Museums in Los Angeles
Los Angeles is an extremely museum-rich city. With such a wealth of museums of all kinds, the pressure is on to compete for patrons, and the traveler who enjoys museums benefits from their competition. Whatever your pleasure, L.A. has the museum for you.
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art is one of the best ways to spend a day in the world. Their beautiful facilities (a campus, really) will blow your mind, before even walking through the door, and their curators always have amazing exhibits and programs. There’s something for the lover of all art media, including film, and the museum’s location, right on the corner of Wilshire Blvd., and Fairfax Ave., is convenient from anyplace in town, regardless of where you are staying.
For a hipper museum, swing by the Museum of Contemporary Art. It’s slick, crisp design really allows you to enjoy the artwork in a setting that brings out the best, and their retrospectives are really enlightening and interesting. A recent tribute to Dennis Hopper was a broadening experience, and regular returns to MoCA reveal new and exciting aspects to the art, MoCA itself, and the art world as a whole.
You probably know the Page Museum by its more familiar name, the La Brea Tar Pits. A glimpse into the past, the museum is built around the naturally occurring tar pits. Now, I know what you’re thinking, because I was thinking it too. What’s so interesting about a bunch of tar bubbling in the ground? It’s not interesting or educational, and it probably smells bad. Well, I’m here to provide you the one word that is going to change your mind. Here it is: Dinosaurs. The Page Museum and the tar pits are literally a natural history museum built atop ongoing natural history. It’s a must-see.
The Paley Center for Media is a proud tribute to an artistic heritage that many Americans hesitate to call art at all. But we are in a golden age of creative expression on television, just as we as a culture enjoyed the golden age of radio all those years ago. Where Abbott and Costello and the Marx Brothers are rightfully seen as artists now, modern greats like “Mad Men,” “The Wire,” and “The Sopranos” are demonstrating that TV is a revolutionary medium. Whether it’s the modern classics that interest you, or the likes of Lucille Ball and Ernie Kovacs, The Paley Center is for you. Make sure to check if they have any special events going on while you’re in town. Writers, directors, and cast of current, recent, and influential programs frequently appear at Paley Center for Q&A with fans.
Not all museums have to be stuffy or educational. The Hollywood Wax Museum is every bit the cheese fest you would expect. Located right in the heart of Hollywood, the tourist Mecca known as Hollywood and Highland, the Hollywood Wax museum is designed for the wacky vacation photos that embarrass us all when we return home, but are just too much fun to take. The sad reality is the Hollywood Wax Museum may be the only chance you will ever have to get your picture taken with Charlie’s Angels and the Terminator at the same time. Bring your aspiring, because your sides will be aching from the laughing! For more of the same fun carnival-barker atmosphere, just a stone's throw away, give the Ripley's Believe It Or Not! Museum a spin.