The Los Angeles County Museum of Art will inaugurate its David Geffen Galleries with an opening gala Thursday, marking a major milestone in the museum’s long-planned campus transformation.
The new building, designed by Swiss architect Peter Zumthor, spans Wilshire Boulevard and will serve as the home for LACMA’s permanent collection.
The structure will open to LACMA members following a ribbon-cutting ceremony Sunday, and to the general public on May 4.
The 900-foot-long glass-and-concrete building, elevated nearly 30 feet above street level, offers sweeping views of Los Angeles and features a single-level exhibition space showcasing works from the museum’s collection of more than 155,000 objects spanning 6,000 years of history, according to museum officials.
LACMA CEO and Director Michael Govan said at a media preview Wednesday the inaugural installation reflects a new approach to presenting art.
“… We eschewed traditional categories of geography, chronology, medium. They’re there, but the overarching idea is thematic organization so that we can tell different, more, I think, subtle, complex stories about people,” he said. “Nineteenth century museums were a lot about characterization, and not only are we living in modern Los Angeles where we’re all interconnected, where migration and interconnectness are so essential to our daily life, and so that spirit is here.”
Govan said 45 curators collaborated on the installation, which fills about 110,000 square feet of gallery space and will continue to evolve over time.
“We’re going to continue to rotate and change. I’m fond of saying that history is always changing. We’re always rethinking, and the museum will be responsive to that,” Govan said.
He said the galleries are organized around global regions including the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic oceans and the Mediterranean Sea, offering what he described as “a fresh look at world cultures” that reflects Los Angeles’ diversity.
Govan said he asked Zumthor to design a museum that allows visitors to move freely through the space.
“The idea is there’s no one path through the museum as there’s no one story of our history,” Govan said. “I said I wanted a museum with no facade, and he said, `What you really mean is you want no one in the back, that everyone’s in the front, that everyone is central and that there’s no hierarchies.”’
Willow Bay, co-chair of the LACMA Board of Trustees and dean of the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, said the new galleries reflect a broader vision for the museum and the region.
“With the support of our county partners and an entire community of builders, we built a museum for Los Angeles that reflects our creative spirit, our rich and beautiful global diversity and brings art and city together,” Bay said.
“That shared commitment to LACMA and its future demonstrates the remarkable and breathtaking amount of civic support for art and culture across Los Angeles, and we are incredibly grateful to everyone who made this possible,” she added.
Bay also praised Govan’s leadership in bringing the project to completion after years of planning and construction.
“… We are in awe of the vision of one person who led us here, and that’s Michael Govan, who is a once-in-a-generation cultural leader. That is true, that is not hyperbole. It’s also true it took a generation to get us here,” she said.
Bay added that Govan has long pushed for a museum that matches Los Angeles’ innovation and global outlook, maintaining that the city can lead in redefining how art is experienced.
Museum officials said the building is designed to use varying natural light rather than uniform illumination, with a mix of perimeter galleries featuring floor-to-ceiling glass and more enclosed interior spaces. Custom metallic-textile curtains are used to help filter light and protect sensitive works, while allowing subtle changes throughout the day and seasons to shape the viewing experience.
The building also creates new public space at ground level, including plazas for public art, education programs, retail and dining beneath the elevated galleries.
A LACMA store and an Erewhon market are scheduled to open Sunday, with additional amenities including a restaurant, theater and wine bar planned for later this year.
The galleries are the centerpiece of LACMA’s broader redevelopment effort, a project more than two decades in the making supported by a mix of public and private funding.