A Valentine for LACMA Council

Rain is always a bane for party organizers, but luckily, storm No. 4 in Southern California’s recent weather cycle held off just long enough for the Graphic Arts Council of the L.A. County Museum of Art to hold its ninth-annual Valentine dinner dance and silent auction.

At the party, the only running water came from a Barbara Benish sculpture, “Beat”--a block of ice in the shape of a heart slowly dripping into a tin bucket.

This year’s dinner dance was held in the Venice studio of artist Laddie John Dill, with the accompanying silent auction next door in the Sharon Truax Fine Art Gallery. Guests making the trek back and forth gazed up at a threatening sky.

Guests included LACMA director Rusty Powell and his wife, Nancy; artists Billy Al Bengston, Deanne Belinoff, Bill Brice, Claire Falkenstein, Nancy Riegelman and Ann Thornycroft , and Graphic Arts Council curators Victor Carlson and Bruce Davis. Caron Broidy, event chair, was there with her husband, Steven; Graphic Arts Council chairwoman Adele Smolen and her husband, Lewis, also attended.

Also on the scene was Jack, Dill’s dog, who spurned the members of the council in favor of hanging out with the caterers from Classic Cuisine. From his dreamy, drooly expression, Jack obviously preferred the smell of pasta, roast beef, marinated vegetables, soups and Italian sausage coming out of the makeshift kitchen to the more conventional dog food in his dish.

Tickets for the evening were priced at $100 and $200 apiece, and the art works on the silent auction block ranged from $500 to $4,000. Even though most were priced at the low end of that range, bidding was slow on many pieces, reflecting a new prudence in the contemporary art market.

Action was most vigorous on the better-known names in the show, like Dill, Bengston, Ed Moses, Ed Ruscha and Charles Arnoldi. Broidy acknowledged the art market slump in her thank-you speech to the crowd, saying, “It’s very difficult to be generous when business is bad.” (When collectors grumble about paying the 8.25% sales tax at a silent auction, you know times aren’t good.)

The evening concluded with dinner and dancing to a live combo, the Leadmen (although the rough-textured concrete floor in Dill’s studio was not conducive to much except slow dancing.) Much to everyone’s relief, the rain held off until the silent auction was concluded and most guests were on their way home.