Everyone loves a parade, and Angelenos thronged Wilshire Boulevard by the tens of thousands on Saturday (20 June) to watch one. This was the first Art Parade organised by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Lacma) and was part of the grand-opening weekend of its David Geffen Galleries. The parade began early in the evening, with attendees lining both sides of Wilshire, as the sun slowly dipped toward the horizon and bathed the street in golden-hour light.
The procession pushed off across from Chris Burden’s iconic Urban Light (2008) and headed east, winding under the museum to Curson Avenue, where it looped back and proceeded west to Fairfax Avenue for one very long block.
The idea for the parade began with a conversation between Lacma’s director, Michael Govan, and the gallerist Jeffrey Deitch. (Deitch oversaw a similar parade in New York City in the mid-2000s.)
Michael Govan and Jeffrey Deitch at the Art Parade Photo: Scarlet Cheng
“I wanted to close Wilshire for a party, to celebrate with the metro open,” says Govan, who has long envisioned the synergy of museum and mass transportation on the Miracle Mile—a new metro stop recently opened directly across from Lacma. “We decided we would try to make the parade part of our big block party,” he tells The Art Newspaper. The Lacma Block Party was a well-attended weekend of dance, music, food trucks and free admission to the galleries.
Parade participants were chosen from around 150 entries, with more than 1,000 total participants, from solo marchers to groups of more than 70. Applicants included artists and just about anyone else who provided a creative proposal and a sketch or illustration. There were some organisations represented, too—such as the Corita Art Center and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, as well as at least two environmental groups raising awareness of the endangered Monarch butterfly.
The Art Parade outside Lacma as seen from above Photo © Museum Associates/Los Angeles County Museum of Art
The selection committee was composed of Naima J. Keith (Lacma’s vice president of education and public programmes), several curators and Deitch. “We were looking for mobile processional works designed for a public setting—carry-able sculptures, costumes, banners, inflatables, performances, all those kinds of things,” Keith says. “It had to be visually engaging, conceptually strong, human-powered and it had to be appropriate for all ages.”
One of the largest contingents in the parade was led by the artist Gary Baseman, who prowled around in his cat-man costume—complete with pointy ears and black cape. His team was similarly, though not as elaborately, dressed for their group’s theme: “Peace thru Purr.” As they meowed and pranced, attendees cheered and meowed back from the sidelines.
Art Parade costumes by La Muerte Maria Photo: Scarlet Cheng
Politics were on the minds of many participants, with calls for peace and condemnations of war, political corruption and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement throughout. One of the most visually striking of these was a group led by La Muerte Maria, who made elaborate costumes for herself and eight other women. Armed with a pitchfork and flanked by red wings, her face painted with Day of the Dead details, a tattered sign on her skirt read: “No child should die in war.”
“I made it just for this event, and it’s to get our voice out,” La Muerte Maria says. “So people can see that we’re not complicit, we’re not okay with what’s going on.” Other costumes sported by her group included a Statue of Liberty in chains and clowns mocking world leaders.
Participants in the Art Parade in front of an inflatable sculpture by Kenny Scharf Photo © Museum Associates/Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Even those who seemed merely playful were purposeful. The artist Kelsey Kuykendall outfitted herself as a cheerful usherette with a round table set with colourful cakes and cookies around her waist like an extended bustle. But all the desserts had a psychological reference. The three-tiered cake, for example, represented the Jungian archetypes of maiden, mother and crone with small pictures of various women from art and film history who fit these categories on each tier.
“It’s all about my psyche, complications around gender, all that kind of stuff,” Kuykendall says. “I’ve spent the last week baking.”
People came by asking for a sample, to which Kuykendall replied: “We’re not allowed to give out anything to eat.” This was one of the parade rules, which she dealt with later by having two burly accomplices eat everything off her table as she glided down Wilshire.
Chela Vain Simón-Trench’s papier-mâché Levitated Mass being carried down Wilshire Boulevard Photo: Scarlet Cheng
Another notable parade piece was Levitated Mass, created by the art writer Chela Vain Simón-Trench as a smaller version of the Michael Heizer boulder installed on the museum’s grounds. Her papier-mâché piece was light enough for four people to carry on a pallet, like a new Golden Calf before the public.
Govan was largely responsible for acquiring the original, monumental work, and it clearly remains one of his favourites—he snapped many photos of the mini-Mass as it passed. Asked if the Art Parade would become an annual event, the museum’s director says: “Well, not next year, it was so much work!” Then he thought better of his answer: “I can’t imagine not doing it again!”
