal that the guy who bought a Picasso drawing in the 1980s is now opening his first L.A. museum dedicated to the master? (Well, you know the answer to that one.)
A big deal or not, both events are impressive and interesting, and we’re going to be hearing a lot about them for the next few months. The big one is just getting under way, with works by Picasso slated for the Musée Picasso in the Hollywood area. The show runs through Oct. 31. The smaller one, which was planned for the end of May, is on view through March.
The L.A. Times recently attended day one of the Art & Soul open house, the second of two exhibitions dedicated to the Picasso museum and the collection that surrounds it, which include paintings by the cubist master from the beginning of the 20th century, as well as more than 100 of his drawings.
The first show, which debuted at the Gagosian Gallery last month, was a huge success for the art world. The Art & Soul exhibition and the accompanying website, where visitors are able to look at works on paper as well as in person, opened in two months with more than 6,000 visitors. It was so popular that a second show at the Gagosian Gallery is on tap for this coming summer, tentatively titled Unbroken Mirror.
This afternoon, while the official Art & Soul showcase was open to the public, we dropped in on the works of L.A. museum visitors. Most of them were just browsing through the museum’s collection on their own and browsing through photos on their smartphones: they’d heard about the Picasso show, and they wanted to see it.
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