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Review:
Pretty Vacant: The Los Angeles Dingbat, Observed by Clive Piercy,Chronicle Books (October 2003)
Twenty
years after moving to Los Angeles, Brit Clive Piercy has composed his love
letter to the city and his cherished dingbats in this glossy, brick-like
hardback. Vacant is
largely a pictographic appraisal of building exteriors, stylized lettering,
kitschy detailing and evocative property titles. The snapshots, numbering over
480, serve as the narrator. Devoid of people, the photographs focus on the
dingbats’ personalities and their curious relationship with the automobile. In
many respects, the automobile is the ultimate personalization of the structure,
an essential design component and the definitive occupant. For this genre of
buildings, adornment is concentrated on the street-fronting fa�ade; this is the
plane along which Piercy’s camera lens travels, zooming in and out. Names evoke
distant tropical paradises (Bali Hai, The Tahitian), lady loves (The Char Lee,
Monica Palms) or royalty (Kings Arms, Lord Carlton, Lord Byron).
While this
treatment of these under-appreciated, quirky apartment boxes elevates them to
the status of urban gems, Pretty Vacant fails to delve behind the facade. The succinct
introduction cites the evident influence of the International Style on most and
the resemblance of numerous diNgbats to Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoye, but does
not delve deeper into this declaration. Who designed these apartments? Are the
floor plans largely identical? Are the interiors adorned in kitsch? An expanded
preface about the buildings and their history would complement the charming
pictorial tale.
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