LAAA : Timeline

Chronological History of the Los Angeles Arts Association
1890	Louisa Garden MacLeod, principal of the Los Angeles School of Art and Design, organizes an Art Association, serving as Los Angeles's first public art gallery and compensating to some extent for the lack of a public art museum. Nonetheless, the city's residents continue to clamor for a more official institution.
1913	Debut of the Los Angeles Museum of History, Science, and Art ("The County Museum"). Located at Exposition Park, the County Museum devotes five rooms to art gallery space but does not have a permanent collection.
1918	William Preston Harrison, art collector, becomes major donor for the County Museum.
1925	Museum Patrons Association forms in an attempt to "speed up the sluggishness of the art department" which Museum Director William A. Bryan has spent little time activating. Proactive Patrons include Harry Chandler (publisher of the Los Angeles Times), Edward Dickson (founder of UCLA), and William May Garland (civic leader who brought the 1932 Olympics to Los Angeles).
1931	Harry Muir Kurtzworth, first curator for Department since 1916, is hired for a year and a half. In 1933 Kurtzworth becomes director of LAAA.
1933	Museum Patrons Association decides to reconvene of its own accord. Changes name to the Los Angeles Arts Association, operating as a non-profit, non-political organization, completely independent of the Los Angeles Museum. In addition to Harry Chandler, Edward Dickson, and twenty other LAAA founders, Harvey Mudd, oil baron and founder of Mudd College joins the group.
1934	LAAA owns 63 works of art and has 2,500 members. LAAA hosts a landmark "All-California Art Exhibition" at the Biltmore Salon featuring the work of over 1,500 California artists. LAAA exhibition of etchings by Rembrandt.
1936-1937	LAAA is located at 702 Subway Terminal Building.
1937	LAAA is located at the Central Library on 5th and Grand. Loan Exhibition of International Art. Artworks on view include Pablo Picasso's "Woman With Blue Turban," Marcel Duchamp's Nude Descending the Stairs," and Salvador Dali's "L'eco Nostalgic." Hollywood celebrities including Marion Davies and Edward G. Robinson play a major role in the success of loan exhibitions by making works of art from their private collections available to LAAA while Cecile B. Demille, Samuel Goldwyn, Norma Shearer Thalberg, and Hal Roach act as sponsoring patrons. Major turnout for LAAA exhibition is noted in LA Times. "The International Art exhibit at the Town House Annex on Wilshire Boulevard, which will close tomorrow evening, has attracted more than 200,000 persons to the "Old Masters" and great modern paintings during the last two months, H.M. Kurtzworth, director of the Los Angeles Arts Association announced yesterday."
1938-1939	The county government purchases the property adjacent to the Otis Art Institute, the Earl Mansion at 2425 Wilshire Boulevard, for $99,000. LAAA relocates their headquarters to the Mansion, establishing a centrally located downtown art gallery for the people of Los Angeles.
1940's	Due to the existence of the County Museum, LAAA shifts focus and becomes an organization devoted to encouraging and exhibiting works by contemporary southern California artists. Man Ray exhibits at the LAAA Earl Mansion location.
1940	Due to the new focus of the County Museum, some LAAA Board Members step down and donate their large collections of art to the County Museum, helping to form the foundation for what will become the Los Angeles County Museum of Art [LACMA]. By 1947 Mr. and Mrs. William Preston Harrison contribute 267 artworks to what later became LACMA. Click here for more information. William May Garland remains president of LAAA until 1940, W. Bertrand Stevens becomes president in 1941. Harry Chandler remains on the LAAA board of trustees and becomes Vice President of LAAA in 1941.
1944	LAAA receives notice to vacate on grounds that the Otis Art Institute anticipates a high enrollment of returning soldiers and needs the extra space but LAAA insists that their gallery of art serves just as valuable a role in the community as the school did and secures the rights to remain at the Earl Mansion for thirteen more years. Helen Wurdemann, art critic for Art in America magazine, becomes new Executive Director. Helen Wurdemann, also known as Italian Baroness Helen Guzzardi, continues to work at LAAA full-time and without salary for over 40 years. Stephen Longstreet and Lorser Feitelson are key supporters of Wurdemann. Lorser Feitelson, the artist who invented "hard-edge" painting and was host of the 1960's NBC series, "Art in Our Times," assists Wurdemann in running LAAA.
1948	Wayne Thiebaud exhibits with LAAA in the exhibition "Artists under 33" Curated by Lorser Feitelson.
1951	First solo exhibition in LAAA history features Hans Burkhardt and is curated by Lorser Feitelson.
1957	The Earl Mansion is bulldozed in order to build a parking lot for the Otis Art Institute and, with only $300 in the bank, LAAA seems as if it will be forced out of business. Amazingly the artist members organize an auction at the Art Center, College of Art and Design in Pasadena, that raises $10,000 and with that money Wurdemann is able to rent a storefront space at 8317 Beverly Blvd.
1960	Purchased with funds from Helen Wurdemann, as well as proceeds from an auction of artworks donated by member artists, LAAA relocates to current 825 North La Cienega address in the area, which will later be known as "Gallery Row." Although some members of the community at the time consider the Association to be quite conservative both politically and artistically, active collectors such as Vincent Price, Julie Andrews and Tab Hunter are among the Hollywood celebrities who frequent the gallery and purchase work.
1970's	Nationally respected writer Stephen Longstreet is named LAAA Board President and Shirley Burden as Vice President.
1979	LAAA publishes "Lorser Feitelson Drawings" edited by Stephen Longstreet.
1980's	After Helen Wurdemann retires, former LAAA artist Richard Campbell assumes the role of Executive Director of the Association. Wishing to bring the "cutting-edge" back to La Cienega, Campbell introduces juried shows at LAAA for the first time.
1986	"Jubilee Retrospective" an exhibition featuring over 60 artists who have shown work at LAAA galleries over the past 60 years including Hans Burkhardt, Man Ray, and Millard Sheets.
1993	Amy Perez joins Campbell as co-director and is credited with renaming the La Cienega Location "Gallery 825" (more representative of the contemporary direction LAAA was headed in.)
1999-2000	Ashley Emenegger, formerly with the Santa Monica Museum of Art, joins LAAA as Executive Director and, along with Gallery Coordinator Sinead Finnerty (current Artistic Director), further drives the gallery into a contemporary direction hosting exhibitions with guest artists; Lita Albuquerque, Michael McMillen, Lisa Adams, and Frank Romero.
2002	LAAA acquires an Annex at Bergamot Station, Santa Monica, CA.
2004-2005	Some of LAAA's exhibition jurors include: Carl Berg, Carl Berg Gallery; Eleana Del Rio, Koplin Del Rio Gallery; James Elaine, The Hammer Museum; and Tim Wride, former curator at the Los Angles County Museum of Art.
2005	Peter Mays, formerly Director of Development and Supplementary Education Services at the Galef Institute is appointed Executive Director of LAAA. To commemorate the 80th anniversary of LAAA, an exhibition featuring a selection of artists who have exhibited and participated throughout the association's history, is organized by curator Molly Barnes. Events held to complement the anniversary exhibition include a panel of distinguished speakers such as former museum director Henry T. Hopkins, gallery owner Tobey Moss and artist June Wayne and moderated by exhibition curator Molly Barnes. LAAA closes the Annex at Bergamot Station.
2006	LAAA opens LAAA South in conjunction with the Mike Napoliello Gallery in Hermosa Beach, CA.
2008	LAAA closes LAAA South.