Architect of Geffen explores the role of gallery design at LACMA
David Geffen Galleries architect Peter Zumthor will be in conversation with Michael Govan, CEO and Wallis Annenberg Director of LACMA, on Wed., April 22 at 7 p.m. This is the third Genesis Talk with creative leaders in the lead-up to the highly anticipated opening of the new building. LACMA’s David Geffen Galleries open to members with reservations Sun., April 19, to Sun., May 3, and to the general public beginning Mon., May 4.
ARCHITECT PETER ZUMTHOR is the subject of LACMA’s upcoming Genesis Talk. Photo © Brigitte Lacombe
The Genesis Talks, named for underwriter Hyundai’s luxury car, explore the value and role of art museums and their holdings to the community. The conversation with the Swiss architect will address museum design as a force for public engagement.
Zumthor’s is an ambitious design, a 900-foot elevated floor that sweeps across Wilshire Boulevard, with multiple entrances and glass walls that allow the natural world to penetrate the art world. This approach seeks to present art in a egalitarian way, rather than the usual hierarchy separating popular Western masters from the often tucked-away galleries of lesser-known art from other corners of the world. Artworks will be displayed to resonate with each other across styles and time periods in ways not possible when exhibited in art “silos.”
The Pritzker Prize-winning Zumthor created outdoor space on the site for educational programming, art installations, and public events which aim to capture the community’s imagination the way Chris Burden’s outdoor light sculpture “Urban Light” and live jazz concerts do now. Similarly, the newly installed “Split-Rocker” by Jeff Koons, who spoke with Govan at the first Genesis Talk in December, is a plant-covered monumental sculpture that should entice guests to visit its ever-evolving flora and flurry of butterflies, bees, and birds that hover around it.
The second Genesis Talk, which was held in January, further explored the role of a museum in public life, with a riveting discussion led by Govan with Darren Walker, president of the National Gallery of Art and former president of the Ford Foundation, and artist Mark Bradford. They each stressed the importance of being exposed to the arts and of bringing art into underserved communities.
GENESIS TALK from January 2026 with (from left) Ford Foundation former president Darren Walker, artist Mark Bradford, and CEO and Wallis Annenberg Director of LACMA Michael Govan.
Walker, who grew up with economic hardship in rural Texas, first discovered art when he perused art books in collectors’ homes while accompanying his grandmother to her housecleaning jobs. He became a banker before his exposure to the New York art scene, when a lover who was an artist convinced him to pursue a more creative outlet. At the Ford Foundation he put arts and social justice at the center of what they funded.
Bradford, a MacArthur Fellow and 2023 recipient of the National Medal of Arts, grew up in a boarding house in Los Angeles. He worked in his mother’s hair salon in Leimert Park before receiving a scholarship to the California Institute of the Arts. His collaged paintings are layered with sanded, ripped, and torn papers, and always include a social message. In his powerful wall-sized “150 Portrait Tone,” installed in the Resnick Pavilion at LACMA, he carved excerpts from the words Philandro Castile’s girlfriend, Diamond Reynolds, called in anguish as a police officer shot and killed Castile after stopping their car; the words include “Lord, please Jesus, don’t tell me that he’s gone.”
In 2015 Bradford used his MacArthur prize money to co-found Art + Practice, a nonprofit foundation in Leimert Park. It collaborates with social service providers and other nonprofits to support foster youth and education initiatives and to provide free access to artist talks, film screenings, workshops, and contemporary art exhibits curated by the California African American Museum.
“I wanted to bring the mountain to the people,” Bradford explained. “I wanted them to be able to stop and see an exhibit on the way to the store.”
LACMA prioritizes community outreach initiatives, such as programming an adjunct gallery at Charles White Elementary School near MacArthur Park, at Mark Bradford’s suggestion, and supporting the restoration of the Simon Rodia Towers in Watts.
For information on the upcoming Genesis Talk with Peter Zumthor on Wed., April 22, or to make a reservation to visit the David Geffen Galleries, go to lacma.org.
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