Museum Of Contemporary Art

RE "SUITS About Papers, Not Art," by Mike Boehm, July 3: I do not believe for one second that this suit is about "protecting" art collectors. It's about greed and someone taking advantage of laws that were written to protect collectors from intentional fraud. While I don't feel any particular sympathy for Louis Vuitton, I am incensed that anyone would sue the Museum of Contemporary Art over paperwork that was overlooked. I am sure that something could have been resolved before it came to litigation that will hurt all of us in L.A. Denise Clary Culver City

The MOCA Mobilization, a Facebook group banded in support of L.A.'s financially strapped Museum of Contemporary Art, recently used its Facebook page as a tool to draw about 450 people to the Geffen Contemporary for a rally intended to draw attention to the problems that threaten the existence of the museum. Now, the group -- led by a committee including artists Cindy Bernard, Diana Thater, Judy Fiskin and Mark Pally -- has launched a letter-writing campaign to encourage the public to contact Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, MOCA trustees and city officials.

When film is the dominant art form of our time, when poetry is growing an ever-larger audience, when architecture is exhibited and reviewed as art and when the most interesting abstract work of the past decade has been done in the medium of cuisine, Times art critic Christopher Knight dares to wonder how a museum can renovate itself without expanding its gallery space ("Putting Up a Grand Facade," March 10). The answer is simple: Wall art itself now holds only a marginal position in the contemporary arts.

Fifty-one images by Diane Arbus will go on the block Thursday at Christie's New York in the first round of a three-part sale of about 500 photographs amassed by Los Angeles collectors Bruce and Nancy Berman. Works by William Eggleston will be auctioned in October; the final group, including images by Dorothea Lange and Walker Evans, will be offered next year. The Bermans, who exhibited some of their photographs at the J. Paul Getty Museum in 2006, are selling the works from their 2,500-piece holding as part of a divorce settlement.

I visited the new Museum of Contemporary Art. The paintings are obviously there to make one think. I thunk the following: Titian, John Singer Sargent, or Gully Jimson could do 8 or 10 paintings with the canvas used for each of many of them. Most of the exhibit is an argument for poverty: an artist who can't afford canvas is naturally more selective. I memorized some of them in five minutes. The Temporary Contemporary building is excellent. Only paintings sprinkled by Peggy Guggenheim with water from the canals of Venice should be admitted until some improvement is shown.

Snooty snobs feel "a tremendous amount of anxiety" because works of art that were once accessible by a select few who could afford to travel to museums such as the Hermitage Museum in Russia can now be seen by commoners with limited means ("Doubling Down on Art" by Tom Gorman, Oct. 7). To enjoy world-class art displayed in a museum that is connected to a casino will not result in "turning art into a commodity, an entertainment experience" as Richard Koshalek, former director of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, fears may happen, just as having a meal in a world-class restaurant adjoining a casino will not turn the food into the quality and experience of fast food.

Why can't the good sense of some of your book reviewers and entertainment critics ever show up on your editorial pages? The latest piece to raise that question is Terry Atkinson's June 19 review of KCET-TV's "Take Five" programs. I realize that this kind of "the-emperor-is-bare-rumped" commentary will make it difficult for some of The Times' senior folk to move in their accustomed high social circles. Nonetheless, I hope that Terry Atkinson will not be a casualty of his on-point reportage.