Latest news with #Angelenos
Time Out
14 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Time Out
It may not have any art yet, but LACMA's new building offers plenty to look at inside
There's not a single piece of artwork to see on the concrete walls of LACMA's new building right now. And yet, this is undoubtedly the most exciting art destination in Los Angeles this weekend. Months ahead of the galleries' planned April 2026 debut, and before the institution begins installing artwork, LACMA has allowed the public to take a peek inside its new David Geffen Galleries—to the tune of a one-of-a-kind performance from local saxophone extraordinaire Kamasi Washington, no less. For the museum members and everyday Angelenos who were lucky enough to secure tickets, they'll find more than 100 musicians split between 10 performance areas, with each ensemble playing a different component of the six-part jazz suite Harmony of Difference; you might catch Washington soloing on sax toward the center of the building, but round a corner and you'll hear the buzz of a brass section or the echoing voices of a choir. But what about the building itself? The Peter Zumthor-designed replacement for LACMA's myriad mid-century buildings on its eastern campus consolidates collections into a single-floor, 110,000-square-foot amoeba-shaped space. It's also, since its unveiling in 2013 and start of construction in 2020, invited plenty of strong opinions about everything from its aesthetic to its footprint. So what's it like to actually step inside (still sans art, of course)? I was invited to the museum on Thursday for the first of three performances. About an hour before sunset, I filed past the familiar spider-like lines of Tony Smith's Smoke sculpture and hoofed it up the long staircase into the David Geffen Galleries (there are elevators, as well). I passed by what looked like a ground-floor restaurant space and a future bookshop but could only gawk from outside. Upstairs, though, I was free to roam across the entire floor—and roam I did. The building isn't broken up into traditional rooms; instead, there are roughly two dozen enclosed galleries toward the center of the structure, while the entirety of the exterior is lined with floor-to-ceiling windows. The views are absolutely dreamy and offer a fresh vantage point that makes it feel as though you're floating above one of L.A.'s most crowded cultural corridors. Each curve unveils a new, unexpected perspective: overlooking the lake at the La Brea Tar Pits, eye-level with the bubble-like theater of the Academy Museum and literally on top of the traffic on Wilshire Boulevard. Yes, the building spans the busy road (Jeff Koons's floral Split-Rocker sculpture will eventually anchor the outside of the southern side), and it's tough to articulate just how wild it is to shuffle along the museum floor and suddenly find yourself crossing over the iconic street. At every point, the architecture perfectly frames each vista, so—for better or worse—expect plenty of posing, particularly as the setting sun floods the west side with dramatic lighting. Despite all of those windows, it was easy to get a little bit turned around inside of the space—but I imagine that'll be much less of an issue once there's actually artwork installed. For now, it's a lot of unadorned concrete, so if you're not looking out a window, there are no other visual cues to place exactly where you are. Without paintings, drawings, sculptures and installations, the interior galleries feel raw and empty because they're, well, raw and empty right now—so I'll hold off any sort of proper judgment until after the installation process has wrapped up. (You can see how the galleries will look with art inside over on LACMA's site.) When Washington's performance wound down, it was dark out. As I descended the staircase out of the David Geffen Galleries, Urban Lights' rows of streetlamps glowed in the background. On my way in, I thought some angles of the building were more flattering than others; the profile of the tar pits side looks beautiful, but stand close enough to the western tip and it feels a little like a low-angle selfie. But as I was exiting and looked back up the staircase at night, it was as if the entire building was floating. It was oddly peaceful—and already difficult to imagine the museum and Wilshire Boulevard without it. Check out some more photos below. Kamasi Washington continues his performances on Friday and Saturday—tickets are unfortunately sold out—followed by a series of member previews of the building. The David Geffen Galleries open April 2026.
Los Angeles Times
15 hours ago
- Los Angeles Times
Fireworks are out of control in L.A. Here are 5 things experts wish you knew
One thing I still can't get used to living in L.A. is the Bayhem-level of firepower Angelenos bring to bear on the Fourth of July. My neighbors have already started setting them off. By all accounts — and there are many — we are living in the illegal firework capital of the United States. That's not just because all fireworks are illegal in the City of Los Angeles, which the doctors, public safety officials and pollution experts I talked to about their dangers are at pains to point out. Many immigrant Angelenos come from cultures where DIY fireworks are common, and we're an easy drive from places where they're cheap and legal. With few exceptions, the penalty for setting off professional-grade pyrotechnics is small and difficult to enforce. Nationwide, the problem is much bigger now than it ever was. In 2024, almost 15,000 Americans were treated for firework-related injuries — a jump of more than 50% from the year prior, according to the Consumer Product Safety Commission. In 2025 alone, Cal Fire and its partner agencies have confiscated more than 600,000 pounds of illegal fireworks. Still, the folks who most want you to stop buying M80s — city managers, ER doctors, Smokey the Bear — know their pleas fall on deaf ears. The quest to save fingers, lungs, palm trees and the state budget from fireworks was described to me as 'quixotic' and 'Sisyphean.' Even January's firestorm is unlikely to tame our passion for pyrotechnics, they said. At least one expert told me he thinks 2025 will be 'worse than it's ever been,' describing fireworks as a kind of Freudian pressure valve for communities on edge. Here are five things experts wish you knew about your cache of emotional-support explosives. 'We have among the worst air quality in the country on the night of July 4 into July 5,' Dr. Scott Epstein of the South Coast Air Quality Management District said. 'Over the past 15 years, we have seen an upward trend.' Remember those two dozen semitrucks worth of confiscated fireworks I mentioned earlier? Golden State taxpayers foot the bill to ship them to Ohio, Hawaii and Massachusetts to dispose of. 'Think about packaging up a couple thousand pounds of fireworks and sending them to Ohio — it's going to cost hundreds of thousands of dollars,' said Cmdr. David Barrett, head of MySafe:LA. Multiply that a couple hundred thousand times, you're looking at a budget black hole. 'The number one thing kids tell us is: 'We don't want fireworks, but our parents bought them,'' Barrett told me. 'The message doesn't need to be for kids, it needs to be for parents,' he said. 'Something like: 'How do you feel about your kid having four fingers?'' 'The things I've seen the most are loss of a finger or a hand, or severe damage to the eye,' said Dr. Jeremy Swisher, a sports medicine doctor in the orthopedics department at UCLA. 'Burns are the most common.' Many of those burns come from sparklers. 'When it's over 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit, holding it for a few seconds can cause a lot of damage,' the doctor explained. 'It can cause deeper burns into the skin, which can lead to the need for skin grafting, many surgeries and needing to stay in the hospital for a week or more.' 'If you look forward to the next three years, we have the World Cup, the Super Bowl, and the year after that we have the Olympics,' Barrett said. 'They're all summer events, so the potential for out-of-control fireworks is significant.' 'The last thing we need is for the Hollywood Hills to burn down because of fireworks.' Today's great photo is from Times contributor Yasara Gunawardena. This year's jacaranda bloom in L.A. was short a few trees following the January wildfires, but experts say many burned trees will recover. Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editorAndrew Campa, Sunday writerKarim Doumar, head of newsletters How can we make this newsletter more useful? Send comments to essentialcalifornia@ Check our top stories, topics and the latest articles on
New York Times
20 hours ago
- General
- New York Times
For the Future of Water Conservation, Look to … Los Angeles?
Los Angeles was built in a desert. And it takes a colossal infrastructure to transport water to the city. But large-scale construction isn't the only way the city has quenched its thirst. Critic's Notebook Supported by You've probably come across more stories about water woes in California than you can recall, so you may feel you've had enough for a while. I understand. There's no easy or permanent fix. The protagonists don't divide neatly into good and evil. Water in the state often isn't where the people are — or, as with the recent fires, isn't there at all. After looking into the subject for years, I still can't wrap my head around the endless ins and outs. But there is one indisputable fact that keeps surfacing in the conversations I have about California water that feels like something of a beacon. The first time I heard it, it came as quite a surprise. Over the last half century or so, millions more people have moved to greater Los Angeles, settling in increasingly far-flung reaches of the desert and in the mountains, requiring more faucets, toilets and shower heads, producing more garbage and more gridlock on the 405 freeway, reinforcing all the clichés about excess and sprawl. And during this same time, Angelenos have been consuming less water. I don't just mean per person, though that figure, according to state authorities, is down by a whopping 43 percent since 1990. I mean, residents and businesses in the Los Angeles area now consume less water in total. The population has grown, yet the city consumes less water. How Los Angeles Gets Its Water CALIFORNIA Sacramento River Sacramento/ San Joaquin River Delta Mono Lake Owens River Owens Lake CALIFORNIA AQUEDUCT LOS ANGELES AQUEDUCT COLORADO RIVER AQUEDUCT Pacific Ocean Los Angeles Colorado River 100 miles CALIFORNIA Sacramento River Sacramento/ San Joaquin River Delta Mono Lake Owens River Owens Lake CALIFORNIA AQUEDUCT LOS ANGELES AQUEDUCT Pacific Ocean Los Angeles Colorado R. COLORADO RIVER AQUEDUCT 100 miles By Barbara Berasi The L.A. Aqueduct starts at Mono Lake … … and taps into the snaking Owens River… … diverting water from Owens Lake, now a toxic moonscape. The aqueduct crosses deserts … … and flows into reservoirs … … and spills down into the city delivering water to millions. How do you think about water in your community? You just read our story about water in Los Angeles, but we're curious: How do you think about water where you live? Whether you're dealing with drought, trying to conserve, facing rising costs, trying to use less or just trying to understand it, we want to hear from you. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Los Angeles Times
a day ago
- Los Angeles Times
ICE in L.A.: Texts of terror
As immigration raids continue in Southern California, Angelenos are using cellphones and other digital platforms to share fears, concerns and warnings.
Los Angeles Times
2 days ago
- Health
- Los Angeles Times
Letters to the Editor: How ICE raids could inadvertently encourage the spread of infectious diseases
To the editor: Staff writer Corinne Purtill's article on healthcare avoidance due to Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations highlights a crucial gap: the public health threat posed by undetected infectious diseases ('In Southern California, many are skipping healthcare out of fear of ICE operations,' June 20). While missed chronic care appointments create individual health risks, the failure to diagnose and treat contagious conditions threatens our entire community. When fearful residents stop seeking medical care, avoid routine visits and skip vaccinations, communicable diseases such as tuberculosis, measles or seasonal flu can spread uncontrolled. A single undiagnosed case in L.A.'s densely populated neighborhoods, schools or workplaces could trigger outbreaks affecting everyone — documented and undocumented residents alike. Public health depends on communitywide participation in disease surveillance and prevention. Immigration enforcement that drives vulnerable populations away from healthcare doesn't just harm those individuals; it also creates dangerous blind spots in our infectious disease monitoring systems. Los Angeles cannot maintain public health while a significant portion of our population remains hidden from medical care. This crisis demands immediate attention to protect all Angelenos. Thomas Klitzner, Culver City
