New Museum Opens In East LA

A new museum has opened on the East Los Angeles College campus, courtesy actor Vincent Price, who donated 2,000 works of art to the recently opened Vincent Price Museum of Art at the school. Adolfo Guzman-Lopez reported for KCET:

The facility’s named after the actor because he donated about two thousand works of art to back up his wish that people have art in the middle and working class neighborhoods around the campus. There were no Rembrandt or Van Gogh oils in the collection but lots of pre-Hispanic, African, and South Pacific sculptures and prints by Picasso and works by Rufino Tamayo. That sets this community college museum apart from most others. The previous museum was a shoe box-sized gallery…

One of the museum’s upper floor galleries is called Hoy Space and is reserved for emerging artists. Artist Sonia Romero is showing her consumption and overabundance-themed work in the gallery now.

What I found to be touching about the report was the story of a speech Vincent Price gave to students in East LA 60 years ago. He spoke at a graduation ceremony, and as this story shows, not only did he talk the talk, he walked the walk. I can’t wait to visit!

Here’s a video Guzman-Lopez took of one of the young ladies at the exhibit:

Follow Sara Inés Calderón on Twitter @SaraChicaD