(Note: Originally published in August 2017. The Pasadena Museum of California Art, PMCA, has closed permanently.)
Pacific Standard Time LA/LA, the region-wide art exhibition sponsored by The Getty and The Broad Museum is underway. 70 museums across Southern California are participating in this biennial event, which, this year, focuses on the art, sculpture, and photography of Latin America.
The exhibition of Cuban film posters at PMCA was the first official event I attended, although I think the Frank Romero show I saw at Museum of Latin American Art in Long Beach earlier this year should have been included as a preview of PST. MOLAA is now doing a show of Caribbean art for PST.
Anyway…I will be attending and reporting on as many of the PST exhibitions as I can until January 2018 when it ends. The next Pacific Standard Time is scheduled for 2024.
Here are a few of the movie posters. Oh, this show also includes 5 political posters, but the majority of posters are for movies. Entry to PMCA is free on the first Friday of each month.
As the Cuban economy crumbled during the early Castro years, there was only enough money for black ink. Colored inks were a luxury for a country spending its money on teaching all its citizens to read. The lack of colored inks did not stop the creative impulses and within a few years 94% of Cubans were literate. Many of the posters in this show are for Cuban-made movies–not Hollywood or European films.
