May 4 at LACMA: The Murals of Los Angeles & Teotihuacan, a Conversation
Los Angeles is a city that is just beginning to embrace its mural history and culture, so it’s fitting that LACMA has opened a new exhibit The Painted City: Art from Teotihuacan, which celebrates Mexico’s ancient painted city. On May 4th, 12:30pm, at LACMA’s Bing Theater, the museum has organized a special, free discussion addressing mural painting as an inherently political medium and its role in shaping the civic identity of both Teotihuacan and Los Angeles.
Teotihuacan and Los Angeles have much in common, despite the centuries that separate them. As the largest metropolis in Mesoamerica, Teotihuacan attracted artists and merchants from across the region and became a place where ideas and technologies were traded readily. Sounds a lot like L.A.!
Participants include Judy Baca, mural artist, founder/artistic director of Social and Public Art Resource Center (SPARC), and professor at the University of California, Los Angeles; Ilene Fort, Senior Curator of American Art at LACMA; Matthew Robb, Curator of Art of the Americas at San Francisco’s de Young Museum, Cindy Schwartzstein, founder of Cartwheel Art; Tanner Blackman, Planning Director for District 14 (L.A. City Council); and Victoria Lyall, Associate Curator of Art of the Ancient Americas at LACMA.
Krown DDCF. Lost Aztlan represents socio-political reality of murals in L.A.
One of Los Angeles’ lost murals, by Philip Lumbag
Shepard Fairey at Indian Alley