Made in L.A. at the Hammer: Trouble in paradise

Failure to launch?

“Made in L.A. 2025” at the Hammer in Westwood

by Bondo Wyszpolski

Prior to introducing Essence Harden and Paulina Pobocha, the co-curators of “Made in L.A.”, Hammer Museum director Zoë Ryan spoke urgently about the Trump administration’s efforts to curtail freedom of expression, and in particular the danger this poses to museums and other art institutions. Therefore, all Americans are being impacted, regardless of where one stands on the political spectrum.

The co-curators then talked about their nearly year-long search to find and select art for the current iteration of this biannual showcase, the result being 28 hand-picked artists who were either born in or are working in Los Angeles.

“Made in L.A.”, however, is not particularly overwhelming, and has left me wondering: Should we judge an exhibition exclusively on what it is or on what it shied away from?

These are precarious times. Our President is using large cities, Democratic-leaning for the most part, as training grounds for the U.S. military. He has pushed out of office those who’ve opposed him or his mandates, filling in the vacancies with his cronies and sycophants.

So where’s the pushback here? Where’s the defiance, the anger, the subversive art?

I find it disheartening that the current “Made in L.A.” doesn’t really engage the important issues of our day, and not just those emanating from Washington, D.C. It also refrains from visually commenting on conflicts — take your pick — the world over: Ukraine and Russia, China and Taiwan, the atrocities in Sudan and Gaza, not to mention global hunger, overpopulation, climate change, and mass shootings in what should be safe zones, places of worship and schools.

Artists are not obliged to grapple with the hot potato of politics, but if you’re still publicly fiddling with personal issues of race and gender and identity while Rome burns, then you’re simply out of tune. This isn’t 1984, but Big Brother is tracking us as if it were.

From reading over the material handed to me about “Made in L.A.” it appears that the co-curators were focused on the artists’ academic credentials and where they’d previously shown their work. But, you know, who cares? That’s not relevant.

What is relevant is to confront and engage your audience. A few pieces come close.

Patrick Martinez is represented by a pair of works, one of which is the neon on plexiglas “Hold the Ice” (“Agua is Life: No Ice”). He made that piece in 2020, but he could just as well have made it this morning.

Bruce Yonemoto’s “Broken Fences” (monitors, lacquer and wood) references the past: Japanese internment camps and Nazi death camps. Which also resonates now with people being scooped up off the streets or in their places of employment.

Gabriela Ruiz’s “Collective Scream” is a large wall piece that from afar looks like a melting version of the cover of “In the Court of the Crimson King” (King Crimson’s debut album). It’s a painting, but one embedded with LCD monitors and metal hardware. We are informed that “Her interdisciplinary practice explores surveillance capitalism, mass consumerism, and the intersection of technology, memory, and fantasy.” That’s fancy art-speak for Ruiz casting a wary eye at government repression.

But these are soft jabs at best.

There’s some ribald humor here, specifically “Dr. Lazarus” by Beaux Mendes, a modest vitrine with silicone dolls decked out as surgeons, three men and a woman, one of whom holds a fresh human heart in his hand. All of them wear surgical gowns, but the woman’s gown, and one of the men’s is open, and they’re nude underneath, the man sexually aroused.

There may be other “inflammatory” works, and I hope there are, but I do not recall anything else that might be goading or controversial. There are large portraits of Black men and women by Greg Breda. Okay. Curious assemblages by Carl Cheng that wouldn’t be out of place in the Museum of Jurassic Technology. Okay. B&W photographs by Pat O’Neill that he took in the 1960s. Okay. Ceramic pots (I use the term lightly) by Brian Rochefort that resemble volcanic explosions. Fine. More ceramics, these being cartoonish figures (cutesy bears and rabbits, etc) by Alake Shilling. Sure. A wishing well and postcard stands by Kelly Wall. Okay.

There’s more, and many visitors may come away praising the exhibition and or having a new-found respect for some of the artists. But I think the show is far too tame. Either that, or maybe not enough of L.A’s artists have woken up to what’s encroaching upon their freedom and ours. I do hope I’m wrong about that.

The Hammer Museum at UCLA is located at 10899 Wilshire Blvd, Los Angeles. Hours, Tuesday through Thursday, plus Saturday and Sunday, from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Friday from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Closed Monday. Free. Parking is $8 for the first three hours; you’re maxed out at $22. Through March 1, 2026. Call (310) 443-7000 or visit hammer.ucla.edu. ER