‘White House’ Crafts Stand Too Much on Ceremony

“The White House Collection of American Crafts” opened at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art just in time for the long Independence Day weekend. This kind of flag-waving may cause some bitter smirks among those aware of deep cuts in public funding for the arts allowed under the current administration.

Local viewers who can get their minds on the actual exhibition of more than 70 contemporary objects may find their thoughts wandering elsewhere. A show like this has special significance in Los Angeles. California has a long history of pondering the vexing question of why some craft objects manage to attain the status of high art while others don’t.

It’s not a great exaggeration to say that contemporary art in Los Angeles was based on transforming craftsmanship into poetry. The Greene Brothers of Pasadena did it architecturally during the Craftsman era, as did many around them. In the ‘50s, the Bay Area ceramic artist Peter Voulkos came to L.A. and sparked a movement that combined the spontaneity of Abstract Expressionism with that of Japanese raku pots, revolutionizing ceramic art.

This show cries out for a piece by Ken Price to show how L.A. got this right. In the ‘60s, the highly material-and-craft-inspired L.A. Finish Fetish artists carried the expressive uses of craft techniques further with their use of glass, metal and plastics. They gave us an artistic distillation of Lotusland’s myth of sybaritic immortality.

Looking at the White House collection, you’d think none of the above ever registered or, if it did, it was rejected. All too much of this work consists of absolutely heartless, over-designed, overrefined, excessively clever, deficiently thoughtful objects considerably less interesting than a fire hydrant. They appear to accept a definition of craftsmanship that makes pointless virtuosity its highest aspiration and forbids any utilitarian function from disturbing its narcissistic languor. This has to have something to do with works specifically selected for a residence where discretion and protocol are king.

Fortunately, there are numerous exceptions. Not surprisingly, given the history, it’s often Californians who make them. Sam Maloof, for example, is represented by a functional rocking chair of laminated walnut that draws on the Craftsman and Shaker traditions. It’s an amazing combination of understated elegance and homely ease. Beatrice Wood is seen in a gold luster chalice with two handles that draws on her Dada roots to achieve a witty, modest opulence. Adrian Saxe managed to get away with a slightly funky ewer that looks like an Alice in Wonderland teapot.

Artists from elsewhere use various tactics to keep on keel. A dramatically restrained black carved jar by Nathan Youngblood clearly derived inspiration from his Native American heritage. Cliff Lee’s celadon porcelain leaf vase is similarly indebted to Asian tradition.

Artists like Dawn Kilani Hoffman maintain sense by making things you might actually use, like her handsome silver oval punch bowl. A couple of the gee-whiz virtuosos pushed excess so far it’s actually interesting. Jon Kuhn took the idea of a kitsch glass paperweight with fool-the-eye flowers inside, cranked it up to the size of a bowling ball and gave us a surreal world from outer space.

The collection was assembled by Michael Monroe, curator of the Smithsonian’s Renwick gallery. The exhibition is being circulated by the National Museum of American Art.

* Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 5905 Wilshire Blvd., through Sept. 29, closed Mondays. (213) 857-6000.