Artillery Magazine

Last September, almost immediately after the inaugural reception of the Pacific Design Center's Design Loves Art program, director/curator Helen Varola received a flood of proposals from gallerists and artists asking how to sign on. To add to this frenzy, a new contemporary art fair was in the works, also to be held at the iconic Blue Building in West Hollywood. At DLA's subsequent opening, the excitement was so palpable I wondered how the Design Center could have so transformed, seemingly overnight, into LA's latest mecca of cultural currency and hipness.

As DLA marks its first anniversary, last fall's initial buzz has subsided. The fair, held in January, will re-emerge at a new venue next year. Ironically, many LA natives, including a sizable number in the art community, remain unaware or confused about the residency program of 12 to 15 participants - gallerists, artists, collectives and independent curators - on the building's second floor. The fact that DLA is so far under the radar is truly unfortunate, because the programming is fantastic. There is also the real potential, with so many art venues in one place, for the PDC to position itself as the next big art community in Los Angeles. But that can only happen if CEO Charles S. Cohen is willing to reinvent the complex's puzzling, quasi-public identity.

As an art destination, the PDC is a surreal departure from the gritty, open-air experience of walking gallery to gallery in downtown, Chinatown or Culver City. The atmosphere feels quite the opposite - clean and fluorescent-lit - as a shopping mall catering to the luxury interior design trade. Amid the polished surfaces of marble and glass, there are dozens of chic chairs, Oriental carpets and cascading chandeliers - and now, next to the stores in identical windowed showrooms, the eclectic and unpredictable offerings of art. But when the art spaces come alive during openings, you can feel an invigorating sensory overload just by walking the halls and taking in those juxtapositions.

http://www.artillerymag.com/