Stephanie Barron

Calendar's choices of Taste Makers--people who move and shape our arts and entertainment in 1988--run the gamut. If the eight faces on the cover form a rather curious collection, it's because creative abilities come in many forms. As a result, our group's pursuits range from directing the distinguished PBS series "American Playhouse," to fronting the hard-living, hard-rock band Guns N' Roses.

You can't blame a writer for taking risks, especially when the writer is as talented as Stephanie Barron, whose background includes a degree in European history and a stint as a CIA intelligence analyst. Under the name Francine Mathews, she has written contemporary mysteries centered on Nantucket and globe-trotting thrillers set in the present as well as in World War II Paris ("The Alibi Club"). These are in addition to the nine novels in the Jane Austen mystery series for which Barron is best known.

You can't blame a writer for taking risks, especially when the writer is as talented as Stephanie Barron, whose background includes a degree in European history and a stint as a CIA intelligence analyst. Under the name Francine Mathews, she has written contemporary mysteries centered on Nantucket and globe-trotting thrillers set in the present as well as in World War II Paris ("The Alibi Club"). These are in addition to the nine novels in the Jane Austen mystery series for which Barron is best known.

"That looks enormous, way out of proportion. It dwarfs everything else in the gallery." Stephanie Barron is gazing unhappily at a mannequin in a zoot suit standing on a central platform in a room of 1940s artworks at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. It's a month before the exhibition "Made in California" will open, but the countdown is on for the museum's senior curator of modern and contemporary art and vice president of education and public programs.

Suzanne Muchnic's article on the L.A. County Museum of Art exhibition "Exiles and Emigres: The Flight of European Artists From Hitler" left me deeply touched ("Art in a World Gone Mad," Feb. 16). Was it really over 60 years ago that I came to New York as a Hitler refugee, went to work for the International Relief Assn. and associated with many of the artists featured in Stephanie Barron's exhibition? Barron and her German associate, Sabine Eckmann, vividly illustrate a nearly forgottenaspect of the '30s: the American public was unaware of Nazi atrocities, and the belief that the Hitler regime was here to stay was widespread.

"Works of art" that are not capable of being understood in themselves but need some pretentious instruction book to justify their existence--until at long last they find someone sufficiently browbeaten to endure such stupid or impudent twaddle with patience--will never again find their way to the German people. --Adolf Hitler, 1937. Adolf Hitler's foray into the art world didn't end with his failed career as a painter.

The County Museum of Art and nine other local institutions have scheduled a wide range of educational events in conjunction with "Degenerate Art: The Fate of the Avant-Garde in Nazi Germany." Following are some highlights of the concerts, lectures, symposia, films and dramatic productions that are scheduled through April 29.

In a major curatorial shift at the County Museum of Art, Maurice Tuchman, longtime senior curator of 20th-Century art, has been named senior curator of 20th-Century drawings. Stephanie Barron, curator of 20th-Century art, has been appointed acting head of the 20th-Century art department. In his new post Tuchman, 56, will head a newly created department, building upon a collection of about 750 American and European drawings.

"That looks enormous, way out of proportion. It dwarfs everything else in the gallery." Stephanie Barron is gazing unhappily at a mannequin in a zoot suit standing on a central platform in a room of 1940s artworks at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. It's a month before the exhibition "Made in California" will open, but the countdown is on for the museum's senior curator of modern and contemporary art and vice president of education and public programs.

Stephanie Barron's LACMA exhibitions always put art in a larger context. Now the museum curator takes on a real monster: the state of California.

Suzanne Muchnic's article on the L.A. County Museum of Art exhibition "Exiles and Emigres: The Flight of European Artists From Hitler" left me deeply touched ("Art in a World Gone Mad," Feb. 16). Was it really over 60 years ago that I came to New York as a Hitler refugee, went to work for the International Relief Assn. and associated with many of the artists featured in Stephanie Barron's exhibition? Barron and her German associate, Sabine Eckmann, vividly illustrate a nearly forgottenaspect of the '30s: the American public was unaware of Nazi atrocities, and the belief that the Hitler regime was here to stay was widespread.

In a major curatorial shift at the County Museum of Art, Maurice Tuchman, longtime senior curator of 20th-Century art, has been named senior curator of 20th-Century drawings. Stephanie Barron, curator of 20th-Century art, has been appointed acting head of the 20th-Century art department. In his new post Tuchman, 56, will head a newly created department, building upon a collection of about 750 American and European drawings.

The County Museum of Art and nine other local institutions have scheduled a wide range of educational events in conjunction with "Degenerate Art: The Fate of the Avant-Garde in Nazi Germany." Following are some highlights of the concerts, lectures, symposia, films and dramatic productions that are scheduled through April 29.

"Works of art" that are not capable of being understood in themselves but need some pretentious instruction book to justify their existence--until at long last they find someone sufficiently browbeaten to endure such stupid or impudent twaddle with patience--will never again find their way to the German people. --Adolf Hitler, 1937. Adolf Hitler's foray into the art world didn't end with his failed career as a painter.

Calendar's choices of Taste Makers--people who move and shape our arts and entertainment in 1988--run the gamut. If the eight faces on the cover form a rather curious collection, it's because creative abilities come in many forms. As a result, our group's pursuits range from directing the distinguished PBS series "American Playhouse," to fronting the hard-living, hard-rock band Guns N' Roses.

THE artist is running out of ink; the cinematographer is running out of film. The result is a fast-paced seven-minute clip from Henri-Georges Clouzot's 1956 film "The Mystery of Picasso," in which an ebullient, bare-chested Pablo Picasso tries to complete a series of overlapping images -- flowers become part of a chicken, which morphs into a fanciful face -- before the clock runs out.