Former CalArts School of Critical Studies faculty Richard A. Hertz, author of Jack Goldstein and the CalArts Mafia (2003), has written a new book chronicling the ins and outs of the Los Angeles art scene. The Beat and the Buzz: Inside the L.A. Art World (Minneola Press, 2009) consists of 33 oral histories of prominent artists, dealers, curators, critics and collectors gathered over the past five years.
One subject, CalArts’ School of Art Dean Thomas Lawson, describes his journey and multidimensional career path from his birthplace in Scotland to New York and Los Angeles. Other Calartians featured (in order of their appearance) are Elyn Zimmerman, who taught at CalArts in the mid-1970s; artist Dorit Cypis (Art MFA 77); Elyse Grinstein, a trustee of CalArts for many years and an architect of campus buildings constructed after the 1994 earthquake; curator/artist Maynard Monrow (Art BFA 01); artist/educator David Askevold, who taught at the Institute in the late 1970s; artist/public art consultant Marc Pally (Art MFA 78); and arts patron, collector and CalArts donor Cliff Einstein.
From Ezrha Jean Black’s introduction:
The Beat and the Buzz is about how one finds a way into the art world–here specifically, the L.A. art world…but also by implication, the larger world of global commercial and production centers, of prestigious art schools and university art departments, and of international fairs, festivals, colonies, and retreats, where the art world takes stock of where it’s been and has a look at where it might be going.
The book is available at Amazon.com.
Related link:
Inside the Art World by Edward Goldman