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Today's New York Travel section recommends 31 places to go in the world this year. Tucked in between Leipzig and Shangai — and after Antarctica and Damascus — is our own little town. Andrew Ferren offers:
Visitors love to bemoan the lack of an old-fashioned cultural neighborhood in Los Angeles. In truth, the city has as many thriving art spots as it does ZIP codes. Last October, the pioneering Culver City gallery Blum & Poe inaugurated an airy 21,000-square-foot space; in July, the veteran local dealer Thomas Solomon opened a space in Chinatown. And the powerhouse New York galleries L&M Arts and Matthew Marks are scheduled to open prominent spaces in 2010.Local museums, many of which struggled financially in recent years, are back afloat. The Museum of Contemporary Art is celebrating its 30th birthday with a huge exhibition of 500 highlights from its outstanding collection of postwar art. In October, the vast Los Angeles County Museum of Art will get even bigger when it unveils a Renzo Piano-designed addition to its multiacre mid-Wilshire campus. And the billionaire collector Eli Broad, who has been both savior and villain to just about every major museum in town, is now looking to plant his own museum in Beverly Hills, Santa Monica or a third unnamed location.
Actually, as we reported in a mini-scoop in November, Santa Monica looks to have the upper hand and has scheduled a Tuesday vote on an agreement in principle. I wouldn't be surprised if the weekend death of mayor Ken Genser could affect those plans, however.