HOLLYWOOD DREAM BUBBLE:

Ed Ruscha’s Influence in Los Angeles and Beyond

Organized by Jessica Gallucci and Dani Tull

April 27–June 15, 2024

OPENING: Saturday, April 27th, from 6–8pm

844 N La Brea, Los Angeles

We are proud to announce HOLLYWOOD DREAM BUBBLE: Ed Ruscha’s Influence in Los Angeles and Beyond, a group show opening Saturday, April 27th at The Hole: 844 N La Brea Avenue in Los Angeles. 

Ed Ruscha has occupied many roles in the broad cultural consciousness—foil to the New York-based Ab-Ex movement, a member of Ferus Gallery’s “cool school”, standard-bearer for Southern California and renderer of funny and oracular words in his Boy Scout Utility Modern font—but among artists, particularly in Los Angeles, he is known for his steadfast support of the scene. He shows up at openings: he collaborates, he collects and he donates. Hamilton Press, the Venice fine art printing company he co-founded, invites emerging artists to produce editions. 

It is natural then that the exhibition began with a conversation we had with an LA artist and longtime Ruscha admirer, Ellen Jong.  Jong’s wall works, which contain words formed from traditional Chinese ink congealed and sculpted into strips, were created in direct homage to the ribbon-like words in Ruscha’s gunpowder drawings. Tull himself has made paintings with palettes borrowed from gradients in Ruscha paintings. The show came together quickly and rhizomatically: a local network of Tull’s Ed-affiliated friends and collaborators opened up into a major group of people across the country who have been influenced by Ruscha.

No doubt this exhibition has a lot to say: beyond Jong’s ink assemblages (spelling PIE and SCHMEAR) a partial list of words and phrases includes MOTHER TONGUE (Mitchell Syrop), TO DISAPPEAR ENHANCES (Roni Horn), OMG and OY/YO (Deborah Kass), OPEN YOUR EYES (Sam Durant), chrysanthemum (Ricci Albenda) and A MILLION YEARS CLEAN (Harland Miller). Kim Gordon’s contribution, one of her signature Word Paintings, is a tribute made expressly for this moment. 

Other recognizable stylistic cues include the cigarette pack diagonals and supersaturation in Kristopher Raos’ Untitled (Slow Burn), which recall the dramatic use of single-point perspective and bold colors in Ruscha paintings like Standard Station, 1966 and Large Trademark with Eight Spotlights, 1962. Ruscha’s distinctly West Coast sunsets and gradients are echoed in photographs by Amir Zaki (above) and Brice Bischoff, and two photographs from Catherine Opie’s iconic Freeway Series evoke Ruscha’s serial photographic documentation of Los Angeles’s streets. Jennifer West’s film Museum on Fire (after Ed Ruscha – 35mm and super 8 film painted over and etched into with dyes and inks, permanent markers, Los Angeles tap water and some urine) at once references the painting of LACMA, Ruscha’s short films and his use of nontraditional mediums as stains. 

You could scan the surfaces of works in this show looking for shades of Ruscha to find that his presence is just a proposition; the show’s titular “influence” encompasses direct quotations, tributes and choices in style and medium, as well as links that are more oblique or profound. Some works represent Ruscha’s involvement in an artistic cohort that extends from contemporaries, like Wallace Berman and Dennis Hopper; to family members, like his son Eddie Ruscha and daughter-in-law Francesca Gabbiani; to studio staff Senon Williams and Jason Mason, among others. Jeffrey Vallance asked to contribute a color drawing of Mike Kelley (1954-2012) and sent us this note: "Ed really liked Mike. Ed sponsored an exhibition of the three of us entitled "Three Headed Monster"—I did the drawing for it." 

With more than seventy artists, this is not a “tightly curated” exhibition: neither could it possibly be a comprehensive one. HOLLYWOOD DREAM BUBBLE is just a piece of the discourse around the great artist’s reach and a celebration of his impact among American artists across generations. Two and a half miles away from Ruscha’s LACMA retrospective, the conversation continues.

Artists: Adam Stamp, Aaron Curry, Adam Rabinowitz, Alfred Steiner, Allen Ruppersberg, Amir Zaki, Analia Saban, Bart Exposito, Benjamin Weissman, Bettina Hubby, Brice Bischoff, Carly Jean Andrews, Catherine Opie, Chaz Bojorquez, Chris Johanson, Dan Attoe, Dani Tull, Daniel Hawkins, Dave Muller, Deborah Kass, Dennis Hopper, Doug Crocco, Eddie Ruscha, Ellen Jong, Eric Yahnker, Frances Stark, Francesca Gabbiani, Friedrich Kunath, Gary Simmons, Greg Colson, Hamilton Press, Harland Miller, Jaime Muñoz, Jason Mason, Jason Rhoades, Jeffrey Vallance, Jennifer West, Jeremy Shockley, Jim Shaw, Kelly Wall, Kenny Scharf, Kim Gordon, Kristopher Raos, Lari Pittman, Lisa Anne Auerbach, Mark Hagen, Matt Murphy, Michael Bevilacqua, Michael Decker, Michael Lombardo, Mike Kelley, Mitchell Syrop, Mungo Thomson, Nick Taggart, Nicolas Shake, Norm Laich, Pae White, Pentti Monkkonen, Pippa Garner, Raymond Pettibon, Renée Petropoulos, Ricci Albenda, Rives Granade, Rob Pruitt, Roni Horn, Ry Rocklen, Sam Durant, Senon Williams, Wallace Berman, Wendy White and Zoe Crosher

Thank you to all the contributing artists and galleries who made this exhibition possible: François Ghebaly, Diane Rosenstein, The Pit, Altman Siegel, Charlie James Gallery, Wilding Cran, Michael Kohn Gallery, OCHI, BLUM, Karma, Andrew Kreps, Mike Kelley Foundation For The Arts, Mixografia, Nazarian/Curcio, White Cube, Hamilton Press, Hauser & Wirth, GAVLAK, Robert Berman Gallery and Tanya Bonakdar. The curators would also like to extend their gratitude to every artist involved in the exhibition, and to Kathy Grayson, Ed Ruscha, Mary Dean, Ed Hamilton, Ellen Jong, ​​Ruthanna Hopper and Mary Clare Stevens for their additional support.

—Jessica Gallucci and Dani Tull

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Jessica Gallucci is an independent exhibition organizer and art advisor who relocated to Los Angeles from New York City in 2022 to run The Hole’s West Hollywood gallery. She continues her relationship with The Hole part-time as artist liaison and is a partner in the Topanga Canyon–based curatorial enterprise GALLUCCI TULL. In previous roles she directed programming and partnerships for the Monira Foundation in Jersey City and managed the Westreich Wagner art collection in New York. Her performance practice includes past and ongoing collaborations with Kembra Pfahler, Kira Nova, Olek and Richard Maxwell’s New York City Players. In addition to her work in the arts, she has held editorial positions at The Economist, Intelligent Life and Vogue. She holds a master’s degree in Visual Arts Administration from New York University and a BA in English from Georgetown University.

Dani Tull is an artist based in Topanga Canyon, California. He received his MFA from Stanford University and a BFA from The San Francisco Art Institute. He has exhibited in galleries and museums internationally. Selected solo exhibitions have been presented by: The Landing, Blum and Poe, The Pit, and Diane Rosenstein (Los Angeles); Jack Hanley Gallery (San Francisco); Fredericks & Freiser, On Stellar Rays, and Jacob Lewis Gallery (New York City); Torch Gallery (Amsterdam); and Wewerka (Berlin). His work has been written about in The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Artforum, Art in America, i-D Magazine, Art Review, Wallpaper and Frieze, among others. Permanent collections include The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art/LACMA, The Getty, The Laguna Art Museum and The Peter Norton Family Collection. Since 1990, Tull has curated internationally for various galleries as well as programming his artist-run space ODD ARK LA, The Encina Artist Residency and the recently launched curatorial enterprise GALLUCCI TULL, all based in LA.