The Vincent Price Art Museum

My love for Vincent Price runs deep ~ just read the blog I wrote about him.  It made sense, while in California a few weeks ago, we took a slight detour to check out the Vincent Price Art Museum. No it's not a museum dedicated to the master of macabre ~ but instead, to the pieces of art that he donated...along with rotating exhibitions.

Located on the campus of East Los Angeles College, it's small with a modern design, and a focus on education. Vincent Price wanted art to be accessible to everyone, and in 1957 he donated 90 pieces from his ancient world art collection to become the first "teaching art collection", it has continued to grow ever since. The museum has collected 9000 objects for it's permanent collection, which is rare for a college gallery.

During our visit one of the floors was closed for a new exhibit being set up, and the others housed modern art ranging from digital media, to paintings, to installation art, but the one gallery I was most interested in was their permanent collection, Form and Function in the Ancient Americas. Not only was it awe inspiring to be surrounded by such old pieces of pottery, but I couldn't help but think, "Vincent Price touched these." The room itself had a great energy and I could have spent hours there taking it all in.

Of course he's holding a cat sculpture.

(The text is referencing the picture above.)

If you're ever out that way I recommend visiting the Vincent Price Art Museum. If you don't like it, not a big loss since it's is free (unless you need to pay a $2 parking fee) and even though it's on a college campus it's open to the public.