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Arts And Culture Of Los AngelesThe arts and culture of Los Angeles are as varied and rich as the population and history of the area. Motion pictures The greater Los Angeles area is the most important site in the United States for movie and television production. This has drawn not only actors, but also writers, composers, artists, and other creative individuals to the area. The area is home to many institutes that study and appreciate film production, such as the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and American Film Institute. Various awards are given annually for movie and television production, some of which garner huge worldwide audiences. There are many small Film festivals, like the Los Angeles Film Festival sponsored by IFP/Los Angeles and the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Film Festival conducted by Outfest. Specialty theaters like the Egyptian Theatre and art houses like the Nuart Theatre screen eclectic mixes of new and historic movies. Film production in Los Angeles faces increasing competition, however, from other parts of the United States and from the Canadian cities of Vancouver and Toronto. The phenomenon of entertainment companies running away to other locales in search of lower labor and production costs is known as "runaway production." The motion picture and TV industries have created helped define the image of Los Angeles across the world and tourists flock to see Hollywood-related landmarks such as the Walk of Fame and the Grauman's Chinese Theater. Literature Los Angeles's literary side includes Raymond Chandler, whose hard-boiled detective stories were set in pre-war L.A. Walter Mosley is among the local succesors to Chandler. Nathaniel West's book, The Day of the Locust, depicted a raw side to the Hollywood dream. Ray Bradbury wrote science fiction after moving to the city in 1934. Actress Carrie Fisher has found success as a novelist. The best known local poet was Charles Bukowski, who mostly lived in San Pedro. Tens of thousands of screenplays have been written by L.A. city residents, and the movie business has attracted many authors, including F. Scott Fitzgerald, Tennessee Williams, Evelyn Waugh, and William Faulkner. Music Los Angeles is also one of the most important sites in the world for the recorded music industry. The landmark Capitol Records building, which resembles a stack of albums, is representative of this. A&M Records long occupied a studio off Sunset Boulevard built by Charlie Chaplin (who wrote the music for his own films). The Warner Brothers built a major recording business in addition to their film business. At the other end of the business, local Rhino Records began a reissue boom by digging through archives of old recordings and repackaging them for modern audiences. Los Angeles had a vibrant African-American musical community even when it was relatively small: a number of musical artists congregated around Central Avenue, and the community produced a number of great talents, including Charles Mingus, Buddy Collette, Gerald Wilson, and others in the 1930s and 1940s before disappearing in the 1950s. In the 1960s the Sunset Strip became a breeding ground for bands like The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, and the Doors. The Beach Boys were founded in nearby Hawthorne. Much hard rock has come out of Los Angeles, including "hair bands" like Mtley Cre, thrash metal acts like Slayer, and also 90s rock bands such as Korn. Metallica got their start in L.A., but made their fame in the Bay Area. The hardcore punk movement also had an offshoot here, featuring bands like X, Black Flag and Wasted Youth. In the 1990s, Los Angeles contribution to rock music continued with acclaimed bands such as Tool and Rage Against the Machine. At the end of the 1990s the nu metal band Linkin Park was formed in Santa Monica, and was named after Lincoln Park in that city, near their recording studio. The Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra now performs at Walt Disney Concert Hall after having spent many years in residence at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, and performs summer concerts at the Hollywood Bowl. The demands of scoring thousands of hours of soundtracks for TV and movies also provides work for composers and classically-trained musicians. Art The plein air movement of impressionistic landscape painting found early adherents in the Los Angeles area, and became a signature style of California art. In the 1960s, Corita Kent, then known as Sister Mary Corita of Immaculate Heart College, created bright, bold serigraphs carrying the messages of love and peace. Los Angeles is known for its mural art, and its thousands of examples of wall art are believe to outnumber those in every other city in the world. Mexican muralists such as Diego Rivera, David Alfaro Siquieros and Jose Clemente Orozco all created murals in the area. The city also has a famous "public art" program which requires developers to contribute one percent of the cost of construction of new buildings to a public art fund. Much of this money has been spent in downtown Los Angeles. Architecture In downtown Los Angeles, there are several buildings constructed in the Art Deco style. In recognition of this heritage, the recently built Metropolitan Transit Authority building incorporates subtle Art Deco characteristics. Modern architecture in the city ranges from the works of pioneering African-American architect Paul Williams, to the iconoclastic forms of Frank Gehry. Charles Eames and his wife Ray Eames designed famous chairs and other domestic goods. Heritage The greater Los Angeles metro area has several notable art museums including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), the J. Paul Getty Center on the Santa Monica mountains overlooking the Pacific, the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), the Hammer Museum and the Norton Simon Museum. In the 1920s and 1930s Will Durant and Ariel Durant, Arnold Schoenberg and other intellectuals were the representatives of culture, in contrast to the movie writers and directors. But, until the 1960s the region was something of a "cultural wasteland" compared to San Francisco and New York--if culture is defined as the "high arts" of ballet, opera, classical music and legitimate theater. However, as the city flourished financially in the middle of the 20th century, the culture followed. Boosters such as Dorothy Buffum Chandler and other philanthropists raised funds for the establishment of art museums, music centers and theaters. Today, the Southland cultural scene is as complex, sophisticated and varied as any in the world. Cuisine While the cuisines of many cultures have taken root in Los Angeles, it is the home of the Cobb Salad, invented in the Brown Derby restaurant in Hollywood, the French-Dip sandwich, originated by either Cole's or Phillippe's restaurant in downtown, the ice blended coffee drink by Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and Tommy's Hamburger. Criticism The high profile of Los Angeles has generated many critics. Los Angeles has been derided by many in the rest of the United States for most of the last century; to quote one dyspeptic observer, the city "oozed up through the unstable earth like some noxious tropical plant growing and spreading over the plain and sending forth strange fruit to contaminate the rest of the country". H.L. Mencken complained about the stink of oranges, Douglas Adams noted that the city is "like several thousand square miles of American Express junk mail, but without the same sense of moral depth," while Bertolt Brecht compared Los Angeles to hell with "endless processions of cars/Lighter than their own shadows, faster than/Mad thoughts, gleaming vehicles in which/Jolly-looking people come from nowhere and are nowhere bound". The current stereotype appears to be Los Angeles as dystopia, as portrayed in movies such as Blade Runner and novels like Snow Crash, and also promulgated in part by socialist urban critic Mike Davis, author of the influential nonfiction works City of Quartz and Ecology of Fear. Other perceptions of Los Angeles suggest a town full of surfers, gang members, valley girls and show biz types.
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