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2016 Museum Associates Los Angeles County Museum of Art 5905 Wilshire Boulevard Los Angeles CA 90036 All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical including photography recording or any other information storage and retrieval system or otherwise without written permission from the publisher Editors Hilary Walter and Eduardo Sanchez Designer Hilary Walter Unless otherwise noted all photos 2016 Museum Associates LACMA The 2016 Andrew W Mellon Summer Academy at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art June 12 17 2016 is a component of the Andrew W Mellon Undergraduate Curatorial Fellowship Program The Andrew W Mellon Undergraduate Curatorial Fellowship Program is made possible by the generous support of the Andrew W Mellon Foundation
Lauren Churchwell Alexa Cua Leon Hope Flores Miguel Gutierrez Amara Hopping Jenny Le Melissa Marinero Jasmine McNeal Nadinne Natalia Gisely Ruiz Yesenia Salazar Rachel Tang Leonardo Vilchis Zarate Brian Xu
We are proud to present On the Threshold of Reality Selections from LACMA S Permanent Collection the capstone of the 2016 Andrew W Mellon Summer Academy at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art LACMA The Summer Academy which is a foundational component of the Andrew W Mellon Undergraduate Curatorial Fellowship program is generously supported by the Andrew W Mellon Foundation LACMA has taken a leadership role in launching the Andrew W Mellon Undergraduate Curatorial Fellowship program and is pleased to partner with four other American art museums in an effort to diversify the curatorial ranks of American art museums An impressive cohort of fourteen freshman or sophomore students currently enrolled at colleges universities and community colleges throughout Southern California with an expressed interest in art art history or the museum field were selected and financially supported to participate in this one week behind the scenes program The students many of whom had never worked in an art museum were able to gain access to professionals in the field and learn about the curatorial process in art institutions LACMA s 2016 Andrew W Mellon Summer Academy offered the students a rich experience in the museum environment with workshops tours field trips and networking events with museum professionals During the immersive program the students who had only recently met curated an exhibition together based on photographs from LACMA s permanent collection In this role the students were able to apply their art historical knowledge to the exhibition s organization and wrote the exhibition related texts which can be found in this catalogue The students met with LACMA curators during tours of exhibitions and gallery rotations allowing them to gain insight into the role and career path of a curator An off site field trip to the J Paul Getty Museum enabled the group to tour Robert Mapplethorpe The Perfect Medium and along with LACMA s exhibition of the same name experience the oeuvre of this artist The students visited Daniel Joseph Martinez s art studio and learned about his long and medium rich career In addition we visited the home of Mr Cheech Marin and spent time exploring his Chicano art collection Lastly the Summer Academy allowed students to meet with a wide range of museum staff and learn about career options related to art and art history As a result of the Summer Academy opportunity the participating students have gained first hand knowledge of the curatorial process at LACMA The program has been a success due to the extraordinary skills and experiences each student contributed to the week We look forward to following each student s career path and being able to say we knew them when Hilary Walter Coordinator of Curatorial Fellowships Los Angeles County Museum of Art Eduardo Sanchez Education Content Specialist Los Angeles County Museum of Art 5
On the Threshold of Reality Selections from LACMA S Permanent Collection is the result of a collaboration between fourteen undergraduates participating in the Andrew W Mellon Summer Academy at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art Drawing from the museum s Marjorie and Leonard Vernon collection of photographs in the permanent collection the exhibition presents a thematic grouping of works spanning centuries regions and artistic movements After surveying 50 works in the museum s holdings the young scholars engaged in a curatorial workshop to cull concepts and themes that bridge these diverse objects narrowing the selection to fourteen works linked around a central concern This exercise exposed the Summer Academy participants to various aspects of the curatorial process while emphasizing a close investigation and study of the artworks themselves Over the course of most of its history photography has struggled to be recognized as a legitimate art form due to its relative accessibility and its inherently representational nature In the mid 19th century other disciplines moved away from representation and towards abstraction and self sufficiency which photography had yet to accomplish In order to achieve this artists pushed the limits of photography through a modernist approach creating work that called attention to itself Works like Le Gray s Great Wave use technical manipulation to create an image which would be impossible to depict otherwise Whereas works like Still Life 15 skew perspective and embrace the photograph as a single art object and brings attention to line and form This selection of images from the Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection exemplify artists attempts to put themselves on the threshold of reality 7
Berenice Abbott New York At Night circa 1932 printed circa 1980 Gelatin silver print Image 13 7 16 10 5 16 in 34 1 26 2 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation acquired from Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 1 Berenice Abbott Masters Getty Images The urban landscape comes to life as night falls Abbott captures the vibrant energy that New York possesses through this bird s eye view which is a perspective not naturally seen by the human eye The image comes from Abbott s project Changing New York that documents the city With the camera she presents her own mapped out vision of the Big Apple one that was becoming the metropolis that we are familiar with today Jenny Le 9
Ruth Hallensleben Interior Structure Factory 1950s printed 1950s Gelatin silver print Image 4 1 4 5 1 16 in 10 8 12 86 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation acquired from Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 1004 Ruth Hallensleben Ruhr Museum Photo Archive In response to the destructive effects of advanced technology used in both world wars Hallensleben presented this rational and geometric perspective of a factory The point of view she chooses is decontextualized from typical chaotic depictions of industry as well as from the exploitative function of a factory Through this Hallensleben juxtaposes the cold and logical nature of technology against the chaos and devastation that it can cause Leonardo Vilchis Zarate 11
Gustave Le Gray The Great Wave S te 1857 Albumen silver print Image 13 3 8 16 7 16 in 34 41 8 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation and Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 1284 Trained as a painter Le Gray takes a pictorial approach to his dramatic seascapes by experimenting with exposure methods Tonal and exposure differences between the sea and sky forced photographers to sacrifice one for the other Le Gray creates a captivating composite and subtle abstraction by stacking two different glass negatives to produce a single albumen silver print using the horizon line to seamlessly merge both exposures Melissa Marinero 13
Charles Sheeler Stairwell Williamsburg 1935 Gelatin silver print Image 9 5 16 6 1 16 in 23 7 15 4 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation and promised gift of Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 1809 The Lane Collection An ominously lit stairwell descends around the corner to a doorway that is just out of view A ray of light escapes onto the stairwell like a stray brushstroke on a blank canvas Trained as a painter Scheeler s photography practice was largely informed by his interests in abstract painting Taking notes from painters like Picasso this photograph applies a focus on an ambiguous disorienting perspective and the precision of geometric lines Rachel Tang 15
Tina Modotti Edward Weston Untitled Straw Matting From Idols Behind Altars 1924 1926 printed 1924 1926 Gelatin silver print Image 9 7 16 7 3 8 in 24 18 7 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation acquired from Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 1357 1981 Center for Creative Photography Arizona Board of Regents This photograph depicts geometric and linear design through interwoven strips of straw material The central division gives the photo symmetry and draws the eye vertically across the compositional space The distinction between the patterns gives emphasis to the top layer while giving a sense of unity with a minimal range of tones The practice of straw matting is traditionally used in ceremonies across Mexico Yesenia Salazar 17
Ansel Adams White House Ruin Morning Canyon De Chelly Nat l Monument Arizona 1949 printed 1950 Gelatin silver print Mount 18 x 14 Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation acquired from Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 65 4 Ansel Adams Publishing Trust At this national monument Adams captured the fa ade of an ancient Puebloan cliff dwelling surrounding flora and the cliff itself He pre visualized his composition employed his Zone System a scale showing the gradient from white to black to determine optimal exposure and through the extensive use of darkroom techniques Adams amplified contrast to achieve richer tones This piece which is drawn from Portfolio II exemplifies Adams photography which expresses creative perspectives that transcend technical mastery Brian Xu 19
Man Ray Paris A L Arbre De Victor Hugo 1923 Gelatin silver print Image 11 5 16 7 15 16 in 28 7 20 2 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation acquired from Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 1488 2016 Man Ray Trust Artists Rights Society ARS NY ADAGP Paris American artist Man Ray was a innovative leader for the Dada movement The movement was inspired by World War I and moved its focus from aesthetics to discussing dynamics of social issues The piece shows the destruction of war which encompasses Dada beliefs and Ray s editing techniques or Rayographs The white clouds and dark sky highlight the gray detail of the building and the quiet demolition of the architecture Jasmine McNeal 21
Rose Mandel On Walls Behind Glass 1947 Gelatin silver print Image 4 11 16 3 3 4 in 11 91 9 53 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation acquired from Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 1369 Rose Mandel Archives Rose Mandel was a Jewish woman enrolled at the University of Geneva in Switzerland when Hitler s troops forced her and her husband to flee the country The past traumas of the war present themselves in the image as Mandel inserts elements of discord and ambiguity This foreboding mood is engendered with the reflection of the shadowy figures in the store front window and the inclusion of the enormous eye whose omnipotent gaze challenges the viewer Gisely Ruiz 23
Rei Taka Still Life 15 1989 printed 1989 Platinum print Image 4 3 4 x 3 3 4 Mat 10 x 8 Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation acquired from Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 2228 Rei Taka Still Life 15 is an abstract painterly approach to photography that depicts objects chosen for their formal dialogue rather than any symbolic meaning The aerial view renders three dimensional objects as line shape and value on a flat surface Furthermore her choice of the platinum print indicates Taka s investigation of tonal value as it can capture almost four times the amount of color the much more common gelatin silver could Miguel Gutierrez 25
Albert Renger Patzsch Eschoveria Setosa circa 1925 printed circa 1925 Gelatin silver print Image 8 15 16 6 5 8 in 22 7 16 83 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation acquired from Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 1736 2016 Albert Renger Patzsch Archiv Ann u J rgen Wilde Z lpich Artists Rights Society ARS New York This close up of the Eschoveria Setosa forces the audience to engage with the plant more intimately The succulent s tactile nature is heightened and the illuminated fibers transform the soft hairs into sharp spikes The spoon shaped leaves shrink in size and spiral inward as the fibers envelope the center Albert Renger Patszch is most known as the photographer of things and portrays everyday objects in a new light Nadinne Natalia 27
Carlotta M Corpron Abstraction circa 1930 Gelatin silver print Image 2 3 16 2 5 8 in 5 56 6 67 cm Primary support 2 1 4 2 3 4 in 5 72 6 99 cm Mat 14 11 in 35 56 27 94 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation acquired from Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 552 Carlotta M Corpron Situated in a modernist approach toward photography Corpron s work is concerned with the potential of light to reveal space and shape a composition While the nature of self referential abstraction seems removed Corpron sought light through an engaged process of experimentation and play whom her contemporaries called light poetry As the medium of photography captures our world Corpron is able to move beyond materiality and create a light environment completely her own Amara Higuera Hopping 29
Roy DeCarava Image eye Sherry 1970 printed 1981 Gelatin silver print Image 12 8 1 16 in 30 5 20 5 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation acquired from Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 638 Estate of Roy De Carava This photograph by the late Roy DeCarava uses the techniques of cropping and focus to highlight essential truths of the Black experience Cropping a quarter of the woman s face Decarava creates the effect that she is trapped in the frame while also intensifying her eye Also by leaving the image out of focus Decarava illustrates how the larger public sees this woman not as a fully realized human but as an indistinct fragment Lauren Churchwell 31
Frederick H Evans A Sea Of Steps Wells Cathedral 1903 Platinum print Image 9 1 16 7 1 4 in 23 02 18 42 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation and Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 736 In a moment of serenity the steps of Wells Cathedral are bathed in intimate light Horizontal waves of stone lead us through ancient portals on the upper left lending the image a sense of infinity Contrasting steps and columns rhythmically encapsulate a void in the center pulling the viewer deep into the composition Executed through a dualemulsion process no detail is lost in the image and it remains a testament to Evans masterful in camera manipulation Hope Flores 33
Imogen Cunningham Magnolia Blossom 1925 Gelatin silver print Image 9 3 16 11 5 8 in 23 3 29 5 cm Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Marjorie and Leonard Vernon Collection gift of The Annenberg Foundation and Carol Vernon and Robert Turbin M 2008 40 599 The Imogen Cunningham Trust An early example from Imogen Cunningham s extensive body of work Magnolia Blossom marks her departure from the more painterly style of photography that historically dominated the medium This precisely framed and sharply focused image reflects a modern aesthetic that requires the concentrated observation of a familiar object from a new perspective By presenting the recognizable in hyperrealized form Cunningham s work demands further investigation into photography s ability to not only capture but ultimately reconstruct one s reality Alexa Cua Leon 35
L R Lauren Churchwell Amara Higuera Hopping Miguel Gutierrez Jenny Le Leonardo Vilchis Zarate Melissa Marinero Yesenia Salazar Michael Govan Hope Flores Alexa Cua Leon Nadinne Natalia Brian Xu Rachel Tang Gisely Ruiz Jasmine NcNeal
Lauren Churchwell is a third year undergraduate at Pitzer College Born and raised in Nashville Tennessee she is currently an anthropology and art history major with a keen interest in accessibility and visibility in art museums In the past she has interned at Bevara a non profit arts consulting firm where she helped to organize the 2015 National Basketry Organization conference and worked with the Patton Homestead Foundation Most recently she has worked with the Pomona College Museum of Art doing comprehensive research on economic opportunities for Cahuilla basket weavers in Southern California Alexa Cua Leon is a second year Glendale Community College GCC student Born and raised in Los Angeles she enrolled at GCC in the spring of 2015 where she realized her passion for art history Over just three semesters Alexa immersed herself in the small but tight knit art community on campus where she lead supplemental instruction sessions for two courses offered by the art history department and assembled a group of interested students to form the school s first art history club As its president she worked to increase student and faculty awareness of the arts both on and off campus She also designed and recently completed a yearlong Independent Study research project that examines the intersections of feminism gender and art in contemporary culture Alexa will pursue her undergraduate degree in art history at the University of California Los Angeles this fall Hope Flores enrolled in the Honors Program at East Los Angeles College ELAC after transferring from The New School in 2013 She is pursuing an A A in studio arts and art history with a goal to transfer to California State University Long Beach and earn a B A and M A in art history In 2015 Hope was the Getty Multicultural Undergraduate Intern MUI at Self Help Graphics Art where she assisted in the selection process of a Cuban Printmaking Exchange Hope continues to assist staff at Self Help Graphics Art while also working at the Vincent Price Art Museum VPAM and LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes This summer Hope will be the Getty MUI intern at the Museum of Latin American Art Additionally she will continue exploring the intersectionality of spirituality activism and expression through her studio art practice where she specializes in black ink illustration She maintains those interests in her academic research and plans to examine the visual culture of spirituality across ancient cultures in her senior thesis with a concentration on the similarities between the spiritual art of the Middle East and Latin America Miguel Gutierrez was born and raised near Long Beach California He is currently an art major at the University of California Los Angeles but will claim a double major in art history Within his own practice Miguel works only within his community of queer men of color the contemporary conditions dictating their experiences and his own experience as a queer Latinx in modern day Los Angeles His ideas more often than not manifest themselves in the form of film performance and drawing but will sometimes take a multi media approach As a member of the Hammer Student Association Miguel recently worked alongside a small committee to coordinate Arts Party Chapter 6 Rubbing Elbows the museum s college night where he worked with selected LA based artists to produce workshops around the themes of the current exhibitions for attendees to participate in Amara Higuera Hopping was born and raised in Highland Park Los Angeles to two artists Her community constantly serves as her subject and support She is currently an art student at the University of California Los Angeles UCLA and has been working on a series concerned with transit and the methods in which transient experiences shape the lives of women refugees immigrants children of immigrants students workers and others The series takes shape in various forms textiles sculpture photography and video work Additionally Amara has been involved with the NexGen Program and Boone Children s Gallery at LACMA in Most recently Amara was awarded the Martha Matthias Denny Scholarship through UCLA and in conjunction with the award will exhibit in Fall 2016 with other awardees Jenny Le is attending the University of California Riverside majoring in art history and pursuing a minor in French She was born in Saigon Vietnam and immigrated to Southern California at four years old Jenny was raised in the Vietnamese community in Westminster and she maintains a close relationship with her Vietnamese culture At a young age she developed an interest in fashion which now has grown into a passion Jenny is interested in the Belgium and Japanese avant garde designers as well as modern and contemporary art Through her studies at university she is constantly bridging the influences of art in fashion to see that these two forms of self expression can exist together 37
Melissa Marinero is an art history and photography major at East Los Angeles College ELAC This semester she founded the ELAC Foto Club and is the current club President She has exhibited her chromogenic landscape installation Wilder Ways at the 2015 student art show One of her current series of portraits and landscapes documents Salvadorian life through 35mm color and black and white film Melissa s interest in art history derives from being a student worker at the Vincent Price Art Museum and from her Salvadorian American culture Melissa will be the first of her family to graduate from college this semester and will be transferring to Cal State Long Beach in the fall Her main goal is to attain her Ph D in art history and help introduce more Salvadorian Central American Art in the United States Jasmine McNeal grew up in South Central Los Angeles She is a second year World Arts and Cultures student at the University of California Los Angeles UCLA with an interest in curatorial studies She plans to earn a Masters degree in art history with a concentration in contemporary art While studying at the University of Ghana Legon last year she worked with cultural art and learned the importance of preservation She has interned for the Los Angeles Art Association and Saatchi Art in curatorial and marketing positions Her career and life goals are to curate for progressive museums who believe in the respect and preservation of contemporary cultural art as well as having conversations of how art has been collected and appropriated in the past She wants to specialize in curating exhibitions that educate on the historical and progressive truths of Black culture with contemporary art Her favorite artists include Kehinde Wiley Frida Kahlo Jean Basquiat Oscar Howe Claude Monet and Salvador Dali Nadinne Natalia was born in Jakarta Indonesia and raised in Los Angeles She is currently completing her first year at Santa Monica College with a major in art and a concentration in art history with hopes of transferring to a university next fall She volunteers for the graphic design program at Inner City Arts a nonprofit that provides art classes to schools where art curriculums are often eliminated In her personal work she engages in the photographic medium and explores the complex identities of people of color Gisely Ruiz grew up in East Los Angeles and is a third year art history and history student at the University of California Riverside UCR and plans to pursue her PhD in art history She currently works for the California Museum of Photography as a museum assistant This past year she has been nominated to be a part of the student editorial board for the UCR Undergraduate Research Journal Gisely has also interned for the Riverside Art Museum She conducted in depth research on local artists in Riverside County Her current art historical interests are in the Italian Baroque period Yesenia Salazar is a third year undergraduate at East Los Angeles College ELAC where she tutors art history for the Art Department and is part of the student staff at the Vincent Price Art Museum She has been a lab assistant at ELAC s ceramics studio for a year where she worked closely with a group of veterans She is also interning at Self Help Graphics Art where she will be cataloguing their collection of prints and managing the art database In addition to her passion for visual and cultural studies she is an aspiring artist that utilizes graphite and ink drawings along with oil paint and photography to raise consciousness on social issues and to empower women of color Rachel Tang grew up near the Navajo reservation in Gallup NM She is a third year art history and Philosophy student at Montana State University with plans to continue her studies at the University of Southern California As an intern at the Museum of the Rockies Rachel has catalogued and rehoused the majority of the museum s fine art collection Her current research interests include the politics of representation and the socio ethical imperatives of art and its makers Most recently Rachel has been conducting research for her paper By Any Other Name The Poetics of Titles and the Code of the Contemporary Art World Leonardo Vilchis Zarate is a second year undergraduate at the University of California Riverside where he is pursuing a major in art history He grew up in Boyle Heights where his interest in Latin American art as well as the intersections between art and social justice developed Leonardo is an intern at the Riverside Art Museum where he worked closely with Terri Geis to curate Impossible Worlds The Early Works of Pedro Friedeberg Currently Leonardo is working on The Visual Voice an exhibition of Southern California African American artists and as a research assistant for a Self Help Graphics exhibition of the permanent collection of the Riverside Art Museum Brian Xu is a second year studio art and art history student at East Los Angeles College ELAC He was raised in Monterey Park by traditional Chinese immigrant parents who encouraged practice of the arts but solely as a hobby At the University of California Santa Barbara UCSB he struggled with balancing his personal sexual and cultural identities An Islamic art and architecture class at UCSB and survey classes of Western art history at ELAC ignited Brian s passion for the arts Brian hopes to cooperatively explore historic and contemporary Eastern cultures and works that are not salient in American museums 38
There are many people we would like to thank for making the 2016 Andrew W Mellon Summer Academy at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art LACMA possible First we greatly appreciate the Andrew W Mellon Foundation s generous support of the Andrew W Mellon Undergraduate Curatorial Fellowship Program of which the Summer Academy is a component We also owe a debt of gratitude to Michael Govan Chief Executive Officer and Wallis Annenberg Director LACMA for advocating on behalf of the next generation of curators and would like to thank Chon Noriega Director UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center and LACMA Adjunct Curator and Brooke Davis Anderson Executive Director U S Biennial Inc formerly the Deputy Director for Curatorial Planning at LACMA for their vision in shaping the program Next we would not be here without the guidance of the selection committee members Nancy Thomas Senior Deputy Director for Art Administration Collections LACMA Pilar Tompkins Rivas Director Vincent Price Art Museum and Joe Smoke Grants Administration Division Director Department of Cultural Affairs City of Los Angeles LACMA staff members also contributed their time to the organization and execution of the Summer Academy Art Preparation and Installation Jeff Haskin Collections Management Alyssa Morasco Communications Miranda Carroll Lucy Redoglia Conservation Mark Gilberg John Hirx Janice Schopfer Curatorial Stephen Little Rebecca Morse Sarah Newby Megan O Neil Britt Salvesen Eve Schillo Sharon Takeda Director s Office Samara Whitesides Education Amy Dillon Exhibitions Zoe Kahr Exhibition Design Victoria Behner Marketing Ashley Harris Photographic Services Jonathan Urban Laura Cherry Publications Lisa Mark Erica Wrightson Registrar Errin Copple Nancy Russel Amy Wright Research Library Alexis Curry Douglas Cordell Pauline Wolstencroft Web and Digital Media Joel Ferree and of course Debra McManus Additionally we appreciate Paul Martineau Associate Curator in the Department of Photographs at the J Paul Getty Museum spending time with us on a tour of Robert Mapplethorpe The Perfect Medium at the Getty Center Likewise we are grateful for meeting and discussing art with Daniel Joseph Martinez at his studio as well as having the opportunity to spend time with Mr Cheech Marin and his art collection Finally a special thank you to our family and friends for supporting our artistic pursuits The 2016 Andrew W Mellon Summer Academy participants and Hilary Walter and Eduardo Sanchez 39
