Pasadena Museum of California Art

The Pasadena Museum of California Art (PMCA) is a new museum dedicated to California art, architecture and design from 1850 to the present. The museum opened in 2002 and its programs are informed by the state’s rich mixture of cultures and its extraordinary geography. The PMCA has featured a wide range of exhibitions including contemporary design, historic photography, cutting-edge installation art and California Impressionism.

Cultivating Pasadena—From Roses to Redevelopment
Take a trip back to the early years of Pasadena through this photography exhibition, which pairs 25 historic photographs drawn primarily from the archives of the Automobile Association of Southern California with 25 contemporary photographs taken from the exact place and perspective of the historic photographs. Installed side by side, the photographs tell a provocative story of land transformation and urbanization. Computer stations installed throughout the gallery allow visitors to fade historic photographs into the contemporary ones and back again.

Archives of Change
Curated by Southern California Auto Club archivist and urban historian Matthew Roth, the exhibition—photographs primarily from the archives of the Southern California Auto Club juxtaposed with the contemporary photographs of Rosemary Comella—explores how human settlements, once shadowed by the geography and natural elements in this region, have rapidly subsumed it. The bittersweet story of the area’s urban development, the demand for transportation and roads, and the symbols and signs erected to mark the land, are told through these striking images. The story of Pasadena, with its rich history and strong cultural tradition, is presented here for the first time across the gulf of time in a way that will cause visitors to consider the past and future anew.

A Link to Our Partners
Next time you look at a copy of the Pasadena Star-News, see if you find any images from Pasadena’s early days. The Sunday edition of the paper contains a historic photo from the archives of the Pasadena Museum of History, and you can visit the Museum for a look at early Pasadena at its Flowing Waters, Fruitful Valley exhibition.