Introduction : Confusion, Uncertainty, and the Southern Californian Origins of Art's Postmodern Plurality -- A DEW Line for the Old Culture : 1971, the "Art and Technology" exhibition, and the End of L.A.'s Modernist Daydreams -- The Long March : The Rise of Women Artists -- Viva Mi Raza! : The Rise of Chicano Artists -- A Laminar Flow at the Edges : Or, Anger and Dissent in the early 1970s Art Scene -- Not an Energy Crisis : L.A.'s Explosion in Conceptual and Performance Art -- "Devil with a Hammer and Hell with a Torch" : How L.A.'s Street Culture Inspired a New "Lowbrow" Art Movement -- The Horizontal City : Public Art in the Landscape of L.A. -- The Mongols in the West : A Trio of Outsiders Quietly Subvert the L.A. Art World -- Future Shock : The Birth of L.A.'s Young Romantics -- A Last Look at the "L.A. Look" -- Epilogue : The Lingering Afterimage of L.A.'s Art of the 1970s.
Summary:
Examines the premise that the progress of art in Los Angeles ceased during the 1970s--after the decline of the Ferus Gallery, the scattering of its stable of artists (Robert Irwin, Ed Kienholz, Ed Moses, Ed Rusha and others), and the economic struggles throughout the decade--and didn't resume until sometime around 1984 when Mark Tansey, Alison Saar, Judy Fiskin, Carrie Mae Weems, David Salle, Manuel Ocampo, among others became stars in an exploding art market. However, this is far from the reality of the L.A. art scene in the 1970s. The passing of those fashionable 1960s-era icons, in fact, allowed the development of a chaotic array of outlandish and independent voices, marginalized communities, and energetic, sometimes bizarre visions that thrived during the stagnant 1970s. Fallon's narrative describes and celebrates, through twelve thematically arranged chapters, the wide range of intriguing artists and the world--not just the objects--they created.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.