The Associated Press is reporting that about 150 pieces of art from Los Angeles’ Bohemian art scene of the 1960s are going on display at a high-rise residential tower in L.A.
That includes the centerpiece — Dennis Hopper’s Route 66 photograph titled “Double Standard,” shown above (hat tip to Art Collections for Educators). Hopper, as many of you will know, found most of his fame as a director (“Easy Rider”) and as an Oscar-winning actor (“Hoosiers”).
We previously reported this exhibit in the early days of this blog. But this report contains more details:
Hopper’s acclaimed “Double Standard,” a billboard-sized, black-and-white photo of a 1961 Los Angeles intersection near the western terminus of Route 66, greets visitors in the lobby. The picture is so rich in detail that the price of a gallon of gasoline (30.9 cents) is clearly seen at a corner filling station.”Dennis was the first person I went to,” Cline says of the “Easy Rider” star.
“Everybody thinks of Dennis as an actor and director. But he was also the most important person in terms of documenting the LA Art Scene photographically, and he’s also a great artist, a great photographer.”
The soft-spoken, 69-year-old Hopper is modest about his contributions.
“It was important to take the early photographs of Warhol and the others,” he says as he drives to the set of his “E-Ring” TV show. “Also, it was a time when I wasn’t getting any activity as an actor, so it was my only creative outlet.”