Pure Beauty

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) presents John Baldessari : Pure Beauty, the most extensive retrospective to date of Los Angeles-based artist John Baldessari (b. 1931), on view June 27 to September 12, 2010. Organized by LACMA in association with Tate Modern, the exhibition will bring together more than 150 works and examine the principal concerns of Baldessari, who is widely regarded as one of the most important artists working today. LACMA's presentation will be the only West Coast showing and feature the greatest number of works of any venue on the show's major international tour.

Over the years, John Baldessari has collaborated with LACMA on a number of projects, including the unique installation design for the 2006 exhibition Magritte and Contemporary Art: The Treachery of Images, where he turned the galleries topsy-turvy, most memorably placing Magritte-inspired cloud carpet on the floor and papering the ceiling with freeway images. In December 2007, LACMA debuted its new logo, designed by the firm 2X4 in collaboration with Baldessari, using an image with a pencil and palm tree originally made by the artist in the 1960s. Baldessari also contributed the inaugural work to adorn the Wilshire Boulevard façade of the Broad Contemporary Art Museum (BCAM) when the building opened in February 2008. And most recently, in conjunction with Pure Beauty, he has created new banners for the Wilshire façade of BCAM, featuring a giant nose and ear—themes commonly seen in his work.