Michael Werner launches its Beverly Hills space with a show by Markus Lüpertz and Pierre Puvis de Chavannes that's in a league of its own.
East Coast and European galleries seem always to be opening secondary (or tertiary) spaces in Los Angeles—most recently David Zwirner, Marian Goodman, and Perrotin. When they do, they must choose their angle: do they foreground the Los Angeles artists in their roster, or do they introduce names from further afield, who may be unknown on the West Coast?
Michael Werner Gallery, which opened a space on North Camden Drive in Beverly Hills on 21 June, has brought to Los Angeles an exhibition—and a gallery—unlike anything else in the region in recent memory. For better or worse, its inaugural show, Markus Lüpertz – Pierre Puvis de Chavannes—which brings together the work of an 83-year-old German Neo-Expressionist painter with a lesser-known 19th-century French romantic symbolist—seems out of step with current trends and local sensibilities. In a city that often appears concerned only with the now and the near-future, this focus on art 'out of time' feels paradoxically fresh and invigorating.
