Art Deco is never really demolished: even after a century, the snake zigzag, the suave ladies and the elegant lines associated with it always define sophistication.
The style gained popularity after being presented at the Paris Exhibition of modern decorative and industrial arts in 1925, and to coincide with this centenary, the new book by West Hollywood, “Art Deco Los Angeles. In addition to the photos of the praise of beloved monuments, some familiar and some reduced in the rubble a long time ago, the Angel City Press Tome Includes an essay by the author and the historian of Alan Hess architecture on the style of the 20th century known for daring geometric forms.
(Angel City Press at the Los Angeles public library)
“I responded visually and emotionally to the places I grew up,” Landau told The Times of his photograph, mentioning the Pan-Pacific auditorium as one of these places. “I went there as a child to see Harlem Globetrotters,” he said about the sprawling structure of the Fairfax district near the farmer market which was Destroyed by fire in 1989. “The” 20s “, the 1930s, were an exciting period, and people were inspired by the dynamics of things such as cars and technology, and also the creation of fun and engaging architecture.”
Designed by Wurdeman & Becket in 1935, the aesthetics of Modern Streamline of Pan-Pacific echoes the shows of the motorcycle car that had passed there. A sprawling structure of low height was an example of a horizontal decor iteration compared to the vertical style found in most cities.
The Department of Colombia-East, whose clock tower has been authorized to exceed the limits of the existing heights of the, has since been transformed into lofts. Landau photographed the 1930s construction and support swimming pool in 2015.
(Robert Landau)
“We have a smaller decor here,” observes Margot Gerber, executive director of Los Angeles Deco Society. “For a long time, it was a or two floors, a sprawling metropolis. We used to have limits 150 feet high, but technology has evolved so that we can have larger buildings at”
Also in the book: The Mauretania, a building of low height apartments designed in 1934 by Milton J. Black in a modern style of rationalization which refers to the British luxury lining of this name, which established a record of transatlantic speed in 1909. The structure of 10 units surrounds one per open courtyard and is at the head of a large penthouse where “Wizard of Oz” Haley Haley Haley.
The Los Angeles Central Library, photographed in 1988 and originally built in 1926, characterizes the art deco design in a city concerned with earthquakes.
(Robert Landau)
Other examples of low height in the book include the Los Angeles Central Library (Goodhue and Winslow, 1926), Union station (Parkinson and Parkinson, 1929) and the Griffith Observatory (Austin and Ashley, 1935), all emblematic of Deco.
The ornamentation on buildings has existed for as long as buildings, but the roots of the Art Deco style are often traced at the work of Frank Lloyd Wright, his mentor Louis Sullivan and movements like Art Nouveau, Bauhaus and the secession of Vienna.
A Gilmore service station at 859. N. Highland Ave. Now dispenses Starbucks Coffee. Built in 1935, it was photographed in 2024.
(Robert Landau)
“You can see where they simplified all the forms and removed it from what it had been in the classic period or the Victorian era,” notes Gerber. “You look at Art Deco and it's lighter, so black and white and so graphic.”
The book also includes modest houses, such as one on Hudson and Larchmont which presents a vintage stained glass window, but whose interior was renovated in the modern style of the middle of the century. Vitrines like the deserted commercial building of Long Beach on North Atlantic Street are also represented with service stations and reused tire stores such as restaurants and cafes.
The Wiltern and Pellissier building, located at 3790 Wilshire BLVD., was built in 1931 and photographed in 2002.
(Robert Landau)
Too many structures have been lost over the years, no as painful as the Richfield tower rast in 1969, an office building in 1929 in downtown Morgan, Walls & Clements, the company also behind the Mayan theater, the Pellissier and Wiltern building.
“It is increasingly difficult due to state mandates for housing. And many development limitations have been lifted, ”explains Gerber about the fight to preserve these architectural gems.
The son of a Gallerist in Los Angeles, Landau began to photograph the city in the late 1960s.
(Angel City Press)
She and others fought to get the Fairfax Theater appointed as a cultural monument, but despite successful campaign The owner has demolished the interior of the theater, leaving only the Art Deco facade, as required by law, with a stand open behind.
Among the many losses of Art Deco are the Pacific Theater on Wilshire (demolished in 1988), Wilshire Bowl / Slapsy Maxie's (demolished in 1952), the Mole-Richardson Studio Depot On Labrea (demolished in 2014), Simon Drive-In restaurant (demolished in 1971) and the Four -star theater building on Wilshire (demolished in 2015).
“There are a lot of things that we thought we were marked, but it is not that you get the designation that the building cannot be demolished.
“Did not have a very good story to respect its past, perhaps because it is always a relatively young city,” explains Landau. “The May Co., they could have easily eliminated this and put a box in it, but they did not do it and now it is the Academy Museum. The public comes to understand that many of these modern buildings that are put in place do not correspond to the character or the quality of some of these buildings in the past. »»
Formerly a department store in May Company, this Art Deco style building built in 1939 now houses the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures. Landau photographed it in 2024.
(Robert Landau)
The son of Gallerist Felix LandauRobert began to photograph the city in the late 1960s. The previous books include “Rock 'N' Roll Billboards of the Sunset Strip” and “Stageous the” The previous images of his new book were shot on a Hasselblad in the 1970s and 80s. For subsequent images, he used a Nikon D700.
“I grew up in black and white,” he says. “My heroes were European street photographers – Atget, Kertész, Bresson. But here, the elements of the urban landscape are designed for the cars that pass and they howl for attention, and the color is a large part of that. I do a lot of my shot on weekends, the color of Sunday and color. ”.
Popular with the public in his time, Art Deco was rejected by the artistic and academic community in favor of the international style, an elegant and minimalist sensitivity seen in the works of practitioners like Richard Neutra and Philip Johnson, curator of a spectacle of Moma Monument in 1932 on the subject. However, he endured.
“People rejected Deco in the 1950s because it seemed to be something that was old school and they wanted nothing to do with it. But he did not die, ”observes Gerber. “The Oscars, the past five years, have made an art deco style very specific to their set. Now the style is synonymous with timeless elegance. I don't think it has ever really disappeared.”
