Life in the UK

Many Angelenos have been awe-struck by the varied visions of British artists during the UK/LA ’88 Festival. Suzanne Muchnic’s review of the pair of UK/LA photography exhibitions at the Long Beach Museum of Art (“As England Is Different, So Pictures Reveal,” March 21), is a case in point.

But the photography exhibit she reviewed (“Mysterious Coincidences: New British Color”) barely scratched the surface of the troubles plaguing the “world’s oldest democracy.”

The term “United Kingdom” was coined in the 1920s to incorporate the newly severed province of Ulster into the union of England, Scotland and Wales. Yet nothing in this UK/LA festival (which has been heavily subsidized by the local taxpayer) even comes close to showing the effect of years of war on Northern Ireland through the arts, particularly photography.

Why is this?

Perhaps it is because the English government would rather Californians didn’t think about the longest war in Europe when purchasing British products or considering travel to the British Isles.

If Angelenos were truly internested in life in the U.K., particularly in Northern Ireland, they would venture to the Los Angeles Photography Center (412 S. Park View) to see the City of Los Angeles-sponsored exhibition, “Why Me?”--A Portrait of Northern Ireland.”

The exhibition serves to illuminate, educate and entertain, yet doesn’t gloss over reality with pretentious anglophilia. It simply illustrates that there is a horrifying side to the “British experience,” one not wiped away by the recent visit by the Duke and Duchess of York or UK/LA ’88.

MARIKA VAARANEN

Santa Monica