Barnsdall Art Park

Barnsdall Art Park. . , A Female Don Quixote , Oil heiress Aline Barnsdall was an artistic visionary, feminist, world traveler, political radical, and friend of the anarchist Emma Goldman. "I believe I could best describe her as a sort of 'female Don Quixote,’” Barnsdall's daughter, Betty, remembered. “Always jousting at windmills , a dreamer.” , As a young woman, Barnsdall was fascinated with experimental theater and studied under the famed actress Eleonora Duse. She began producing plays, mounting a production of Alice in Wonderland in Chicago. Barnsdall dreamed of building a theatrical and artistic community , a creative campus , like the ones she had encountered in Europe, with her home in the center. "Art is the soul of the people," she explained. "Without visions, we are only ants, and our communities only ant hills." , , Aline and Frank , In 1919, Barnsdall bought 36 acres on Olive Hill. The crest was already well known in East Hollywood for its grove of 1,225 olive trees and as the site of Easter sunrise services. It had also stood in for the Mount of Olives during the filming of D.W. Griffith's Intolerance. , To design her artistic hilltop compound, Barnsdall hired her brilliant and equally pugnacious friend, the legendary architect Frank Lloyd Wright, who she knew from Chicago. From the start, Barnsdall and Wright had a highly contentious relationship. They ultimately parted ways, but not before Wright designed many buildings for the compound, including Aline's home , known as Hollyhock House (named after her favorite flower). Designed in a style Wright termed "California Romanza," construction of the landmark house and other structures on the property were overseen by Wright's son, Lloyd. Modernist architect Rudolph Schindler was also brought in to refine Wright's plans. Despite this coterie of architectural geniuses, Barnsdall was disappointed with Hollyhock House. The doors were so heavy, she complained, "I need three men and two boys to help me get in and out of my own house!" Barnsdall would influence not only Wright and Schindler, but also the illustrious architect Richard Neutra to come to California, thus changing the course of modernist architecture in Los Angeles forever. , Gifts and Grievances , By the mid-1920s, the mercurial Barnsdall had tired of her hilltop commune and in 1926 deeded the land and buildings to the City of Los Angeles for use as an art center and public park. That same year the California Art Club moved their headquarters into Hollyhock House, and an outdoor children's theater was established on the grounds. , Barnsdall continued to exert control over her former hilltop domain. She erected billboards on land she still owned around the park's perimeter, advocating for progressive causes, including the freeing of labor leader Frank Mooney. She also fought Los Angeles over various land agreements. Barnsdall died in 1946, in a small house on Olive Hill deeded to her by the city. , A Park for The People , In 1967, the Junior Arts Center opened at Barnsdall Park. The Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery and the Barnsdall Gallery Theatre debuted in 1971. Hollyhock House was designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2019 and both the park and house are City of Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monuments. Today, Barnsdall Art Park is a world-class artistic, cultural, and educational center. Decades after her death, Barnsdall's vision for Olive Hill has come to fruition.