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Art & Design
When an Exhibition Resonates (Almost) Like a Book Exhibition Review: Overdrive: L.A. Constructs the Future, 1940–1990 9 April–21 July 2013 The Getty Center, Los Angeles, USA Text by Shirley Surya Images courtesy of the J. Paul Getty Trust
The ephemerality of exhibitions, in particular
its all-encompassing curatorial methodology
those on the subject of architecture and the
that could reframe how we study, display, and
city—whose reality exists outside the gallery
perceive architecture and the city.
space—often
A swee ping su r vey of Los Ang eles ’ a rchitec tu re a n d u rba n pla n ning ove r the span of 50 years, Overdrive is an ambitious ef for t to document L . A .’s g row th into on e of th e m os t p op ulo u s a n d influ e ntial cities in th e world . Shi rley Su r ya p rese nt s a n ove r view of th e exhibition org a nised by th e G et t y Resea rch In s titute a n d th e J . Pa ul G et t y M u se u m .
in
terms
renders
of
knowledge
impactful than
There was something exhilarating when the title of Getty’s long-anticipated exhibition
experienced
on
than
production
meticulously
“read.”
Yet
modern
architecture
in
Los
Angeles
there have been exhibitions that curators
(L.A.) was announced more than a year
and
ago.
historians
revisited A
for
re ce n t
their
lasting
is
G ra h a m
one
of
Charged
with
mechanical
an
drive
overriding
behind
an
sense actively
Foundation’s commemoration of the “ground-
developing urban phenomenon, free from
breaking” exhibition Italy: The New Domestic
the predictable affectations of mid-century
Landscape, curated by Emilio Ambasz in 1972
California
for challenging established notions of product
exhibition could not be more appropriate.
design
Presented
in
everyday
life
and
introducing
modernism, with
the
materials
title on
of
the
the city’s
new social and political dimensions to the
architectural
discussion. Considering how Ambasz achieved
scale and breadth, one’s general experience
this by organising the show according to
through the gallery was akin to being on
polemical
excessively
interiors
categories by
and
high-profile
newly
designed
high
in
a
gear—though
sweeping
with
less
risk of feeling spent if one kept in mind the
more
challenge of exhibiting (not just researching)
seek
architecture and the city. The exhibition’s
materials,
curators—Wim de Wit and Christopher J.
be as disruptive as the likes of Ambasz’s
Alexander—were clear about benchmarking
spectacular
scholarly
Overdrive to an exhibition like Architecture
texts? From a curatorial-research point of
in California, 1868–1968 (UCSB Art Gallery,
view, the exhibition Overdrive: L.A. Constructs
1968), which they claimed to be the only
the
comprehensive survey of the region’s diverse
historical to
and
faithfully
Future,
architects,
production
can
collections-based
158
less
say, a book. Exhibitions, after all, are more
s i g n i f i c a n ce.
1 Department of Water and Power Building by A.C. Martin & Associates. Photo by Julius Shulman, 1965. Gelatin silver print. 20.2 x 25.2 cm (7 15/16 x 9 15/16 in.). © J. Paul Getty Trust Used with permission. Julius Shulman Photography Archive, Research Library at the Getty Research Institute.
them
exhibitions
inductive present
dioramas
1940–1990
with
bent, archival
or
a
which
other
presented
such
a
possibility (though not without its limits) for
architecture and infrastructure since 1968.
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The exhibition revealed the multiple and complex factors behind the layers that made up L.A., so as to consider anew a region that has generally been written off as either a superficial faceless sprawl, where commercialism seems to take “design” out of architecture; or whose design legacy, on the other extreme, was just about the works of Schindler and Neutra, and Case Study Houses.
Art & Design
Unlike other exhibitions such as California
psychedelic night lights—at the entrance of
Design, 1930–1965: Living in a Modern Way
the exhibition’s gallery, as though to remind
(LACMA, 2012) or Birth of the Cool: California
the visitor how the city had been perceived,
Art,
and its vastness in which architecture would be
Design
and
Culture
at
M i d ce n t u r y 2007),
contextualised in the show. Here, architecture
Overdrive prioritised all-inclusiveness, diversity,
was embedded in L.A.’s urbanism and shaped
processes,
architectural
by its multiple actors, and this notion was
production in the representation of archit-
doubly emphasised by a quote, also at the
ecture
entrance,
(Orange
County and
and
Museum networks
modernism
of of in
Art,
L.A.,
beyond
the commonly mediated style of postwar
by
Los Angeles Times journalist
Norris Leap in 1958:
Californian modernism. It insisted on a longer historical view of addressing both historic
“This is the day supersonic flight, of the
and contemporary urbanism. According to
one-man helicopter and the moon rocket, of
De Wit, 1940 marked the beginning of L.A.’s
the miracles of chemistry and physics and
expansion
its
engineering. It also is the day when dreamers
freeways, while 1990 signalled its end when
include the architect and the builder and the
many plans were scraped and the city turned
hard-headed banker. And this day’s dreamers
inward. In terms of architectural development,
say it’s well past the dawn’s twilight of a new
De Wit thought that the risk of burdening
Los Angeles era.”
with
the
masterplanning
of
the viewer with the 50-year span was worth
2 Entrance Tower on Vermont Boulevard to the 1984 Olympics, Los Angeles, 1983. Colour pencil, crayon, and ink on tracing paper. 46.2 x 40.3 cm. Collection of John Spohrer, Los Angeles. 3 Dave Packwood Santa Monica Freeway (Interstate 10) and Harbor Freeway (Interstate 110) Interchange, May 1962. Photograph. 25.4 x 20.3 cm (10 x 8 in.). Automobile Club of Southern California Archives. 4 Julian Wasser, Tower Records, Sunset Strip, Los Angeles, CA, 1973. Gelatin silver print. 19.1 x 23.4 (7 1/2 x 9 3/16 in.). Courtesy of Julian Wasser and Craig Krull Gallery, Santa Monica. © Julian Wasser
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it as “ending around 1980 would have left
Th e
out a whole younger generation of Gehry,
would take no centre-stage but as innovative
q u o te
Mayne, Rotondi, and Moss,” which he said was
designers, were key agents among multiple
important to show that modern architecture
forces
in L.A. was “not just about the highlights of
patrons, financial flows, powerful alliances,
Schindler, Neutra, or Ain.” 1
and vested interests that resulted in a built
of
e n c a p s u l ate d
change
h ow
driven
by
architects
enlightened
environment shaped not by an aesthetic norm Comprehensiveness
was,
therefore,
more
a
revisionist, than an encyclopaedic attempt. The
but by factors of industry and commerce, diversity of cultures, and disciplines.
exhibition revealed the multiple and complex factors behind the layers that made up L.A., so
This was evident upon entering the first
as to consider anew a region that has generally
gallery
been written off as either a superficial faceless
inundated
sprawl, where commercialism seems to take
visual artefacts—drawings of Googie coffee
“design” out of architecture; or whose design
shops, car showrooms, as well as renderings
legacy, on the other extreme, was just about
and
the works of Schindler and Neutra, and the
which could come as a surprise to one with
Case Study Houses. The gesture of bringing
certain
to mind (and dismantling) preconceptions of
show, until noticing that it was the “Car
the city was clear from the start with Peter
Culture”
Alexander’s
opening chapter showed how L.A.’s urbanism
painting
PA
and
PE
(1990)—
an aerial view of L.A. reduced to a sea of
and
as
the by
videos
v i s i to r a
of
Ford’s
expectations section
architectural
wa s
i m mediately
floor-to-ceiling
of
automobile
of
an
the
identity
sea
of
design,
“architecture”
exhibition. in
the
This 1950s,
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particularly in
with
typology,
was
its
w i d e s p re a d
inextricably
d r i ve to
had reviewed of the exhibition, “the quality of
motorised living, as well as industrial forms
the drawings, photographs and models (was)
and materials of automobile culture. The
remarkably high,” with a special mention of
non-hierarchical
curbside
the Tillman Plant whose design was considered
landmarks in the form of Armet and Davis’
to have fundamentally changed the way the
rendering of Rome’s Times Square drive-in
Department of Water and Power viewed its
restaurant (1955), photographs of billboards
architectural legacy since the 1980s.
display
of
linked
representations. 2 As Christopher Hawthorne
these
and signage on Sunset Boulevard, as well
5 View of gallery in between “Car Culture” and “Urban Networks” section. 6 View of “Engines of Innovation” section of the gallery. 7 Romeo’s Times Square Restaurant by Armet & Davis, 1955. Pencil on paper. 55.9 x 160 cm (22 x 63 in.). Collection of Armet Davis Newlove Architects.
as artist Ed Ruscha’s maquette for Every
An exhibit in the next section of “Engines of
Building on the Sunset Strip (1966), set the
Innovation,” however, would serve to remind
tone for the rest of the exhibition marked
that twenty years earlier, the Department was
by the display of both the pedestrian and
already the first to embrace the modernist
commercial,
vocabulary
alongside
the
authored
and
of
steel-and-glass
as
emblems
iconic. Such a curatorial st rate g y o f b re a k i n g
of efficiency and good business, as seen in
d ow n
“high”
Julius Shulman’s night photograph of the
and “low” reflected the approach historians
u n d e rc u r re nt
categories
Los Angeles Department of Water and Power
and critics like Reyner Banham, Mike Davis,
Building (1964) designed by A.C. Martin &
and Kevin Starr have taken in expounding
Associates. It was an example of the section’s
on Los Angeles’ vibrant built legacy and
emphasis on the ecology—the actors and
potential
forces—that shaped the urban environment
opportunities
of
through
a
socio-
economic and material-cultural reading of
and architectural manifestations.
urbanism, in which transportation networks and power infrastructures were as significant
From
in shaping the city as its signature residential
d eve l o p e d by a e ro s p a ce i n d u st r i es in the
designs. It led to a natural transition into
design of Howard Hughes’ hangar, to Franklin
the neighbouring section of the exhibition
D. Israel’s and Eric Owen Moss’s adaptive
8 Corbin Palms Development by Palmer and Krisel, 1953. Pencil on vellum. 45.6 x 127.8 cm (17 15/16 x 50 5/16 in.). Gift of Wiliam and Corinne Krisel, William Krisel Architectural Archive. The Getty Research Institute.
entitled “Urban Networks.”
reuse of old warehouses into film studios for
9 KTLA Studios by Thornton M. Abell, 1948. Ink and pencil on tracing paper. Unframed: 52.7 x 102.6 cm (20 3/4 x 40 3/8 in.). Thornton Abell Papers, Architecture and Design Collection. Art, Design & Architecture Museum, UC Santa Barbara.
162
the
use
of
new
building
materials
the media and entertainment clients, as well From
photographs
transmission
as the commissioning of higher education
towers and freeways, which conveyed how
facilities like the beautifully sited Art Center
Banham once likened these arteries’ sweeping
College of Design “bridge building” (1968)
arcs elegantly permeating the grid system
presented in a 198-centimetre-long sketch
of municipal districts as “a work of art,” to
by Craig Ellwood—the exhibits demonstrated
the impeccable model of Anthony Lumsden’s
the avenues of creativity provided by likely
Tillman
and
Water
of
electric
Reclamation
Plant
(1984),
unlikely
visionary
architectural
clients,
whom
not without their formal qualities as built
array of building types wo u l d remain on
projects, enhanced by the nature of their
p a p e r.
“Urban
experiments
without
these utilitarian infrastructural facilities were
N etwo r k s ”
and
for
an
“Engines
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of
I n n ovat i o n ”
re p re s e nt i n g of
capital
ra i s e d
the
of
n e ce ss i ty
i n d u st r y,
while driving through L.A.; the boulevards became less dreadful while considering the
well
as
less-known
rise and fall of Googie buildings upon seeing
In the introduction of the book Curating
that represented their complex form-making
the new and dying storefronts. Outside of
Architecture
production, especially when the architect-
experiments and precursor to the built High
Los Angeles, perhaps one need not have read
Chaplin and Alexandra Stara reminded readers
auteur and the finished form had often been
School No. 9 in L.A.. There was, thus, a thread
Cody’s article to realise the influence of L.A.’s
that any reading of the contemporary city is
elevated above the commercial or utilitarian.
running through the exhibition, of paying
architecture in Asia if one started noticing
like that of a “layered parchment”—far from
tribute, through equally engaging artefacts,
the
glass-
complete and having to go through constant
to
under-
clad corporate towers, and shopping malls in
rewriting. 5 Curating architecture and the city
represented, with a balanced appreciation of
Singapore or Jakarta. Depending on the type
should thus be “messy and contingent, full
the formal and social.
of visitor, an exhibition in the end could only
of
hit a few nodes—it is not an exposition but a
most importantly, present opportunities to
Presenting beyond
the
the
pioneering
diversity
of
canonical
building
continued
types
in
the
second last section of the exhibition entitled
both
the
celebrated
and
the
“Community Magnets.” While the section had Art & Design
drive-in
restaurants,
insulating
and
endless
the
questions,
City,
editors
contradictions,
Sarah
and,
the noble goal of exploring structures including
While Overdrive succeeded in doing justice
lead-in, and at best, it could present objects
engage directly with spaces, places, people
malls, synagogues, and performing arts centres
to t h e m o d e r n i t y o f L o s A n g e l e s ’ archi-
and subjects that merit further scrutiny and
and their ideas.” Overdrive had achieved
that become destinations for residents and
te c t u ra l
opened new lines of inquiry and research.
this
tourists, there was a sense that its broad
addressing its diversity and interconnections
criteria could also include buildings in other
between various agents, yet without some
While
sections. There remained, however, significant
effort of sieving out the details or reading
of
there
curators had not cowed from tackling the
examples:
the
the
could not be enough emphasis on how the
comprehensive picture without the trappings
model of Disney Concert Hall, made more-or-
exhibition could well be a dizzying frenzied
production of an exhibition is also far from
of totalising narratives. It represented the
less of stacked cuboids, presented the reality
plenty to the layman. The scholar-expert,
the production of a text. It is precisely due
complexity of the region’s modernity without
of
expectations
on the other hand, may also be frustrated
to the exhibition’s many publics that the
losing
and advances in digital design technology
at having only a glimpse of each project
success of an exhibition would lie in its ability
through
had drastically transformed its initial design;
through an artefact and a short label, and
to
objects, archives, and historical documents
while Jerde Partneship’s axonometric of the
may consider the exhibition short of being
sources of an architecture exhibition, which
related
to
the
processes
of
entrance tower and life-size construction of
able to prove its “thesis” of L.A.’s role in
Mirko Zardini, Director of C a n a d i a n C e n t re
production
that
indicated,
reinforced,
sonotube columns for the 1984 Olympics was a
constructing the future—especially when the
for
confirmed new directions in research. More
reminder of how an architectural practice (now
“future” seems to be a moving target within
‘transdisciplinary
shunned as being overly “commercial”) had
the span of 50 years.
“a combination of architecture, theatre and
historiographical
scenery, visual art and electronic media.” 4 For
in the tricky business of curating architecture
how
Frank
much
Gehry’s
finance,
1988
public
competition
p ro d u c t i o n
catalogue,
and
one’s
urbanism
impression
of
by
once proposed a brilliantly bold and pragmatic kit-of-parts
type
of
eve n t
a rc h i te c t u re
A ss e ss i n g
the
i m p a ct
of
a
one
an
could
compare
exhibition
communicate
versus
through
A rc h i t e c t u re ,
aptly space’
the a
reception
book,
tangible
primary
described created
as
a
through
of Los Angeles’ commercial skyscrapers in
shows,
exhibition
the shaping of the central business districts in Asia. 3 But such a reading would not be
average
like a room of “dollhouses,” with a number of 1:200 scale models of the city’s signature
clear through the display of an advertisement
led to the amassing and dissemination of
housing
by
Overdrive call
of
demonstrating
had
gone
beyond
architecture in-depth
the
exhibitions
research
that
of PPG Solarban Insulating Glass published
ideas embedded i n ex i s t i n g , u n d e r u t i l i s e d ,
familiar residential projects were deliberately
in
(Nov,
or unknown archives by creatively displaying
left to the last, in De Wit’s words, “to keep
1974).
question
original and wide-ranging models, photographs,
people’s suspense.” Yet the range of projects
of how much could an exhibition format
artworks, drawings, and footages of impeccable
presented remained consistent with the rest
explicate complexity, but also the fact on
quality. These included the screening of the
of
diversity.
the exhibition’s many publics—the by-passer,
marketing clip of Capital Records Building or
form
of
the reflector, or the investigator—as opposed
Jack Laxer ’s photographs of Amet & Davis’s
Pierre F. Koenig’s drawing of Stahl House
to a book’s keen reader, such that it would
coffee shops viewed through stereograms,
and Julius Shulman’s iconic photos of them,
have been sufficient for an exhibition to
but also producing new representations with
though
a
communicate to any of these audience, at any
archival sources: a visual mapping of L.A.’s
fraction of the range of housing projects
degree. Perhaps it was sufficient for Overdrive
physical, civic, social, and economic landscape
exhibited. Others included a site plan of the
to open up any narrow preconceptions of
in the first section of the exhibition using
revolutionary
uniquely
L.A., either by making visitors aware of how
statistics related to landscape infrastructure,
sited Corbin Palms tract housing development
the city had come to be the way it is, or by
networks
(1953)
re-examining
they
conflict; and a 3D flythrough of Welton Becket
signifier of the mid-century modern middle-
found too familiar. Personally, the exhibition
& Associates’ Capitol Records Building that
class
according
prodded one to notice the substations and
revealed details of the world’s first circular
to the philosophy of the Case Study House
offices of the Department of Water and Power
tower in the setting of 1956 LA downtown,
the
The
exhibition
Case
Study
in
houses,
prominently
by
showcasing in
placed,
mass-produced Palmer
housing
dream
and
the
were
yet
only
Krisel—the
designed
real
Asian It
Building raised
ideas
and
Construction
the
perennial
behind
architectural
the
methodological
and
necessary approach
non-canonical objects and subjects have not
videos, and models, the last section of the
these
questions
wide-ranging
patterns of urban development, and where
which are usually present in most architecture
curators,
provided
key
of
the centrifugal does not necessarily exist in
of the prototypical structures and materials
the
it
use
that has “altered the visitors’ gaze.”
surprising projects in the form of prints,
For
importantly,
raising
and urbanism, especially that of Asia, where
Despite the lack of 1:1 mock-ups of projects,
projects.
by
strategic
important due to the “culture of experience”
Cody’s article could expound on the influence
almost
clarity,
Zardini, this medium has become even more
And after encountering all of the rather
felt
immersive and thesis-proving exhibition, the
was
certainly more of a task of the catalogue
Fabric”
Even
built
most profitable Olympic Games.
“Residential
postulation.
c i ty’s
ex p e r i m e nt s
p ro g re ss i ve
theoretical
d esign
produced with the lowest budget for one of the
and
beyond
with its inability to hit all the nodes of an
than the exhibition. In the catalogue, Jeffrey
164
modelled by the UCLA Urban Simulation Team.
Coop Himmelblau’s Rehak Residence (1990)
of
te c h n o l o g y
and
unrealised projects through models such as
programme—as
in
n a r rat i ve
m ate r i a l s
of
i nf l u x
a rc h i te ct u ra l
the
and
the
ro l e
projects
and
settlements,
economy
been systematically studied to date. Overdrive: LA Constructs the Future, 1940–1990 is now presented at the National Building Museum (Washington D.C.) from 20 October 2013 to 10 March 2014. For more information, visit www.nbm.org.
1 Email interview with Wim De Wit, 8 August 2013. 2 Reyner Baham, Los Angeles: The Architecture of Four Ecologies (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2009), 203. 3 Jeffrey W. Cody, “Across the Pacific: Los Angeles as Catalyst for Architectural Change in East Asia,” Overdrive: L.A. Constructs the Future, 1940–1990 (Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2013) eds, Wim de Wit and Christopher James Alexander, 97–107. 4 Mirko Zardini, “Exhibiting and Collecting Ideas: A Montreal Perspective,” Log 20, Fall 2010, 81. 5 Sarah Chaplin and Alexandra Stara, “Introduction,” Curating Architecture and the City (Oxon: Routledge, 2009) eds., Sarah Chaplin and Alexandra Stara, 1–5.
and
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