LA’s cultural diversity is reflected by its tremendous array of museums scattered through the city. From dinosaur bones to fairy skeletons, Andy Warhol to Uta Barth, the Abstract Expressionism to Japanese prints, there are plenty of ways to get your ‘edu-tainment’ fix.
Large/City
At the heart of the Miracle Mile is the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Map 6), or LACMA, with its comprehensive collection including Renaissance masterpieces, costumes and textiles, and African beadwork. The museum hosts weekly jazz and chamber music concerts and its Bing Theater shows documentaries and revival films. The Page Museum (Map 6), part of the LACMA campus, showcases fossils recovered from the La Brea Tar Pits that bubble nearby. In Brentwood, escape the hellish 405 and ascend by computer-operated tram to the Getty Center (Map 16), a heavenly museum complex perched on a hilltop. The permanent collection includes works by Van Gogh, Cézanne, and Rembrandt, but the museum’s spectacular views, gardens, and architecture steal the show. As it’s one of the city’s few free museums, all you’ll pay for is parking. The Getty’s sister museum, the Getty Villa in Malibu, re-opened its collection of antiquities in the winter of 2006. Downtown’s Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) (Map 9) owns works by Lichtenstein, Rauschenberg, and Rothko and hosts hip opening-night parties. The Autry National Center in Griffith Park mounts fascinating exhibits on subjects like the art of rawhide braiding and Jewish life along the Santa Fe Trail. Kids love to visit the creepy-crawly insect zoo at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles (Map 11) in Exposition Park. In San Marino, bask in the glorious gardens at the Huntington (Map 35), but don’t miss the institution’s world-renowned art and rare manuscript collections.
Small Collections
The Norton Simon Museum (Map 34) in Pasadena houses a fine private collection of European, American, and Asian art, including many of the bronze sculptures in Edgar Degas’s Dancer series. Work by famed Harlem Renaissance artist Palmer C. Hayden is on display at the Museum of African American Art (Map 10) in Crenshaw. UCLA’s recently remodeled Hammer Museum (Map 20) shows this year’s cutting-edge artwork alongside last century’s masterpieces. For a family field trip, try the Craft & Folk Art Museum (Map 6) or the Zimmer Children’s Museum (Map 6) on Wilshire’s Museum Row.
Specialty
Confront the past at the Museum of Tolerance (Map 23), where interactive exhibits focus on the Holocaust and the American civil rights movement. The Japanese American National Museum (Map 9) in Little Tokyo hosts taiko drummers, sumi-e lessons, and special exhibitions such as the recent Isamu Noguchi retrospective. Indulge your favorite hot-rod historian at the Petersen Automotive Museum (Map 6) near LACMA. The Los Angeles Police Historical Society (Map 33) displays bullets older than your grandfather, and the photos at the African American Firefighter Museum (Map 9) reveal the role played by black firefighters in the history of Los Angeles. Complete with its very own exit off the 405, the Skirball Cultural Center (Map 54) is a premier Jewish cultural organization that offers socially relevant exhibitions along with regular musical and literary events.
Oddities
Culver City’s Museum of Jurassic Technology (Map 24) is one of the most unique places in the city and home to those aforementioned fairy skeletons and other peculiarities. Next door to the MJT is CLUI (Center for Land Use Interpretation) (Map 24), a great exhibition space dedicated to the theme of land usage across the country. While not technically a museum, the LA County Coroner’s Gift Shop, Skeletons in the Closet (See Shopping, Map 40), is a must-shop experience for the macabre or anyone looking for a chalk body outline beach towel. The Paley Center for Media (Map 1), as implied by the name, is a must see for media fanatics. The Museum of Neon Art (Map 9) is just what it sounds like and expectedly trippy.
