{"id":587094,"date":"2026-04-16T04:38:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T04:38:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/587094\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T04:38:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T04:38:08","slug":"designed-to-disorient-la-art-museum-unveils-enormous-concrete-gallery-20-years-in-the-making-los-angeles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/587094\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Designed to disorient\u2019: LA art museum unveils enormous concrete gallery, 20 years in the making | Los Angeles"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two decades ago, the new director of the Los Angeles<\/a> County Museum of Art (Lacma) began a project to revitalize the space for the 21st century. On Wednesday, the institution unveiled the results of that $724m effort: the David Geffen Galleries, a hulking, curving concrete building that spans Wilshire Boulevard.<\/p>\n

In a city of striking modern architecture, from the Getty Museum to the Disney Concert Hall, the opening is a landmark event. The project, whose unconventional shape has been likened to an amoeba<\/a>, has inspired praise and polarization.<\/p>\n

The 110,000 sq feet of galleries are housed in an imposing, elevated gray structure, ringed with enormous windows, that would be at home in an episode of The Jetsons. Speaking to the press on Wednesday, the museum\u2019s director, Michael Govan, hailed the Swiss architect Peter Zumthor\u2019s work as \u201cof the future and past at the same time\u201d, a building that is \u201caccessible and sublime and new and different\u201d.<\/p>\n

The David Geffen Galleries at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Lacma). Photograph: Iwan Baan<\/p>\n

The project has generated seemingly endless controversy since planning began in 2006; Zumthor\u2019s proposal was revealed seven years later<\/a>. The LA Times\u2019 former architecture critic condemned its appearance \u2013 \u201climitless concrete\u201d that\u2019s \u201cmonotonous\u201d<\/a> \u2013 and its freewheeling approach to curation, and wondered about the practicalities of hanging art<\/a> on concrete walls.<\/p>\n

Some were concerned about the museum\u2019s shrinking galleries \u2013 the Geffen Galleries have about 10,000 sq ft less space<\/a> than the torn-down buildings that preceded it. Non-profit groups<\/a> such as Save Lacma emerged amid concern over funding \u2013 $125m came from the county<\/a>, the rest from private donors<\/a> \u2013 and as several old buildings were destroyed. Zumthor and Govan butted heads<\/a> over funding, and Zumthor suggested the process had been so difficult he would never work in the US again<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But the mood on Wednesday was jubilant, as Govan introduced the press to the nearly finished product, which opens to members on Sunday and to the public on 4 May. He likened a walk through the winding museum to wandering through a park or a forest, with works arranged thematically, not chronologically or according to any hierarchy, so that no artist is \u201cin the back \u2013 everyone is in front\u201d.<\/p>\n

The inaugural presentation in the David Geffen Galleries. Photograph: Museum Associates\/Lacma<\/p>\n

Zumthor, meanwhile, seemed far more enthusiastic about the United States than some of his previous remarks had suggested. Reflecting on what the country meant to him, the architect, born in 1943, described American heroism in the second world war, his relationship to the music of Miles Davis and Charlie Parker, and the shifting of the art world\u2019s center of gravity from Paris to the US. After two or three weeks in Los Angeles, he said, \u201cI had to admit: damn it, I love this city.\u201d Being asked to design the museum as \u201can architect who made small buildings in Europe\u201d was an honor, he said. Govan \u201ctrusted me. Thank you.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Geffen Galleries will showcase Lacma\u2019s 155,000-piece permanent collection, with works in constant rotation. The galleries\u2019 layout is indeed very different from that of a typical art museum, where works are arranged by era or movement and housed in separate rooms. The space instead feels defined by its openness, both internally and through windows to the outside. \u201cThere is no hierarchy here, no main entrance, no first floor,\u201d said Naima Keith, senior vice-president of education, public programs and regional partnerships.<\/p>\n

The galleries, with Tony Smith\u2019s Smoke (1967).<\/p>\n

While some artworks sit in darker rooms, the majority are spread throughout a single, twisting chamber. An area focused on the American west contains images across three centuries, with a 19th-century landscape hanging near a mid-20th-century travel advertisement and 21st-century photography. Nearby, a young man balances a soccer ball on his head while moving slowly under it, and a trio of singers accompany him a cappella, all part of a \u201cconstructed situation\u201d by the Berlin artist Tino Sehgal. A set of black-and-white images by the 20th-century Korean photographer Han Youngsoo is around the bend from divine Hindu sculpture dating back to 600AD. With few corners or flat walls, it\u2019s easy to get lost among the art. A recent Los Angeles Times review<\/a> \u2013 by a different critic \u2013 called the building \u201cradically alive\u201d, and other recent coverage has been positive<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe idea was that it would be a reflection of the diversity of cultures of Los Angeles, that we could be a mirror of that,\u201d Govan said in his opening remarks. \u201cNineteenth-century museums were a lot about categorization and knowledge, but we live in modern Los Angeles, where we\u2019re all interconnected, where migration and interconnectedness are so essential to our daily life.\u201d<\/p>\n

The David Geffen Galleries. Photograph: Museum Associates\/Lacma<\/p>\n

The museum\u2019s leadership emphasized the presence of the city itself in the galleries, where the outer walls are dominated by large windows treated to reduce UV light. (Many of the windows are also dimmed by light-filtering curtains, and the more light-sensitive artwork is kept away from them.) \u201cYou are not in a parenthesis of history outside of the present,\u201d Diana Magaloni, the senior deputy director for conservation, curatorial and exhibitions, told the media. \u201cYou are there looking at the present and understanding the present as you look into the past.\u201d Some of Lacma\u2019s most prominent works are outdoors, including an enormous Jeff Koons topiary sculpture, Split-Rocker, that is covered in 50,000 living plants<\/a>. Across the street, an Alexander Calder mobile perches in a fountain; it\u2019s one of Lacma\u2019s first commissions<\/a> and echoed on tote bags<\/a> across LA. The campus is adjacent to the Academy Museum, the Natural History Museum and the fragrant La Brea Tar Pits, pools that served as an inspiration for an early version<\/a> of the Geffen Galleries\u2019 \u201cblob\u201d-like architecture<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In the galleries, \u201cyou\u2019re never fully cut off from Los Angeles\u201d, Keith said. \u201cArt and city are in conversation in ways that should have always been.\u201d And if there were any doubts about the Geffen Galleries\u2019 LA roots, the museum\u2019s new cafe should put them to rest with an Erewhon collab. The presence of a trendy grocery store known for its $20 strawberries<\/a> would seem to run counter to the museum\u2019s democratizing mission; on the other hand, the museum will host free daily programs for families, no ticket required, Keith said.<\/p>\n

Geffen Galleries \u201cwill feel like an invitation for students, families and our first-time visitors, and especially for the people who have always felt that museums weren\u2019t quite made for them\u201d, Keith said. \u201cThis building, this museum, is different. It\u2019s designed to disorient you in the best possible way.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two decades ago, the new director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Lacma) began a project…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":587095,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[228,226,227,229,88],"class_list":{"0":"post-587094","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"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587094","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=587094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/587095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=587094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=587094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=587094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}