Getty & Hammer Exhibits Closing May 4

Not many people travel for art, but this writer does. . . travel that is, and so will many who are able to see the Alice Coltrane, Monument Eternal exhibit at the UCLA Hammer Museum which closes May 4. 

https://hammer.ucla.edu/exhibitions/2025/alice-coltrane-monument-eternal

I drove from the Bay last Saturday afternoon, April 26 for the closing Turiya Rising performance the following day, Sunday, April 27. I arrived at 9 p.m. and was up the next morning for church. After a wonderful sermon, my hostess and I returned to her home for lunch then headed to the museum. We were early enough to get tickets. My friend volunteered to hold our space in line while I went into the gallery, which was full. https://hammer.ucla.edu/programs-events/2025/turiya-rising-performance-series

Later, as we sat in anticipation of the program I felt such gratitude to be able to feel Alice Coltrane's gracious vibes.

The Turiya Rising Sunday evening salons were a part of the exhibition since opening in February with conversations with Swamini Turiyasangitananda's daughter, Michelle Coltrane and musical performances among them one featuring Brandee Younger on Alice Coltrane's golden harp, a gift from Coltrane's husband that arrived after his physical departure (or death). Each performance curated by Ross Chait and Erin Christovale was presented in celebration of Coltrane’s legacy as a musical innovator and as an ode to her Sunday services at the Sai Anantam Ashram. Recorded, look for the performances on the Hammer Museum YouTube channel sometime soon.

Ash Rucker, artist and therapist's performance April 27, was as  beautiful as it was restorative, a healing musical even poetic meditation on what Turiya Alice Coltrane called the "silver cord"--the connection between we and the wombs that bore us. 

So lovely. 

Ash, choreographer, led her audience in a meditation, while the curator played keyboard. Other artists joined the two on trumpet and vocals and spoken word. 

This tribute surrounded us. Seated standing I/we felt among the chosen. Alice Coltrane's portrait smiling approvingly over collective shoulders. 

To close the evening, Michelle Coltrane, daughter and other family joined Ash and company members on stage and led us in her mom's tradition--three 🕉. 

Two days later there was a symposium. Tuesday, April 29. It was a rare treat to listen to the whirling conversations and musings on Turiya Alice Coltrane.

After the symposium, there was a closing concert. I got a ticket but not a seat this time. As I walked into the performance space I heard Yoruba invocations as the masked performers moved among the audience: Esu-Elegba. . . the Egun or ancestors. One woman tapped a staff on the floor as she moved. She told me later it was Ogun's. 

Iron, water, fire. . . What was burning within each present that needed to come out? 

The artist on the stage played singing bowls, woodwinds and other percussion as the representative elements or orishas created a tropical storm. 

Once again Turiyasangitananda's spirit was conjured. It wasn't much of a stretch considering her large portrait within view. It was all ritual ancestor reverence. Given what we learned about Turiya Alice Coltrane's life, her contribution to creative Black music conjured from a spiritual depth evident in Turiyasangitananda's eyes and serious yet lovingly sweet smile. Her ascension was not easy, yet she made it. We look at her family, her living legacy-- four children and their offspring both biological and chosen. 

We look around the gallery at her many albums. We see her religious texts and scriptures in cases throughout the galleries as well as photos with her beloved John and children. There are videos from the Ashram she founded, which burned down in an earlier California wildfire. What a haven gone, yet she lives. This exhibit witnesses her extraordinary life and gifts. 

In recorded footage we see Turiya playing the organ and everyone singing. Such happiness. 

Anyhoo, the exhibit features abstract work, sculpture, paintings, mixed media installations, plus large scale photos of Turiya Alice Coltrane playing her harp, consulting with John, and alone as sage. There are so many awesome videos and listening opportunities to be in her world. Even for a short while such habitation is a transformative opportunity to witness and change.

She was more than a reflection of her husband's greatness. She was great when they met. 

I drove to LA to see, to witness. Pilgrimage is something I believe in. When I get a call I try to honor it. God on the line, right. Have to answer. 

I learned of the exhibition at an InsightLA meditation I attend in the morning. It was February. I looked at the programs on Sunday and choose to attend April 27. I liked that the artist used movement to address trauma. Lucky for me, the symposium was postponed to April 29. 

I hadn't know tangerine was the color of spiritual leadership either. Turiyasangitananda wore such robes. I love this color and wear it often.

I learned Tuesday about another exhibition at the Getty that also closes May 4. May 4 is my auntie's birthday. She died last March. 

https://www.getty.edu/exhibitions/campos-pons/

Turiya wrote about the silver cord. María Magdalena Campos-Pons, featured artist at the Getty Museum in LA, also reflects on the mother-daughter cord in "Behold."

The Afro-Cuban artist's retrospective is an emersive experience. I only had two hours which was not enough time. I think I needed a couple days. It's closing Sunday!

Campos-Pons’s work is conceptual sculpture both material and cinematic. She uses film, photography, collage, and sound to illustrate themes that touch her life such as her spiritual orgins. . . Santeria, ancestor reverence, the Maafa, immigration woes and the ever resilient motherline. 

She and her mother were separated for eleven years. The artist couldn't go home, yet she and her mother spoke daily by phone. Now, it is those conversations prepared in advance when they were separated that sustain her now.

A piece with photos shows the connection between mother and daughter despise physical disconnect. Blues and pale yellow are a palette Compos-Pon applies philosophically to her visual musings. Yemanja and Osun blessings evident. 

Compos-Pons's journey is pictured in literal footprints and in a video simply called "walking." 

I loved the ritual objects, the mobiles featuring butterfly eyes for Breonna Taylor. I also liked the multiple photomontage with the artist as samurai. She has Chinese ancestry and African. Both Africans and Chinese were exploited laborers in Cuba.

One of my favorite pieces is the artist floating upside down in a blue sea. The sea is made from a tapestry of photo squares, maybe Polaroid photos? 

I was racing through the exhibit and I am writing this without notes. Forgive me, just don't miss the exhibition.

There are linked artist comments patrons can listen to to learn more about selected artwork. 

I like work where artists center themselves and Campos-Pons does this. The exhibit is also creative ethnography. Campos-Pons is compared stylistically to Carrie Mae Weems and to Lorna Simpson. I'd also mention Faith Ringgold regarding her storytelling collage. Ringgold utilized multiple mediums, not just textiles. So does this artist, who weaves threads cinematically. There is a beautiful collage that reminds me of Mildred Howard's work. The floor as canvas for ritual art like veves. Compos-Pons has multiple portals with shifting images and sounds like pouring liquid, rocks and other sounds. Pictured are photos and videos of the artist perhaps as a child, mothers and grandmothers; hands making food, pulling seeds from a pomegranate, flower petals, ribbons and in one portal we see feet walking and in another cloth embroidered, folded and stacked and placed on a young girl's head. 

Save time to watch the complete cycle. Oh, also save time to watch the initiation into Ifa. It's 30 minutes. 

Another room has three videos and the artist's notebooks. One of the pieces I watched a year ago in a course I was taking. I remembered it because the dress worn in the performance is in the gallery.

So much work! So much wonderful work. María Magdalena Campos-Pons is such a treasure. She lives! 

https://www.getty.edu/exhibitions/campos-pons/

Get by California African American Museum (CAAM). I highly recommend Really Free: The Radical Art of Nellie Mae Rowe 

https://caamuseum.org/exhibitions/2025/really-free-the-radical-art-of-nellie-mae-rowe

And the Ode to Altadena, CA

https://caamuseum.org/exhibitions/2025/ode-to-dena-black-artistic-legacies-of-altadena

These and other exhibits at CAAM are up through August 3, 2025.