The Lights Go Out in Las Vegas

[With thanks to GC in no_nv for the tip, below, follow-up to an earlier post on the CCAI Blog, a story from Agence France Presse on the closing of the Las Vegas Art Museum.]

Art-lovers despair as lights go out for Vegas museum
by Steve Friess

LAS VEGAS, Nevada (AFP) – Museums dedicated to neon, Liberace and pinball machines remain, but Las Vegas's more high-brow cultural scene has achieved a new nadir: Sin City is now the largest metropolitan area in the United States without a public art museum.

The 59-year-old Las Vegas Art Museum went broke and shut down, the latest in a string of bad news for the arts that also included the closure last year of a Guggenheim outpost in the Venetian Hotel-Casino and the decision in 2007 by Steve Wynn to convert a gallery at his Wynn Las Vegas resort into a Rolex shop.

"This is a community of two million people and it doesn't have a museum," said Libby Lumpkin, the LVAM's last executive director, who quit in January hoping to save the institution money.

"That's not a good thing. It's just really disappointing."

more

[graphic from image search for 'Las Vegas.']

Closing: The Las Vegas Art Museum

[Sobering sign of the economic times as reported in the Las Vegas Sun ...]

Strapped Las Vegas Art Museum plans to shutter

By Kristen Peterson

"We had a lot of really great ideas. We wanted to be able to share them with the community,” said Alex Codlin, interim executive director. “We cut the budget significantly and thought we’d stay one step ahead of the economy. I’ve spoken with people at other institutions around the country. They’re in the same boat. They just maybe have more established donors or bigger endowments."

Full Article

L.A. Now in Las Vegas

December 12, 2008 to March 8, 2009

Las Vegas Art Museum
L.A. Now
David Pagel, Curator

"The “L.A. Now” exhibition features 20 emerging artists who live and work in Los Angeles, California. The exhibition is organized by critic and curator David Pagel. Artists included in the exhibition were selected from among those who presented outstanding artworks in Los Angeles commercial galleries during the 2007-2008 season. The artists work in a wide variety of styles and media; each has gained national or international recognition for artistic achievement.

Artists featured in the exhibition include: Olivia Booth, Miles Coolidge, Liz Craft, Nathaniel de Large, Lecia Dole-Recio, Brad Eberhard, Wendell Gladstone, Katie Grinnan, Elliott Hundley, Annie Lapin, Michael Lazarus, Nathan Mabry, Allison Miller, Kristen Morgin, Christine Nguyen, Jared Pankin, Steve Roden, Jeni Spota, Don Suggs, and Wayne White. The exhibition represents the Las Vegas debut for all of the artists.

According to curator Pagel, “L.A. Now” is designed to showcase the artistic achievements of the artists individually: “rather than start with a theme, and fit the art into that, I'm starting with the art and seeing what emerges from that.” Most important for Pagel was to select artworks that are not only singularly memorable, but that together create compelling interactions: “I wanted the works in my show to converse with one another, to engage one another materially, intellectually, and emotionally.”"

[photograph from a Google image search for 'Los Angeles Now.']