Art Talk: Edgy and erotic photos at LACMA

Want to see something other than the Rock this weekend at LACMA? You can take in photographer Daido Moriyama’s first US show, comprised of his edgy, erotic noir-infused photographs of his native Japan. KCRW’s own Hunter Drohojowska-Philp came in to the studio to talk about his work on view at the Japanese Pavilion.

view at the Japanese Pavilion.

She says, “These pictures are not only black and white, they seem to convey sensations that are similarly shadowy, menacing and intense. Even a photograph of young men lying on a beach conveys none of the sunny pleasure usually associated with such a scene.”

And while we’re talking about photography, Hunter last talked about another under-the-radar great: the 94-year old Mexican-American architectural photographer Pedro Guerrero.

His life’s work began when, as a young man fleeing discrimination in his native Arizona, he was given the chance to shoot Frank Lloyd Wright’s structures. The master architect helped him develop his style, but Hunter says Guerrero’s disarming personality is what made him go on to captivate great yet irascible artists like Alexander Calder and Louise Nevelson.

The work is on display at the Julius Shulman Institute at Woodbury University here, through the end of the month.