Jeffrey Deitch Becomes Gallery Director of MoCA
January 12, 2010 - By Bobby Solomon - Category: Art & Los Angeles
There are few gallery directors that I could name off of the top of my head, and the three I can think of don’t work at museums, they were at small independent galleries. Jeffrey Deitch is one of them with his now famous gallery Deitch Projects. His gallery was started back in 1996 and since then has featured works by artists such as Barry McGee, Steve Powers, Os Gemeos, Swoon and Ryan Mcginnes. These artists were once considered to be “low brow” but Jeffrey Deitch showed them for the true geniuses they are and helped launch their more mainstream careers.
But times change and now he’s decided to switch coasts and become the gallery director of the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art. This presents some very exciting opportunities for Los Angeles, which really excites me. Unfortunately it also means that he will no longer have anything to do with Dietch Projects. From what I read it’s a conflict of interest for him to run an art gallery that makes money while working for a donor based gallery. Nonetheless I’m extremely excited to see what he does with the MoCA. I can’t say that I’ve ever been to an exciting show there, so hopefully he revitalizes the museum and brings in some really interesting artists, like the ones I mentioned above.
My last, and most important point, though, is suck it New York, haha…
Bobby
Comments
If you've got something to say, keep it positive.Interesting direction for him, I completely forgot about the Deitch project, really excited to look at it again. Side note: thats exactly how I’d imagine a gallery director dressing too.
He has no experience with running museums, he is a gallery owner and his job is to seel for profit. This is not what museums are about, maybe MOCA thought it was a good idea, maybe some collectors who are advised my this guy pledged stuff. I don’t know. Kinda lame appointment if you ask me.
Ill-fitting gangster suit, below average hairstyle with hints of hairspray, Ridiculous Harry Potter glasses, Geeky smile.
Yeah, this guy is exciting. Can’t wait to go see all the exciting art he will brign to MoCA. Yawn.
LOL- your last sentence just made my day.
@And What Not – Wah, change is bad… Deitch has a degree from the Harvard Business School and has been a part of the New York art scene since the 80′s, so I’d say he has plenty of experience to be a gallery director. I’m thankful they’re mixing it up and trying something new, especially with his amazing track record.
@Josh E. – Really? You’re going to judge his curatorial experience by his appearance? Please send me a photo of yourself so I can put it on the blog and we can judge you and your skills based on it. Don’t be an asshole.
I excited to see what he does at Moca.
I’ve been to several great shows at Deitch projects.
The street market exhibit with Barry Mcgee, Stephen Powers and Reas,
and the Margaret Kilgallen show were both amazing.
I think he’ll give a fresh perspective to Moca.
What is really alarming here is that you (Bobby) claim to have never seen an “exciting” show at MoCA LA… umm… Martin Kippenberger, Allan Kaprow, Dan Graham, Louise Bourgeois, and Robert Rauschenberg to name a few of the seminal retrospective exhibitions that the museum staged in just the past three years.
Perhaps your not interested in really significant art historical retrospective exhibitions that take museum staff seven years to research and organize?…exhibitons, like Dan Graham, which show real ‘outsider’ artists as opposed to those who traffic in an aesthetics of ‘outsider-chic’… Perhaps keeping up with a mega-gallery is more “exciting”.
Please be a bit more informed with your comments.
@Paul – Wait, how does not not having an interest in those artists make me uninformed? Just because they took a lot of time and you may have liked them a lot doesn’t mean that I have to.
You call them significant but I don’t think making a giant black spider or putting a bunch of pieces of glass in a field or making crazy collages don’t make for the best pieces of art. This is my opinion and you have yours.
Get off your high horse, dude.
P.S. Clearly they weren’t doing something right if Eli Broad had to step in and donate $5 million to keep the museum in business. New blood is absolutely needed.
Bobby,
I forgot to mention Lawrence Weiner’s retrospective. Its not that these are all artists that in “my opinion” I like, and so you “in your opinion” are allowed not to like–its a matter of being able to understand that exhibitions like these are, as you have implied, a difficult sell. For this reason, and that these artists have produced difficult questions for their lifetimes (40-50 years in some cases), perhaps gives one a sense that there is something worthwhile there…something that might convince one to come up with a better expression of thought than: “I can’t say that I’ve ever been to an exciting show there.” I’m not on a “high horse”, just want comments to be a bit more thoughtful.
Your wrong about Eli Broad’s investment in MoCA…he did not buy control over one of the most significant contemporary art institutions for 5 million, it was 30 million. He bought the museum (when the museum was in a critical state of vulnerability through bad fiscal management), put in a CEO friend of his, laid-off half the museum staff, and now has hired his private art adviser to head the museum. Perhaps the museum will thrive with incredible and thoughtful programming, I hope so. But, the situation might also call for some healthy skepticism, and weighing of words.