{"id":282711,"date":"2025-11-10T06:09:17","date_gmt":"2025-11-10T06:09:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/282711\/"},"modified":"2025-11-10T06:09:17","modified_gmt":"2025-11-10T06:09:17","slug":"made-in-l-a-s-anti-curation-doesnt-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/282711\/","title":{"rendered":"Made in L.A.\u2019s Anti-Curation Doesn\u2019t Work"},"content":{"rendered":"

LOS ANGELES \u2014 The seventh iteration of Made in L.A.<\/a>, the Hammer Museum\u2019s biennial exhibition showcasing artists working in the greater Los Angeles area, contains few surprises. The curators\u2019 self described \u201cno-methodology methodology\u201d results in a scattered exhibition that feels bland and curatorially unimaginative.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Despite this, the show contains some strong work, especially in cases where the artists have been given their own rooms \u2014 for example, Hannah Hur\u2019s gorgeous five-panel installation \u201cSuspension\u201d (2025), installed in a vault-like gallery. Each painted panel consists of a grid of faint white lines dotted with white flower-like patterns. The interaction between the grid and the flower motif creates a sense of spatial confusion when viewing the work. This effect is only enhanced by the room\u2019s architecture: The lines in the cement floor and the curved shadows cast from a panel, which appears to be floating in midair, become a vital part of the viewing experience. Hur\u2019s quiet work transforms one\u2019s perception of both the viewer\u2019s physical space and the spaces she creates within each painting.<\/p>\n

\"\"Installation view of Hanna Hur, \u201cSuspension\u201d (2025), acrylic, colored pencil, Flashe, and pigment on canvas<\/p>\n

Na Mira disorients histories and mythologies in \u201cSugungga (Hello)\u201d (2025).\u201d The work references a Korean allegory in which a sick dragon king trying to cure itself lures and is subsequently tricked by a rabbit. Two videos are projected onto opposite sides of a holographic glass \u2014 one filmed in a cab driving around the outside perimeter of a walled former military building, constructed by the Japanese army and later used as a US military base, and the other showing an inflatable rabbit sculpture inside of the grounds. These projections collapse inside and outside. They cast ghostly moving shadows and distorted imagery around the room and onto other viewers. The story of Korea\u2019s occupiers is literally embodied by this one building, and the work\u2019s confusing boundaries cast the viewer as both victim and complicit co-conspirator, as both inside and outside systems of power.<\/p>\n

Another standout is an assemblage by Gabriela Ruiz comprised of cartoonishly painted screaming faces, a surveillance camera that displays the viewer on a screen, and an LED streetlamp. This piece perfectly embodies our fraught relationship with technology, wherein we willingly allow ourselves to be surveilled by social media platforms under the guise of connecting with others. These platforms have also manipulated and damaged our thought patterns, siloing us into our own personalized echo chambers and flattening commerce, memes, life milestones, and horrifying news clips into a single bland stream of content vying for our attention. The work is appropriately titled \u201cCollective Scream\u201d (2025).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\tGabriela Ruiz, \u201cCollective Scream\u201d (2025), acrylic, gouache, pastel, colored pencil, acrylic pens, epoxy clay, metal hooks, metal pipes, metal hardware, LCD monitors, TV monitor, roll-up gate, LED streetlamp, and surveillance camera on wood panel<\/p>\n

Other highlights include Amanda Ross-Ho\u2019s hilarious and poignant oversized replicas of her father\u2019s residential nursing home door adorned with seasonal decorations, Carl Cheng\u2019s singular erosion machines, and Patrick Martinez\u2019s installation of a ruined and graffiti\u2019d cinderblock structure, \u201cBattle of the City on Fire\u201d (2025).<\/p>\n

Without a clear curatorial thesis, Made in L.A. reverts to the default modus operandi of large museum group exhibitions, which is to add legitimacy and cultural capital to artists who have already been vetted by the market or other institutions. Even as a relative newcomer to Los Angeles (I moved here about five years ago), many of the artists included are already familiar to me and have been showing regularly throughout the city. I\u2019d love to see the next Made in L.A. go \u201coff menu\u201d a little more.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\tNa Mira, \u201cSugungga (Hello)\u201d (2024), two-channel Hi8 and HD video, holographic glass, 14 min.
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\tPatrick Martinez, \u201cBattle of the City on Fire\u201d (2025), stucco, cinder blocks, neon, acrylic paint, spray paint and latex house paint on scorched panel
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\tCarl Cheng, \u201cAlternative TV #9\u201d (1979\u20132016), plastic chassis, acrylic water tank, LED lighting and controller, electrical components, conglomerated rocks, and plastic plants
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\tBruce Yonemoto, \u201cBroken Fences\u201d (2025), monitors, lacquer, wood
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\tAmanda Ross-Ho, work from the series Untitled Thresholds (FOUR SEASONS) (2025)
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\tAlake Shilling, \u201cIs there hope for me once more\u201d (2025), glazed ceramic<\/p>\n

Made in L.A. 2025<\/a> continues at the Hammer Museum (10899 Wilshire Boulevard, Westwood, Los Angeles) through March 1, 2026. The exhibition was organized by Essence Harden and Paulina Pobocha, with Jennifer Buonocore-Nedrelow.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LOS ANGELES \u2014 The seventh iteration of Made in L.A., the Hammer Museum\u2019s biennial exhibition showcasing artists working…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":282712,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[228,226,227,229,88,149442,3031,149443],"class_list":{"0":"post-282711","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-artsanddesign","11":"tag-design","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-hammer-museum","14":"tag-los-angeles","15":"tag-made-in-la"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282711","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=282711"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282711\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/282712"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=282711"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=282711"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=282711"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}