Art L.A. at the Santa Monica Civic was a bit of a disappointment. The opening was crowded but not full. About one-third of the galleries had what you might call “name” artists. The other bunch really threw together as much brightly colored eye-catching gloop as possible. The problem is that it was once a tacky and desperate sales tactic, this filling up a fair’s space with inventory – but it has evolved into an aesthetic in itself!
Therefore, the galleries with name-brand artists follow suit and fill their spaces up with badly drawn debris in between the good stuff. It is then something like watching a favorite movie at home while the neighbor blares the new Brittany Album – bad pop trumping great art by simple sensory overload. Pump up the volume is everywhere.
Just about every artwork at the fair had to have a smug twist – for example, if it was an abstract painting, it had to have a cartoon turd or stick figure in it to ensure the hipsters that the art wasn’t taking itself too seriously. We all know when we take ourselves too seriously that people can make fun of our commitment and our beliefs, and the contemporary art shown at the Art LA Fair was made by people with no capacity for either commitment or belief.
We left early … the opening was just kinda boring. Maybe after the tremendous fair last night, with the amazing food and the huge crowds, the big bucks and the good art, maybe this letdown was only relative and Art L.A. was fabulous. But if you can only go to one fair this weekend, go to the one at the Barker Hangar, that one I am sure of, Art L.A. I will go back to on Saturday and look again, but the overwhelming dullness of candy colored smug doodles screaming to be recognized for all of their own inadequacy – it wasn’t cutting it tonight and people shouldn’t make any weekend plans expecting that to change.