The
Miracle Mile
, between La Brea and Fairfax avenues along Wilshire Boulevard, was the premier property development of the 1930s. Many of the businesses have moved out, but recent development has created a "Museum Mile" in their place. Although the enormous
LA County Museum of Art
, or
LACMA
(Thurs-Tues noon-8pm, Fri closes at 9pm, weekends opens at 11am; $7, free second Tues of the month;
), comprises an unimpressive set of blocky buildings, its collections are among the best in the world. Despite the loss of Armand Hammer's stock of paintings to his own museum in Westwood, it justifies a lengthy visit. The
Fearing Collection
of funereal masks and sculpted guardian figures from pre-Columbian Mexico is highly impressive, but where the museum really excels is in its specializations:
German Expressionist
prints and drawings, scrolls and ceramics in the
Pavilion for Japanese Art
, and entire rooms devoted to Auguste Rodin, 17th-century Dutch masters, rare jewelry and porcelain, and Hollywood fashion designers. An astonishing assortment of prehistoric bones has been recovered from the adjacent
La Brea Tar Pits
. For thousands of years animals who tried to drink from the deceptive layer of water that covers this pool of smelly and still-seeping tar have found themselves stuck fast; it is now surrounded by life-size models of such victims as mastodons and saber-toothed tigers, more of which are on display at the site's impressive
George C. Page Museum
(Mon-Fri 9.30am-5pm, weekends opens at 10am; $6;
).
Further west, the
Petersen Automotive Museum
, 6060 Wilshire Blvd, pays sumptuous if superficial homage to the automobile (Tues-Sun 10am-6pm, also open Mon during holidays; $7;
). It fails to explain the reasons behind the collapse of LA's early public transportation system and the city's subsequent obsession with what Tom Wolfe called the "Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby," but it has enough mint-condition classic models to make the car-crazy delirious with joy.
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