Events
Auction
Iovine and Young Center for High School Education Benefit Auction
Online auction: February 13–27, 2024
Live auction: February 27, 2024
This online benefit auction, hosted by Sotheby’s for the Iovine and Young Center for High School Education, features eleven donated works by contemporary artists including Jennifer Guidi and Ed Ruscha. The Iovine and Young Center is part of the Los Angeles Unified School District, and all proceeds from the sale will directly support its educational programming and contribute to the advancement of its impactful initiatives.
Jennifer Guidi, Into the Expanse of the Sky, 2024 © Jennifer Guidi
Screening
Westermann
Memorial to the Idea of Man If He Was an Idea
Tuesday, October 3, 2023, 7:30pm
Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
hammer.ucla.edu
Join the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles for a screening of the 3D documentary Westermann: Memorial to the Idea of Man If He Was an Idea (2023), which tells the story of artist, combat veteran, and acrobat H. C. (Cliff) Westermann, whose dramatic history can be traced through the surreal artworks he made to process the horrors he witnessed on the front lines of the Korean War. The film was directed by Leslie Buchbinder and features narration by Ed Harris, as well as interviews with Frank Gehry and Ed Ruscha, among others. The event will be followed by a question-and-answer session with Buchbinder, Gehry, and Ruscha, and is free to attend.
Still from Westermann: Memorial to the Idea of Man If He Was an Idea (2023), directed by Leslie Buchbinder. Artwork © Estate of H.C. Westermann/Licensed by VAGA at ARS, New York
Auction
Printed Matter
Spring Benefit Auction
May 24–June 8, 2023
This online benefit auction for Printed Matter features over sixty donated artworks—some of which were created especially for the fundraiser—by contemporary artists, including Richard Artschwager, Piero Golia, Adam McEwen, Richard Prince, Ed Ruscha, Taryn Simon, and Jonas Wood. Proceeds from the auction, which is hosted by Artsy, will support the nonprofit organization’s mission to further the distribution, understanding, and appreciation of artist’s books and related publications.
Piero Golia, The Best Is Yet to Come, 2020 © Piero Golia
Fundraiser
Artist Plate Project 2022
Coalition for the Homeless
Launching May 22, 2023, 10am edt
Limited-edition bone china plates produced by Prospect and featuring artwork by more than forty artists—including Virgil Abloh, Derrick Adams, Harold Ancart, Georg Baselitz, Amoako Boafo, Mark Grotjahn, Takashi Murakami, Albert Oehlen, Ed Ruscha, Anna Weyant, and Jonas Wood—will be sold through Artware Editions to raise funds for the Coalition’s lifesaving programs. The funds raised by the sale of the plates will provide food, crisis services, housing, and other critical aid to thousands of people experiencing homelessness and instability. The purchase of one plate can feed one hundred homeless and hungry New Yorkers.
Takashi Murakami, Gargantua on Your Palm, 2018 © 2018 Takashi Murakami/Kaikai Kiki Co., Ltd. All rights reserved
Fundraiser
Artist Plate Project 2021
Coalition for the Homeless
Launching November 16, 2021, 10am est
Limited-edition bone china plates produced by Prospect and featuring artwork by more than forty artists—including Virgil Abloh, Urs Fischer, Helen Frankenthaler, Alex Israel, Ewa Juszkiewicz, Ed Ruscha, Sarah Sze, Tom Wesselmann, Jonas Wood, and Christopher Wool—will be sold through Artware Editions to raise funds for the Coalition’s lifesaving programs. The funds raised by the sale of the plates will provide food, crisis services, housing, and other critical aid to thousands of people experiencing homelessness and instability. The purchase of one plate can feed one hundred homeless and hungry New Yorkers.
Jonas Wood, Clipping Plate, 2021 © Jonas Wood
Auction
Venice Family Clinic Art Walk
Benefit Auction 2021
April 28–May 12, 2021
Venice Family Clinic presents its annual benefit auction, a fundraising event whose proceeds will provide essential health care services to people in the community regardless of their income, immigration, or insurance status. Since its inception forty years ago, this charity event has raised more than $23 million. This year’s auction, hosted on Artsy, is honoring Mary Weatherford as the “signature artist” and features more than two hundred works by nationally recognized contemporary artists, including Piero Golia, Ed Ruscha, Robert Therrien, as well as Weatherford. To register to bid, visit artsy.net.
Mary Weatherford, Sunset, Western Cape, 2020 © Mary Weatherford. Photo: Fredrik Nilsen Studio
Announcements
Honor
Ed Ruscha
California Hall of Fame
Ed Ruscha will be inducted into the California Hall of Fame for his service to the arts in a ceremony taking place on Tuesday, December 13, 2022, at which he will receive a medal from California Governor Gavin Newsom. Established in 2006 at the California Museum in Sacramento by former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and First Lady Maria Shriver, the award honors legendary Californians who embody the state’s innovative spirit and have made their mark on history across a variety of fields, including the arts, education, business and labor, science, sports, philanthropy, and public service.
Ed Ruscha in his studio, Los Angeles, 2008. Photo: Kate Simon
Support
The Met 150
Limited-Edition Print Portfolio
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, has released The Met 150, a limited-edition print portfolio featuring works by twelve contemporary artists from around the world who have a strong history and connection with the museum, including Ed Ruscha, Richard Serra, and Sarah Sze. Commissioned in celebration of the museum’s 150th anniversary in 2020, the portfolios are produced in an edition of sixty by the renowned artists’ workshop Gemini G.E.L in Los Angeles. The twelve signed prints are housed together in a red linen clamshell box and are accompanied by essays written by the Met director Max Hollein and Sharon Coplan Hurowitz, copublisher. Proceeds from sales support the museum. To purchase a portfolio, contact the Mezzanine Gallery at the Met Store at + 1 212 650 2908.
Ed Ruscha, Boom Town, 2021 © Ed Ruscha
Video
Artists on Writers | Writers on Artists
Ed Ruscha and Rachel Kushner
In the third episode of Artists on Writers | Writers on Artists, novelist Rachel Kushner and Ed Ruscha share memories of Kathy Acker and Walter Hopps, talk about their love of vintage cars, and enjoy a good pun. Rachel Kushner’s The Hard Crowd: Essays, 2000–2010 will be released on April 6 and Ed Ruscha: OKLA, the artist’s first solo exhibition in his home state, is on view at the Oklahoma Contemporary through July 5. Artists On Writers | Writers On Artists brings together luminaries in the fields of art and literature to have the conversations they themselves wish to have. This biweekly web series is a joint production of Artforum and Bookforum, and is sponsored by the Morgan Library & Museum, New York.
Still from “Artists on Writers | Writers on Artists: Ed Ruscha and Rachel Kushner”
Launch
12 Sunsets
Exploring Ed Ruscha’s Archive at the Getty Research Institute
The Getty Research Institute (GRI) has launched 12 Sunsets: Exploring Ed Ruscha’s Archive, an interactive website that allows users to browse more than sixty-five thousand photographs of Sunset Boulevard taken by Ed Ruscha between 1965 and 2007. The website allows users to “drive” down a digitally composited representation of this key urban artery, as well as to view, search, and compare geotagged photographs. The photographs are part of Ed Ruscha’s Streets of Los Angeles Archive, a trove of five hundred thousand photographs, notes, drawings, and records documenting the artist’s photography of Los Angeles, which was acquired by the GRI in 2012.
Ed Ruscha, Cesar Chavez and North Broadway, 2007, Streets of Los Angeles Archive, Getty Research Institute © Ed Ruscha
Online Exclusive
Artist Spotlight
Ed Ruscha to kick off new season of Gagosian’s online series
Launching September 16, 2020
Gagosian is unveiling a new vision for the Artist Spotlight series that will operate independently of our exhibition program. This will cement the platform’s status as a vibrant aspect of the gallery’s programming that allows artists to operate imaginatively beyond the physical exhibition format.
The second season of Artist Spotlight—a series that focuses on an individual artist for one week each month—premieres on September 16, 2020, with a new project by legendary artist Ed Ruscha. A selection of works by preeminent artists—including John Currin, Takashi Murakami, Nathaniel Mary Quinn, and Rachel Whiteread—will debut this fall. For updates, please contact the gallery at collecting@gagosian.com.
Ed Ruscha. Photo: Sten Rosenlund
Support
Ed Ruscha
EE-NUF!
Ed Ruscha has created a limited-edition print and an accompanying poster, titled EE-NUF!, to support the People for the American Way’s (PFAW) campaign ENOUGH of Trump. The design features a “fast track” display at how Trump has worked to destroy our democracy. PFAW is a progressive advocacy organization founded to fight right-wing extremism and build a democratic society that implements the ideals of freedom, equality, opportunity, and justice for all.
The print and poster are available for purchase at the Gagosian Shop.
Ed Ruscha, EE-NUF!, 2020 © Ed Ruscha
Museum Exhibitions
On View
Desire, Knowledge, and Hope (with Smog)
Through April 7, 2024
The Broad, Los Angeles
www.thebroad.org
Desire, Knowledge, and Hope (with Smog) is drawn entirely from the Broad collection and showcases works by Los Angeles–based artists. Titled after a work by John Baldessari, the exhibition includes reflections on Los Angeles as a city in flux and turmoil, and on societal issues that extend far beyond the city. Featuring more than sixty works made from 1969 to 2023, it brings together photorealistic painting, photography, sculpture, and political signage by twenty-one artists across varying generations. Work by Mark Grotjahn, Alex Israel, Ed Ruscha, and Jonas Wood is included.
Ed Ruscha, Honey . . . . I Twisted Through More Damned Traffic to Get Here, 1984, The Broad, Los Angeles © Ed Ruscha
Closed
The Milton and Sheila Fine Collection
November 18, 2023–March 17, 2024
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh
carnegieart.org
Milton and Sheila Fine have been longtime advocates and supporters of the arts in their philanthropy throughout the Pittsburgh region. Promised to Carnegie Museum of Art in 2015, their collection of contemporary painting, sculpture, photography, and drawing reflects their interest in American and German art from the 1980s to the 2000s. This exhibition, which is presented as a celebration and remembrance of Milton Fine, who passed away in 2019, foregrounds the importance and impact of the gift. Work by Richard Artschwager, Georg Baselitz, Mark Grotjahn, Donald Judd, Brice Marden, David Reed, Ed Ruscha, Richard Serra, Jeff Wall, and Christopher Wool is included.
Ed Ruscha, Victory, 1987, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh © Ed Ruscha
Closed
Paraventi
Folding Screens from the 17th to 21st Centuries
October 26, 2023–February 22, 2024
Fondazione Prada, Milan
www.fondazioneprada.org
This exhibition investigates the histories and semantics of folding screens by tracing trajectories of cross-pollination between the East and the West, processes of hybridization between different art forms and functions, collaborations between designers and artists, and the emergence of new works. Paraventi presents more than seventy folding screens as well as a selection of contemporary projects, commissioned specifically for this show, by more than fifteen international artists. Work by Francis Bacon, Man Ray, Pablo Picasso, Jean Prouvé, Ed Ruscha, Cy Twombly, and Franz West is included.
Franz West, Paravents, 2010, Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt am Main, Germany © Archiv Franz West, © Estate Franz West. Photo: Wolfgang Günzel
Closed
Colección Jumex
Todo Se Vuelve Más Ligero
November 18, 2023–February 11, 2024
Museo Jumex, Mexico City
www.fundacionjumex.org
To celebrate its tenth anniversary, Museo Jumex has invited Lisa Phillips, director of the New Museum, New York, to curate an exhibition drawn entirely from the Jumex collection and occupying the whole building. Featuring work by more than seventy international artists, the exhibition, whose title translates to Everything Gets Lighter, brings together diverse works in a poetic meditation on the meaning of light and manifestations of lightness. Work by Damien Hirst, Steven Parrino, Ed Ruscha, and Rudolf Stingel is included.
Rudolf Stingel, Untitled, 2001–02, Museo Jumex, Mexico City © Rudolf Stingel
Closed
Gertrude Stein et Pablo Picasso
September 13, 2023–January 28, 2024
Musée du Luxembourg, Paris
museeduluxembourg.fr
This exhibition explores the friendship between Pablo Picasso and Gertrude Stein, two icons of the twentieth century. Both moved to Paris in the early 1900s, and their status as foreigners affected their roles in the city’s bohemian community as well as their artistic freedom. Examining their closeness and inventiveness, the exhibition considers a century of art, poetry, music, and theater through key figures such as Marcel Duchamp, Jasper Johns, Henri Matisse, Ed Ruscha, Andy Warhol, and others.
Pablo Picasso, Femme aux mains jointes (étude pour Les Demoiselles d’Avignon), 1907, Musée national Picasso–Paris © Succession Picasso 2023. Photo: © RMN-Grand Palais (Musée national Picasso–Paris)/Mathieu Rabeau
Closed
ED RUSCHA / NOW THEN
September 10, 2023–January 13, 2024
Museum of Modern Art, New York
www.moma.org
Spanning sixty-five years of Ed Ruscha’s remarkable career and mirroring his own cross-disciplinary approach, the exhibition features over 250 works, produced between 1958 and the present. Including painting, drawing, prints, film, photography, artist’s books, and installation, the works are displayed according to a loose chronology throughout the sixth-floor galleries of the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Alongside the artist’s most acclaimed works, the exhibition highlights lesser-known aspects of his practice, offering new perspectives and underlining Ruscha’s role as a keen observer of our rapidly changing world.
Installation view, ED RUSCHA / NOW THEN, Museum of Modern Art, New York, September 10, 2023–January 13, 2024. Artwork © Ed Ruscha. Photo: Jonathan Dorado
Closed
13 Women
October 8, 2022–August 27, 2023
Orange County Museum of Art, Costa Mesa, California
ocma.art
13 Women marks the Orange County Museum of Art’s sixtieth anniversary; by paying homage to the thirteen women who founded the Balboa Pavilion Gallery, the OCMA’s predecessor institution, which was opened in 1962. The exhibition presents work from the 1960s to the present by the artists central to the museum’s collection, including Chris Burden and Ed Ruscha.
Chris Burden, Large Glass Ship, 1983, Orange County Museum, Costa Mesa, California © 2022 Chris Burden/Licensed by the Chris Burden Estate and Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Closed
Strike Fast, Dance Lightly
Artists on Boxing
June 16–August 11, 2023
FLAG Art Foundation, New York
www.flagartfoundation.org
Copresented with The Church, Sag Harbor, New York, Strike Fast, Dance Lightly: Artists on Boxing, is a two-venue group exhibition that centers on the psychology, ethos, and spectacle of boxing. It explores the sport as both theme and metaphor, together with its complex and multifaceted cultural meanings. The exhibition includes ancient, modern, and contemporary artworks, as well as newly commissioned pieces and boxing-related ephemera. Work by Amoako Boafo and Ed Ruscha is included.
Installation view, Strike Fast, Dance Lightly: Artists on Boxing, FLAG Art Foundation, New York, June 16–August 11, 2023. Artwork, left and right: © Rosalyn Drexler, center: © Amoako Boafo. Photo: Steven Probert
Closed
Motion
Autos, Art, Architecture
April 8–September 18, 2022
Guggenheim Bilbao, Spain
www.guggenheim-bilbao.eus
Motion. Autos, Art, Architecture celebrates the artistic dimension of the automobile and links it to the parallel worlds of painting, sculpture, architecture, photography, and film. The exhibition brings together nearly forty automobiles that are placed center stage in the galleries and surrounded by significant works of art and architecture. Work by Alexander Calder, Christo, Andreas Gursky, Ed Ruscha, and Andy Warhol is included.
Installation view, Motion. Autos, Art, Architecture, Guggenheim Bilbao, Spain, April 8–September 18, 2022. Artwork © Ed Ruscha. Photo: courtesy Guggenheim Museum Bilbao
Closed
America. Entre rêves et réalités
La collection du Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Collection
June 9–September 11, 2022
Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, Canada
www.mnbaq.org
Featuring more than a hundred paintings, photographs, sculptures, and video works drawn from the permanent collection of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, DC, this exhibition, whose title translates to America. Between Dreams and Realities, offers a broad overview of modern and contemporary American art. Organized thematically, it looks carefully and critically at the notion of the American dream and uncovers how artists have variously grappled with questions of identity, the challenges of globalization, the realities of everyday life in America, and the complexities of its technological and political revolutions. Work by Alexander Calder, Willem de Kooning, Helen Frankenthaler, Sally Mann, Man Ray, Brice Marden, Nam June Paik, Ed Ruscha, Andy Warhol, and Mary Weatherford is included.
Mary Weatherford, Engine, 2014, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC © Mary Weatherford. Photo: Fredrik Nilsen Studio
Closed
On the Edge
Los Angeles Art, 1970s–1990s, from the Joan and Jack Quinn Family Collection
September 30, 2021–April 2, 2022
Bakersfield Museum of Art, California
www.bmoa.org
This exhibition highlights 150 works from the collection of Joan and Jack Quinn, which was primarily amassed between the 1970s and the 1990s. Many of their holdings were collected directly from the artists and have never changed hands or been shown publicly. The artworks they were drawn to are defined by a spirit of nonconformity, a play of new materials, a celebration of light, and the “California cool” ethos. Work by Jean-Michel Basquiat, Frank Gehry, and Ed Ruscha is included.
Ed Ruscha, Double Standard #36/40, 1969 © Ed Ruscha
Closed
Artists Inspired by Music
Interscope Reimagined
January 30–February 13, 2022
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
www.lacma.org
To mark the thirtieth anniversary of Interscope Records, the company invited artists to select albums and songs from Interscope’s groundbreaking catalogue and fostered exchanges between artists and musicians to generate resonant pairings. The exhibition, which includes more than fifty works, brings an intergenerational group of visual artists into dialogue with iconic musicians from the last three decades, providing a fresh perspective on influential music for the present moment. Work by John Currin, Jennifer Guidi, Damien Hirst, Titus Kaphar, Takashi Murakami, Richard Prince, Ed Ruscha, and Anna Weyant is included.
Jennifer Guidi, Seeking Hearts (Black MT, Pink Sand, Pink CS, Pink Ground), 2021 © Jennifer Guidi. Photo: Brica Wilcox