Advertisement

USC Pacific Asia Museum to close for a year for seismic retrofit

The USC Pacific Asia Museum is in Pasadena.

The USC Pacific Asia Museum is in Pasadena.

(Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
Share

The USC Pacific Asia Museum will close its doors to the public for approximately one year starting next month so that its 1924 building in Pasadena can undergo a seismic retrofit.

Leaders said on Wednesday that the museum will be closed to the public starting June 27 and is expected to reopen May 2017. They said the retrofitting is intended to strengthen the building’s foundation, and will add approximately 700 square feet of gallery space.

During the closure, the museum will present programs throughout the community, as well as a satellite exhibition at the Doheny Library on the USC campus.

Advertisement

The museum said its curatorial department will conduct a permanent collection survey during the closure, in order to create new exhibitions and programs that focus on its holdings.

The Chinese-style building was created in 1924 by Grace Nicholson, the prominent American collector. She donated the building to the city of Pasadena for art and cultural purposes, and it later became the home of the Pasadena Art Museum.

In 1987, the Pacificulture Foundation bought the structure and it became the Pacific Asia Museum. USC took over the museum in 2013.

The museum is devoted to the arts of Asia and the Pacific region and has a collection of more than 15,000 objects, covering more than 4,000 years of history.

david.ng@latimes.com

Advertisement