A lot of us feel the the Geffen is MOCA’s prime gallery space, that the Grand Avenue site is a disaster, located in a Ghost Town, and with gallery space that leaves a lot to be desired. Many of us would rather see the Geffen open and Grand Avenue closed, if a decision between the two had to be made. So with the Geffen closed as MOCA is unable to either keep it open financially, or to use some elbow grease to make it a viable space for some kind of low budget project, MOCA is hoping to rent it out as a filming location with Hollywood Locations.
Wow.
That’s the bottom of the barrel for LA real estate. Empty buildings, that could be used for living or work space held empty because it’s cheaper to not run them as functional spaces for real humans, litter LA. It’s like the last resort of a lazy landlord. Unable to attract tenants, he/she just lets the building sit there, with banners across the front reading “Available for Filming” and accompanied by a phone number. Last week I was at a talk at JANM (which butts up against the Geffen, and is also available for shoots from Hollywood Locations, but which unlike the Geffen is full of programming and life) and one of the moderators of the panel disparingly described the Geffen as “maybe closed forever”. Now all it needs is a depressing banner and we’re all set.
Now I know that being a filming location is typical for LA venues, it’s part of living in the city. Angels Gate, where I work, is used as an interior and exterior location all the time, and we love working with the film industry – it’s a constant source of fun anecdotes and free, gut busting lunches, two things I can’t resist. But my gallery is open, functioning, doing it’s job, and filming is just something that happens near or in it. There’s something fundamentally depressing about for rent sign on an empty warehouse of a gallery, operated by a museum with an uncertain future and a past history of incredibly bad decision making that makes it possible for me to see the Geffen literally brought to its knees as a monument to a downturn economy and MOCA’s financial catastrophe.
Technorati Tags: MOCA, filming, JANM, Geffen Contemporary, museum, art museum,
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