Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA
Various dates and locations, through Jan. 14
Is Los Angeles part of Latin America? asked Larry Wilson in the Los Angeles Daily News. “The answer, of course, is sí ”: L.A. was founded by 11 Mexican families in 1781, didn’t enter its Anglo phase for a century, and today is home to more people of Latino descent than of any other ethnicity. At long last, the city’s art establishment is celebrating that reality this fall with 80 linked exhibitions, all underwritten by the Getty Foundation, at 70 Southern California institutions. The family bond between Latin America and all of Southland from San Diego to Santa Barbara feels especially strong at this political moment, “but it was always thus.” In the work of the 1,100 artists represented in the sprawling endeavor, the idea of home “emerges as an overarching theme,” said The Economist. One small show, at L.A.’s Craft & Folk Art Museum, makes the U.S.Mexico borderland seem itself like a homeland by calling attention to the art inspired by the border among artists on both sides.
“Given the god-awful traffic in Southern California,” almost no one will be able to visit all 70 venues participating in “Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA,” said Peter Plagens in The Wall Street Journal. But a recent sampling suggests that nearly half offer rewarding experiences: I didn’t even mind that I needed three hours to drive the mere 30 miles between the two halves of an exhibition about how Donald Duck reflects and embodies a history of cultural appropriation, cultural imperialism, and playful cross-cultural dialogue. The scattered