In Los Angeles we picked up the RV (motorhome) and arrived at our first stop, Santa Barbara, in early evening. The next day we walked along the beach, passing lots of sailing boats moored there until we reached the town centre. We then walked up the very pretty main street of Santa Barbara, State Street. It’s a pedestrian street with lots of palm trees, restaurants and interesting little shops. We had delicious empanadas in a Mexican restaurant and then visited the famous court house, which is still in use as a court house but is open to visitors. The building is in Spanish Colonial style and was completed in 1929 after the previous courthouse was completely destroyed in the 1925 earthquake. Like many of the buildings in Santa Barbara it has red tiled roofs, white stucco walls and various balconies. Inside it is gorgeous, with terracotta floor tiles, ceramic tiled walls and lots of interesting paintings showing historical scenes. It also has the amazing Mural Room featuring scenes from Santa Barbara’s history. It is such a beautiful building that it is frequently used for weddings – including that of US Vice President Kamala Harris -and a wedding was taking place in the garden on the day we were there.
Entrance to courthouseWeddingMural roomPresidio neighbourhoodon the street
On Tuesday, after tearful farewells to our lovely cousins we set off to the motorhome rental company to pick up the motorhome in which we were planning to spend the next ten days. We were very excited when we saw it and after being shown how everything worked, we set off for our first stop, Santa Barbara.
However our enchantment with the motorhome, or RV as it is called in the US, was short lived. We soon noticed water running across the floor and realised that there must be a leak. It got even wetter when we switched on the water heater. We called Cruise America’s Travelers Assist and they arranged for us to take it the next day to a repair shop which was on the way to our next stop, Morro Bay. We duly went to Sky River repair shop the next day only to discover no appointment had been made and they were really busy. However we waited a while and they managed to squeeze us in.
The bad news was that after doing a thorough check, the manager of the Sky River, which is a specialist RV repair shop, announced that in his professional opinion it was not safe to continue in the vehicle because it had a serious black mould problem. He said it had clearly been leaking for a long time. Also, he was concerned about the state of the vehicle generally. By this time we had noticed lots of problems – electric sockets which either didn’t work or were broken and not safe to use, lots of panelling coming away, rust inside the microwave…to name but a few.
After lots of phone calls back and forth Cruise America agreed to replace the RV but refused to deliver it to us. We either had to drive back to Los Angeles or drive on to San Francisco,so we opted to drive on. By the time we picked up the replacement vehicle, which was in a much better condition and had a considerably lower mileage, we had lost three days so we decided to cut our losses and not try to resume our trip by driving down to Morro Bay and then on to San Simeon but instead spend longer in Monterey. All was fine with the replacement vehicle, but we would definitely not use Cruise America again and would not recommend them to anyone.
Monday 27 May was a public holiday in the US – Memorial Day – when the country honours US military personnel who died while serving in the United States Armed Services. It was a beautiful, sunny day (though the wind was chilly) and everyone was out enjoying themselves. Our cousins first took us to one of their favourite eating places, Brents – a famous family run Jewish deli and restaurant which has become one of the best delicatessens in the state. The place was packed with families enjoying their day off and we left feeling very replete.
We then drove to Santa Monica, a coastal town (or “city” as they call it in the US) west of downtown Los Angeles. It too was buzzing. We strolled along a delightful pedestrian street called 3rd Street Promenade and noticed lots of brightly coloured wooden rocking chairs (we discovered these are called Adirondack chairs) just sitting on the pavement for people to use. Then we walked to Santa Monica’s wide, sandy beach for our first sight of the Pacific ocean. Interestingly Santa Monica is the western end of the famous Route 66.
The Broad is a contemporary art museum on Grand Avenue in Downtown Los Angeles. The museum is named for philanthropists Eli and Edythe Broad, who financed the $140 million building that houses the Broad art collections.
In the entrance hall is an installation by Yayoi Kusama, Infinity Mirrored Room – The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away. This was in a separate room which you entered and stood on a platform in darkness, and then ….
It is a fantastic gallery and has a standing exhibition of works by Roy Lichtenstein, so this was our next port of call.
Goldfish BowlReflections on “Interior with Girl”Femme d’AlgerI…I’m Sorry!Interior with African MaskNude with PyramidLive Ammo (Blang)River ValleyThings on the Wall
When Eli and Edythe Broad acquired Rauschenberg’s Untitled in 1983, they traded Vincent van Gogh’s drawing Cabanes à Saintes-Maries, 1888, which they had cherished for a long time. For the Broads, Untitled represented a turning point in their lives as collectors, a symbol of their increasing commitment to the works of contemporary artists.
Untitled, 1954Untitled, 1963
Jean Michel Basquiat was born in Brooklyn to Haitian and Puerto Rican parents in 1960, and left home as a teenager to live in Lower Manhattan. In the late 1970s, he and fellow artist Al Diaz became known for their graffiti, a series of cryptic statements seen around Manhattan.
Many of Basquiat’s works have been likened to the improvisational and expansive compositions of jazz. Often themes accumulate through multiple references on a surface, emerging as patterns out of gestural brushstrokes, symbols, inventories, lists, and diagrams.
Basquiat’s work celebrates histories of Black art, music, and poetry, as well as religious and everyday traditions of Black life. At the same time, his paintings and drawings offer these references against the American and global backdrop of the white supremacist legacy of slavery and colonialism.
In his work, Basquiat integrated critique of an art world that both celebrated and tokenized him. He was keenly aware of the racism frequently embedded in his reception, whether it took the form of positive or negative stereotypes. Basquiat saw his own status in this small circle of collectors, dealers, and writers as connected to an American history rife with exclusion, invisibility, and pater-nalism, and he often used his work to directly call out these injustices and hypocrisies.
Obnoxious LiberalsMelting Point of Ice
Jeff Koons created the ‘Puppy’ outside the Gulbenkian in Bilbao and here he is in Los Angeles with Balloon Dog
There were many other artists but we’re saving them for the next time!
Our friend Sheryl took us to the Getty Centre for the day. It’s an extraordinary set of buildings set high up on a hill with stunning views of Los Angeles and the surrounding area (click on a picture to enlarge).
The architecture is beautiful. The buildings are very light in colour with clean lines.
The entrance hall has a superb installation by Mercedes Dorame entitled ‘Looking back’
Camille Claudel
A trailblazing woman artist working in France in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Camille Claudel defied the social expectations of her time to create forceful sculptures of the human form. Her innovative works of art treat the universal themes of childhood, old age, love, and loss with an expressive intensity in a variety of genres, materials, and scales. Collectors and critics immediately recognized Claudel’s talent, but today her art remains little known outside France.
Age of maturityFireside dreamBust of RodinPsalmCrouching woman
Other works within the studios.
Rembrandt Laughing- RembrandtSaint Bartholomew – RembrandtJeanne – ManetSunrise – MonetIrises – van Gogh
And further sculptures were to be found outside, down by the carpark.
Draped Reclining Mother and Baby – Henry MooreHorse – Elizabeth FrinkRunning Man – Elizabeth Frink
The Getty also has a restaurant with wonderful views and delicious food. All in all a fantastic day.
We arrived in LA to be met at the airport by my cousin Simone and her husband Marvin. We stayed with them in their home and we were made so welcome. They have a beautiful garden full of colourful flowers and also orange trees. It was wonderful to be able to eat oranges which we had picked that morning.
We were very excited to discover that the Dinner Party, that wonderful creation by Judy Chicago in the 70s was housed in the Brooklyn Museum. The subway in New York is great and we easily found our way down to Brooklyn and to the museum. Here are the photos (if you click on a photo it will expand to full size)
The Museum of Modern Art in New York is the most wonderful museum and you could spend days wandering amongst the galleries. (click on the images to enlarge)
Giorgio de Chirico – The Nostalgia of the InfiniteSeurat – Evening, HornfleurCézanne – Still Life with ApplesChagall – I and the VillagePicasso – Three Women at the SpringPaul Klee – Around the FishMatisse – Interior with a Violin CaseCynthia Sargent – BartokMagritte – The Portrait Miró – The HunterPicasso – Girl before a Mirror
Ellen invited us to a barbecue at her beach cabin at the beach club on Long Island. What a fantastic experience. First we took the subway down to Wall Street and walked along the river to Pier 11. Then we took the Rockaway Ferry passing the Statue of Liberty, underneath Verrazzano Bridge and docks at Rockaway where we were met by Alan and driven to the beach club.
A cabin with electricity, a fridge and a shower! (far removed from our English beach huts). And a special area for barbecues – I counted 64. We had a wonderful salad followed by delicious barbecued corn and fish washed down with Mimosa (that’s what we call Bucks Fizz). And of course a fabulous beach with all sorts of birds.
