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INVENTORY OF THE EDWARD RUSCHA PHOTOGRAPHS OF LOS ANGELES STREETS, 1974-2010
2012.M.2
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Title: Edward Ruscha photographs of Los Angeles streets
Date (inclusive): 1974-2010
Number: 2012.M.2
Creator/Collector:
Ruscha, Edward
Physical Description:
35.0 linear feet
(28 boxes)
Repository:
The Getty Research Institute
Special Collections
1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1100
Los Angeles, California, 90049-1688
(310) 440-7390
Abstract: The collection is comprised of Edward Ruscha's ongoing photographic documentation of Los Angeles thoroughfares. Included are
shoots of three streets made in the 1970s: Santa Monica Boulevard and Pacific Coast Highway, 1974; and Melrose Avenue, 1975;
and over 40 shoots made since 2007. These shoots represent more than twenty-five streets including Sepulveda, Pico, Olympic,
Wilshire, La Cienega, and Beverly boulevards.
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Language: Collection material is in
English.
The American artist Edward Joseph Ruscha IV was born in Omaha, Nebraska on December 16, 1937 to Edward Ruscha III, an insurance
auditor, and his wife Dorothy Driscoll Ruscha. He was raised in Oklahoma City where he met his lifelong friends Mason Williams,
Joe Goode, and Jerry McMillan. After graduation from high school he drove to California with Mason Williams to attend Chouinard
Art Institute (now California Institute of the Arts). Robert Irwin and Emerson Woelffer were among the teachers who would
have an especially strong influence on him.
Ruscha graduated from Chouinard in 1960 and in 1961 made his first trip to Europe, traveling with his mother and older sister
Shelby by car for seven months. The numerous travel images he took with his Yashika camera that include storefronts, window
displays, and billboards, as well as the perhaps more typical images of people they met on their journey, thematically and
stylistically prefigure the photographs he was soon to take for his early artist's books such as
Twentysix Gasoline Stations (1963) and
Some Los Angeles Apartments (1965).
A visit to New York on his way back to California opened Ruscha's eyes to Pop Art, and the work he subsequently created was
included in
New Painting of Common Objects, the first exhibition of Pop Art, curated by Walter Hopps at the Pasadena Art Museum in 1962. The following year Hopps gave
Ruscha his first solo show at Ferus Gallery. Informed by Pop Art and the distinctive billboard culture of Los Angeles, Ruscha
went on to become a pivitol presence in the West Coast and Conceptual art scenes.
Although much of Ruscha's work is informed by or uses photography as its point of departure, he sees himself not as a photographer
but as someone who uses the medium of photography as part of his larger artistic practice. His early photographic artist's
books, many of which further distill the quotidian elements of the Los Angeles cityscape - parking lots, urban streets, and
apartment buildings - into serial imagery, have fundamentally altered the genre of the artist's book through their use of
photography and commercial production methods. Yet in a discussion of his artist's books with Silvia Wolf, Ruscha noted, "My
use of the camera is still a tool to make a picture...At the time I was into making pictures that happened to be photographs,
rather than making 'photographs' ("Nostalgia and New Editions; A Converstion with Ed Ruscha," in
Ed Ruscha and Photography, 2004, p. 257).
Known for the drawings and paintings of words and phrases that he began making in the 1960s, as well as for his artist's books,
Ruscha is one of the pre-eminent artists of his generation. He has exhibited widely in the United States and abroad. His first
international exhibition was in Cologne at Galerie Rudolf Zwirner in 1968. A few years later he began showing at Leo Castelli
Gallery in New York, and his first retrospective was held at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in 1982. He is currently
represented by Gagosian Gallery (Los Angeles and New York).
Open for use by qualified researchers.
Contact
Library Reproductions and Permissions .
Edward Ruscha Photographs of Los Angeles Streets, 1974-2010, Getty Research Institute, Research Library, Accession no. 2012.M.2.
Promised gift of Ed Ruscha.
Processed by Beth Ann Guynn and Linda Kleiger in 2012.
The Getty Research Library also holds the Edward Ruscha Photographs of Sunset Boulevard and Hollywood Boulevard collection,
Special Collection accession number 2012.M.1.
Scope and Content of Collection
The collection is comprised of Edward Ruscha's ongoing photographic documentation of Los Angeles thoroughfares. This material
demonstrates Ruscha's interest in producing an almost comprehensive representation of the city's main streets. Included are
shoots of three streets made in the 1970s: Santa Monica Boulevard and Pacific Coast Highway, 1974; and Melrose Avenue, 1975;
and over 40 shoots made since 2007. These later shoots respresent more than twenty-five streets including Sepulveda, Pico,
Olympic, Wilshire, La Cienega, and Beverly Boulevards. Some shoots record groups or "suites" of streets such as the Chinatown,
La Brea, and Silverlake areas.
The collection is arranged chronologically by shoot date.
Streets--United States--Los Angeles
La Brea Avenue (Los Angeles, Calif.)--Description and travel
Los Angeles (Calif.)--Description and travel
Melrose Avenue (Los Angeles, Calif.)--Description and travel
Pacific Coast Highway--Description and travel
Santa Monica Boulevard (Los Angeles, Calif.)--Description and travel
Silver Lake (Los Angeles, Calif.)--Description and travel
Sunset Boulevard (Los Angeles, Calif.)--Description and travel
Wilshire Boulevard (Los Angeles, Calif.)--Description and travel
Black-and-white negatives--California--Los Angeles--20th century
Compact discs--California--Los Angeles--20th century
Contact sheets--California--Los Angeles--20th century
Photographic film (photographic materials)--California--Los Angeles--20th century
Photographic film (photographic materials)--California--Los Angeles--21st century