Eli Broad, a businessman and philanthropist whose vast fortune, extensive art collection and zeal for civic improvement helped reshape the cultural landscape of Los Angeles, died on Friday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. He was 87. [...]

Mr. Broad (pronounced “brode”) made billions in the home-building and insurance businesses and spent a significant part of his wealth trying to make Los Angeles one of the world’s pre-eminent cultural capitals. — The New York Times

“We are not aiming at having more visitors or larger attendance, but we’re aiming at being more accessible, at having open doors,” he said in an interview. “As a civic institution, we should be like a library, where you can just walk in.” — LA Times

The Museum of Contemporary Art announced Wednesday that it will close its Pacific Design Center location next month after exhibiting architecture and design at the West Hollywood satellite for more than 20 years.

MOCA will continue an architecture and design program, but at its Grand Avenue and Geffen Contemporary locations in downtown L.A., board Chairwoman Maria Seferian said in a statement. — LA Times

MacDonald Becket ’52, former chairman of the board and CEO of the architecture firm Welton Becket and Associates, died in Phoenix, AZ. He was 89. Becket, who graduated from the USC School of Architecture, was a driving force in the development of architecture in Los Angeles. Two of his major roles in California were coordinating the master planning and architectural implementations of the 260-acre Century City project and in the successful renovation of the state capitol building in Sacramento. — news.usc.edu

In one sense, spectacle shows represent acute risk aversion on the part of museums. It's cousin to the disease that has sacked Hollywood, where only remakes and sequels promise the margins that justify a global blockbuster production—so only remakes and sequels get greenlighted. — citylab

“People used to complain that people went to New York to buy what they could buy in LA,” said Kathy Halbreich, the associate director of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. “I don’t think that happens anymore. I think there’s a recognition that the city matters, that the people aren’t just there for the weather. You see a level of ambition that’s been ratcheted up.” — theguardian.com

This month, audiences will be able to check out the first program to emerge from Vergne's nascent administration: Step and Repeat, a multidisciplinary festival of performing arts, takes place at the Geffen Contemporary at MOCA over four Saturday evenings, beginning Sept. 13 [...] Step and Repeat will feature a unique nightly lineup of poetry readings, noise/experimental music, performance art, stand-up comedy, live bands and deejays, all presented side by side. — LA Weekly

Now that the exhibition has opened at the museum's Geffen Contemporary branch in Little Tokyo, where it will limp along through the middle of September as part of the Getty's Pacific Standard Time Presents series, it's clear that it is the product of an architectural ruling class in Los Angeles that is not so much dysfunctional as increasingly insular. — Christopher Hawthorne, LA Times

A squadron of U-Hauls descended on the parking lot in front of the Geffen Contemporary at MOCA last weekend, setting up a pop-up architecture exhibition in the first in a series of events called On the Road. The U-Hauls served as temporary displays for the work of up-and-coming, experimental architecture practices here in Los Angeles--where architecture businesses are known for being experimental, even if they don't often get a chance to deploy those innovations in Los Angeles. — la.curbed.com

Frank Gehry has pulled out of a major architecture exhibition set to open June 2 at the Museum of Contemporary Art, a move that could force the show to find a new venue or face the prospect of being canceled altogether.

The exhibition... is an exploration of the last 25 years of Los Angeles architecture, with work by Gehry, Thom Mayne, Michael Maltzan, Barbara Bestor, Lorcan O'Herlihy and many younger architects. — latimes.com

The exhibition was planned as an exploration of the last 25 years of Los Angeles architecture, with work by Frank Gehry, Thom Mayne, Michael Maltzan, Barbara Bestor and many younger architects.

It was funded in part by a Getty Foundation grant of $445,000. No other single show in the PSTP series received a grant as large, according to a Getty press release. A 272-page catalog, co-published by Rizzoli, is already complete. — latimes.com

Being a successful collector or dealer does not qualify one to make substantial decisions towards our collective cultural patrimony. — art&education

Deitch’s Disneyesque barrio gave New Yorkers who would never dream of getting off the subway north of 96th Street that delightful frisson of proximity to the underclass, just as the graffiti cult provides affluent viewers with the sense that they are in touch with authentic ghetto culture. — Heather MacDonald, City Journal