Looking Back III: 13 Shots from LACMA

Back in last October, my firstborn had the option for some extra credit in his art class for visiting one of a few local museums. We opted for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

In case you ever wondered, outside is where several of these cool art deco street lights go to die. If you look close, you can see where it looks like there is either a wedding wrap up or photo shoot going on.

Paid our admission, then went to head in. There's an escalator going all the way to the top of a four or five story building, and go to head in. Closed. Went down a level, and it's only open to a private party. Not making much of a first impression.

Finally back to the ground level, and there's an area we can actually get into!!! First thing is a long, twisty... wall. OK. Next thing was a wall with plastic panels, red, green and white, with florescent light tubes behind 'em. Once again, OK.

Third thing we came to, paydirt!!! Finally something awesome!!! Chris Burden's "Metropolis II".

So, that's something I took the most pictures of. Large format, with a ton of tiny details. Very nicely done!!!

Obligatory selfie in some of the mirrored detail...

And an overhead shot, including the boy. Since it was nearly Halloween, he was wearing a good deal of his Vriska costume. That was part of the assignment, get a picture of yourself with one of your favorite exhibits. In case you haven't figured it out, it's got a couple of conveyor ramps up, four wide, for Hot Wheels type cars, then they split into separate tracks and gravity race down, as well as having some train tracks running through. There's an area inside where the operator can squeeze in and run the thing. Wasn't going when we got there. I asked the docent if I could get in and play with it. She said no, but they do run it a couple times a day, which we'd already missed. There's a few videos of it going on the Youtubes.

Attempted to go to the building across from it, and it was closed to the public, too. A bit farther down also yielded nothing we could get in on. The opposite direction had an exhibit of South Pacific-Polynesian artworks.

The ones pictured here seem to use a lot of actual human skulls, the first shot looking like someone fashioned them into whimsical key chains!!!

Up a level from there, they had a nice exhibit on German Bauhaus art. I think I enjoyed this part of the museum most.

One more shot of the student with some art. Another part of the assignment was to talk to someone who works there about their favorite pieces, and why. He did, but they were closing up and we didn't get to go check out what the girl said were some of her favorites.

On the way out, around the side, there was this odd one, several yellow tubes suspended from an overhead frame. Interesting, but it struck me as probably being pretty grubby, with everyone walking through it.

So, how did he do on the assignment??? He is already doing quite well in the class, so he didn't really need it that bad, which is a good thing, because he was supposed to turn in the receipt for admission as another part of it. Guess I missed that part, because I tossed it out.

Parents can be so irresponsible.