Riding the beast.

Attempting to define photography and photographic practice in greater Los Angeles is as much of a challenge as trying to define the city itself. Just over 100 years ago, iconoclasts, fleeing the more conventional, repressive and class-conscious east coast, arrived here to do their own thing. The sheer size of L.A. is formidable and artists here have not gravitated to one area, but have fanned out across the region. This situation produces work that is highly individualistic, emphasizing self-discovery. L.A., of course, is inextricably intertwined with Hollywood, that mythical place where anybody can be anything and where nothing is too predictable or banal to be marketed.

Movie-making, with its crass commercialism, might seem incongruous with the heady act of artmaking but both share an intense relationship with aesthetics and, if nothing else, a profitable industry that can provide day jobs to artists. Hollywood's business is about fantasy and creating an imaging vessel into which viewers can pour themselves. Photography can be the still translation of this mass media hypnosis. Photography appears real and even though we don't believe what we see, we are engrossed by its images. Artists in L.A. embrace this inevitable melding of high/low culture and commerce. They understand the implicit power of the photograph to misinform rather than to inform r to manipulate rather than to educate and they choose to work with the photograph as more than just an image, but also as an object.

The L.A. art scene is a diverse mix of museums and commercial, non-profit and college/university galleries spread over a 50-mile radius so getting around to see everything each month is impossible. However, the location of a gallery in a storefront in San Pedro or Pasadena doesn't mean it is a provincial, uninteresting venue. L.A. is famous for its shifting (sometimes literally) landscape, and Angelenos accept that. Since some of the most exciting venues are small, artist-run spaces, viewers are not intimidated by driving an hour to a gallery they have never heard of.

In L.A., photography is less marginalized now than it has been in the past, but the photo ghetto (composed of galleries that show only photography), though shrinking, is still active and will certainly continue to exist to serve its narrow market. While these galleries show younger artists, they remain separate from the mainstream contemporary art world. Within the ghetto, what sells seems to be the modern masters and traditional photography from the school of visual inspiration. Gallery owner Jan Kesner, who has been part of the photography scene for 20 years, said that she first dealt with a lot of conceptual photo-based work but shifted her focus since she could not sell anything: "I still show challenging work that doesn't necessarily sell, and I balance it with a twentieth-century master that will."(1) With the increased number of contemporary art galleries that show photography she lamented: "The sad thing is that some of the really fine photo-based artists don't even want to show at a quasi-photography gallery. It still has a stigma."

That stigma seems to arise from the static, repetitive exhibitions in the photography galleries and their narrow field of collectors. Evidence of this was found at this year's "Photo LA" - an international trade show for photography dealers. Although the show was crowded, the work hanging in the individual dealers' booths was disappointing. This is not to say there were no beautiful or wonderful photographs, but simply that there were no images by L.A.'s most important young photographers - no Uta Barth, Miles Coolidge, Sharon Lockhart or Catherine Opie. Nor were there photographs by the established Los Angeles masters - John Baldessari, Lewis Baltz, Ellen Brooks, Eileen Cowin, John Divola or Robert Heinecken. Apparently, the photo ghetto's collectors do not buy work by these new or established imagemakers. "Photo LA" followed the marketing rule of supply and demand. Since most people will not buy what they do not know, for this fair to not try to persuade collectors to expand their view is a sign of stagnation.

One interesting bridge between the photo ghetto and the mainstream contemporary art world is Craig Krull Gallery. Krull spoke of how a gallery can move with the times and still be an extension of the gallerist's vision. The work he exhibits reflects his broad range of taste in art and culture. "I happen to be interested in photo-based media, though not exclusively. I don't like to call my space a photo gallery. It's a gallery that shows mostly photo-based work. I've been hesitant to attend photo fairs because it ghettoizes what you do."

Krull's gallery shows a wide range of work, some of which could be categorized as traditional photography (e.g., Julius Shulman's architectural photography or Charles Brittin's photographs of the early L.A. art scene) and some very provocative and innovative work that could easily be shown in other contemporary art galleries (e.g., Jenny Okun's cubist-inspired IRIS prints, Robbert Flick's video stills and Jo Ann Callis's recent: paintings).

The number of photography exhibitions of local, national and international artists in venues that show all media continues to rise and the work shown is exciting and challenging. Some of the more notable shows of photographs from the past year or so include Coolidge's large, panoramic photographs of farmland in central California at ACME; Baltz's installation on surveillance and intrusion at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA); Cowin's photographs and video exploring the structure of narrative at California State University, Long Beach; Opie's photographs of mini-malls and freeways at MOCA; Lockhart's staged women's basketball games at Blum & Poe; Bill Henson's beautifully creepy scenes of teens; at night at Karen Lovegrove; Gregory Crewdson's investigation of the fabricated event at Mark Foxx; Anthony Hernandez's tough 1970s street photography at Dan Bernier; Mariko Mori's photographs and video installation combining references to traditional Japanese culture and science fiction at MOCA; Divola's desert dwellings at Patricia Faure; and Dinh Q. Le's woven photographs on culture and identity at Los Angeles Center for Photographic Studies (LACPS) and Shoshana Wayne Gallery.

Bob Gunderman and Randy Sommer, co-directors of ACME, emphasize that what interests them is the thought that goes into the work of the artists they show. A focus on the work and ideas rather than on the medium has helped ACME to become one of the most provocative art venues in L.A. Three of their 13 artists (Barth, Coolidge and Kevin Hanley) make photographs while the others make paintings, videos, sculptures, drawings and installations. This diversity of media is reflected in their collectors, who rarely buy work in only one medium.

Recent historical exhibitions in L.A. include Man Ray's photographs at the Getty Center and Edward Weston at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). Pictorialism, which seems to be enjoying a rejuvenation at the moment, was beautifully explored by LACMA Associate Curator Tim Wride in "Highlights, Shadings, and Shadows." Wride worked to debunk the popular misconception that the movement died following World War I and persuasively demonstrated its vitality through the annual salons held at LACMA until 1947. Another fine show was "Sunshine and Noir" at the Armand Hammer Museum which provided a good overview of the recent history of art in L.A.

Fueling the continued evolution of photography in L.A. has been a strong economy that has allowed growth in galleries and museums. Mark Johnstone, Administrator of the Public Art Division in the Cultural Affairs Department for the City of Los Angeles, pointed out that since 1982 18 institutions have either constructed new buildings, renovated or added to existing buildings. He estimates that 1.5 billion dollars has been poured into the city's arts infrastructure - a figure that any city would be hardpressed to match. Things continue to shift very quickly here and there is currently over one billion dollars worth of construction occurring within a 15-block radius of city hall. That enormous economic force will bring further changes that can only be imagined and L.A. has the flexibility to accommodate that change.

Since the mid-1980s, the California Museum of Photography in Riverside opened, Arthur Ollman established the Museum of Contemporary Photography in San Diego and the Getty Center acquired nine major photography collections. Combine this with the photographic holdings of the Huntington Library, the L.A. Public Library and LACMA and it is clear that Southern California has become a significant place for photographic practice and study.

L.A. has a large number of art schools, universities and colleges and since many artists also teach, the educational community has played a major role in the development of photography. "There were always artists here who used photography and two of the greatest innovators in photo experimentation and education were John Baldessari at CalArts and Robert Heinecken at UCLA. Add to them Robbert Flick at USC and Darryl Curran and Eileen Cowin at Cal State Fullerton, and you can see there are some pretty heavy hitters here," said Robert Sobiesek, photography curator at LACMA. These artist/educators have probably had the biggest influence on the evolution of photographic practice in L.A. by fostering an environment in which everything is encouraged and nothing is overlooked. Recent college graduates are showing in large numbers in L.A. and theirs is some of the most challenging and innovative work to be seen.

Connie Butler, a curator at MOCA, points out that there is an educated generation working here that knows and understands the history of the medium and is attempting to extend it. Three such artists and graduates of local institutions are Coolidge, Lockhart and Liza Ryan. Coolidge's panoramas of central California farmland play off the tradition of documentary photography, subverting it by obscuring detail in massive enlargements. Ryan explores the mystery of narrative by pairing photographs of evocative scenes and Lockhart's staged sporting events question the validity of photographic representation. The education these artists received along with L.A.'s wide-open spaces, brilliant light and arts-oriented economy play a factor in the work that they make. "There are very unique and idiosyncratic innovative kinds of visions that happen here and ways of working that . . . I don't see anywhere else," said Butler.

Within this dynamic environment photographers have to ask "what are the major issues facing us at the end of the century?" Johnstone says that "it is the responsibility of the artist to stay current with what is going on - not just in their own field, but in all artistic efforts. Photographers need to know about music, dance and theater . . . because by staying current you are interacting, observing and being exposed to other artistic ideas that are really alive and will stretch your own thinking." It is this idea of moving forward that leads to the emergence of the type of photographer that Kesner speaks of - one that does not want to be contained within the traditional photo ghetto.

On the non-profit front, LACPS is in its twenty-fifth year and, although specializing in photography, it is not a traditional photography venue. LACPS curators are known for experimenting with a wide range of photographic practices and are interested in new technology, non-traditional uses of photography and self-representation. As with any experiment, there is a chance of failure, but LACPS shows some of the most consistently provocative work around.

Partnerships are an indication of the evolving state of the art community and LACPS is on the forefront of attempting to create new relationships across traditional and non-traditional boundaries. Hollywood is a huge source of talent, money and influence that Executive Director Tania Martinez-Lemke and Glenn Kaino, co-president of LACPS's board of directors, reach out to. A recent exhibition by the cinematographer Christopher Doyle required partnerships with Smart Art Press, RAM Publications and Minami-Aoyama printing in Tokyo, and brought a new group into the gallery - filmmakers, actors and writers. But attempting to work with various partners and a powerful, commercial industry like Hollywood is fraught with peril and LACPS has been confronted with the "selling-out vs. maintaining artistic integrety" dilemma. Although a relationship with Hollywood can be problematic, they have chosen to make that relationship work.

As the technology and practice of the medium continue to advance, artists here adapt and create innovative work that inspires experimentation. L.A. is a mix of the national and the international, the traditional and the contemporary, and it is for that reason that photography is thriving and continually changing here. Kaino at LACPS describes this change, in photography and the art world, as one in which we know there is something going on, but do not know where it is going. "The only thing we're doing [at LACPS] is enjoying riding this beast - letting it transform into whatever mold it's going to end up as and if it doesn't mold itself, fine - let it be this beast that we ride for the next hundred years! But we understand that that's what we're doing."

NOTES

1. All quotations are from interviews with the author, March 1999.

THOMAS McGOVERN is a Los Angeles-based photographer and writer and author of Bearing Witness (to AIDS) (forthcoming from Visual AIDS/A.R.T. Press).