Alphabet City

Actor Chris Klein at LAXART Benefit Auction presented by Hermès

New York during fashion week, Toronto during the film festival, even Detroit during the auto show—it’s those brief times of plenty when you think how exciting it is to live in the metropolis, and how exhausting. Right now, Los Angeles is in the middle of a full season of art events, and the uninitiated might need an acronym dictionary to survive. It all began with the flashy opening of a Takashi Murakami retrospective at MOCA (the Museum of Contemporary Art). Next was the annual Angel Art auction, sponsored by David and Sybil Yurman and hosted by CAA (Creative Artists Agency). A few nights later, Hermes underwrote another benefit auction that raised $300,000—three times the expected take—for LAX Art. (The non-profit arts space appropriated the acronym used by the FAA—that’s the Federal Aviation Administration, of course—for the Los Angeles International Airport.) Then LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art) and artists Mark Bradford and Ruben Ochoa launched a terrific initiative to take arts education into the LAUSD (Los Angeles Unified School District.)

And that’s not even the half of it. The cymbal crash at the end of this alphabetical crescendo won’t resound until February, when the hotly anticipated BCAM (Broad Contemporary Arts Museum) opens with an inaugural gala. Art lovers who wish to attend are advised to RSVP ASAP.

ANDREAS BRANCH/ ©Patrick McMullan