Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego

Love this museum. It's a great spot for locals and tourists. Lots of art to look at and enjoy. The museum is quite spacious. A lot bigger than I expected. There's at least 3 floors. My favorite room is the one with the open glass looking out to the ocean. So beautiful. I also love how they offer free second Sundays to the public as well. 10 out of 10 recommend! MCAsd

The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (MCASD) offers a large variety of interesting art exhibits to explore. Adult tickets cost $20. My family and I visited just in time for a free guided tour led by a museum educator. Guided tours take place every Saturday from 2 to 3 pm. While MCASD doesn't require reservations, the guided tour took only about 15 minutes as the educator went through one room in the Art in the Caribbean Diaspora, 1990s-Today exhibit. I thoroughly enjoyed the tour because the educator explained the background behind the artists and analyzed our interpretations. If you enjoyed the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, I'd recommend exploring the exhibits in San Diego because it has more exhibits and art like The Broad. You can find MCASD close to the coast and the Village of La Jolla, so it can act as a stop of a walking tour around the area.

Absolutely stunning! Both the museum and location is beautiful. Check out the website to get the best ticket pricing option.

This month's theme dinner was incorporating peas.. very delicious and very impressive what they did with peas!

Beautiful artwork in a beautiful building. The actual building was the highlight for me, I lived looking out and seeing the beautiful SD coast, right alongside the beautiful art. Would highly recommend stopping here!

The only beautiful thing at this museum is the architecture, the fabulous views and that window to the sea. That is the only art you will find in there. I had not been to this museum since the early 2000s when I moved to this city. As I lived out of town for 8 years, I only knew that the architecture has changed a bit. I did not know the 'art' that they show was super crap. My boyfriend felt the same, I am glad we went on one of those free Sundays as we would have requested our money back. There was a room totally hideous showing a huge canvas with nothing on it. Another series of canvases black, brown, gray, dark green, what is that? a joke? I felt my intellect was insulted by the exhibitions there. I only liked a huge pink painting (at least matching with my clothes). I only took pictures of the stuff I liked, which was not much. I understand some art is to make you think but not to feel disgusted and feeling like the curators think that the visitors are idiots who will adore an empty canvas or a black canvas with a dot in the middle and pretend is the infinity of something.

We came here on their free museum day on the 3rd Thursday of the month. We expected a big crowd but it wasn't crowded at all. It's such a nice museum and we spent over 2 hours looking at all the exhibits. And the view of the ocean from the windows where breathtaking. Such a beautiful location!

What a lovely museum! All the unique pieces are beautiful and tells a story. The gorgeous view of the beach is priceless especially during sunset. Def recommend whether you're a fan of art or not.

Accessibility: not the best but not the worst. Parking is a bit difficult to find, and most of it is parallel parking on the street, anywhere you can find. In front of the museum there are stairs, but there is a ramp that goes from an outside café area up to the front of the museum if you need a ramp...again, it is a bit inconvenient for wheelchair users. Inside the museum, there are elevators to get to the different floors, and there are buttons to push that open the doors for you. There is also a ramp to get to the garden outside. Experience: This place is like a maze...VERY confusing. There are rooms off of rooms, and rooms off of those rooms. I lost track of which ways I had gone, and I genuinely got lost at two different points trying to find an elevator. There were some interesting pieces here, like a Mark Rothko, Andy Warhol, Andy Goldsworthy, and more, but some of the pieces here were darker themed (internal organs and plane crashes) and those creeped me out, personally. The museum was affordable, and people under 26 are free, but for some reason, I felt DRAINED emotionally and physically after coming here, and so did my fiancée. I know this sounds weird, but I am very intuitive/psychic, and I felt some weird energy here. I don't think I'd like to come back, but for people who don't pay attention to those things, this is another beautiful art museum and I do support people supporting museums.

ARTSY FARTSY I like a good museum where I could sit and stare at an art piece for a long time (like you see in the movies). Unfortunately, this museum didn't draw me in that way but it was nice to see this fixture existed! Every second Sunday of the month it is free. I had signed up for a visit a month in advance unknowingly it fell on the same weekend as the La Jolla Art and Wine Festival that I got a free ticket to. So it made sense to keep it "artsy fartsy" this Sunday. The museum is beautiful! Within there were many galleries from a collection of artists. I didn't have a favorite artist of the bunch nor did I have a favorite piece. I saw many interesting art, boring art, weird art, disturbing art, and cool art. You make what you want. I will just post pictures of the art pieces that I liked and call it a day.... Because the type of art that I like getting lost in is more contemporary than modern and I didn't feel the art pieces here spoke to me in that way. But still some cool things...

To begin , the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego is built on "sacred" grounds. Once the cottage of visionary philanthropist Ellen Browning Scripps (1836-1932), it has grown into a spectacular structure of rising glass and incomparable ocean views. The inside space unfolds nicely from exhibit to exhibit. The collections are uniquely engaging. We enjoyed the overall experience so much as the museum is big enough to satisfy and small enough to not overwhelm. Also, we were fortunate to have an introduction to the museum by Executive Assistant Jana. We appreciated her time and welcoming comments so much. This attraction is a must see for locals and visitors alike.

This is the flagship location in La Jolla! I love art, but nothing here really drew me into deep thought or awe. The art exhibits were underwhelming. Clean facility. The best parts of the museum were the empty rooms with open windows peering into the ocean, but you can just have the full experience by wandering outdoors. The gift store items had more character than the featured art. Overall, not worth the $25 entry fee.

Always loves sculptures and this one is for me....took lots of photos for my Facebook video clips! Of course nothing tops New Orleans after I visited there but for locals, this one is a great place to explore!

Gorgeous space. I loved all of the feminist themed art. Great views of the ocean, perfect place to hang out on the weekend and look at beautiful things.

Offering free Second Sundays and free member art pass if you are 18-25 years of age. With three levels, free locker rooms and wheelchair accessible areas, this newly renovated and expanded museum was such a surprise. I recommend making a reservation online since they have to monitor the attendance capacity, and if there is a line it can be kind of a long wait. The current gallery displayed focused on the French artist Niki de Saint Phalle in the 1960s, as well as showed the "Looking for Langston" film that encapsulated the era and life of Mr. Hughes. The staff and security were extremely helpful and nice. There's plenty of street parking off of Prospect Street, but some have 1-2 hour time limits.

Beautiful building and gorgeous views but not worth the price of admission of $25/ each as some of the art was something my daughter could paint up. A lot of open space. Better going to balboa park for art as there are some free museums or less costly museums with more history or modern art worth looking at . Or sit on the benches and look out to the ocean for free!

Such a wonderful space that displays unique, beautiful, and fascinating art. I'd say that this is one of the coolest museums I've been to. We made sure to purchase tickets online. This museum also offers free admission and some discounts on the website as well, only if it applies to you, so make sure to research that up first. There are tour guides available on the site as well. It's in a great location with lots of street parking. There's about 3 levels all containing different artwork and exhibitions. There were some installations and artwork from artists I'm familiar with like Yayoi Kusama and Andy Warhol but there's tons of other pieces to explore and learn about. This museum is an awesome place to check out with a date, a friend or even alone if you're a fan of art!

This is a bummer to write, but I need to warn people about going with kids before dropping a decent ticket entrance fee as after speaking with other friends they have had similar experiences, where they too were basically ushered out after 20 minutes. I went with a small group on a weekday morning so as to miss the crowds because we knew we had small kids with us and that could pose a disturbance to some people. I've never had an issue until this time bringing my kids to museums and they've been to museums in the UK, NY, The Art Institute in Chicago, Artpace San Antonio, every museum in Balboa park, among others. To give an accurate view there were 3 adults and 6 kids ages 2-6 in our group. We arrived about the time they opened and headed first to the bathroom and the front desk lady asked if she could help us. When we said we going to the bathroom, with complete annoyance yelled emphatically over to us, "No, CAN I HELP YOU?". So right off the bat it was awkward. We guessed we had to check in before using the bathroom? Once everyone was ready, one of the adults and I headed in with some of the kids and 2 docents blocked our way from entering one of the rooms. My friend responded, "oh, should we go that way?" And they said "yeah". Mind you, there isn't a particular sequence to visit the museum. And of course that first room had a giant sculpture that looked like a jungle-gym. ‍ Each room had more than half a dozen docents and when the 3rd adult met up with us she said it was hilarious because we had 8 docents slowly creeping up behind us. Of course they would ask the kids not to touch the artwork, but instead of engaging the kids with questions like "do you like this piece, how does it make you feel?" they asked us through clenched teeth to go out into the sculpture garden after 20 minutes. So after Pretty Woman-style being asked to leave, we went into the small underwhelming sculpture garden. On the way outside, one of the 6-year-olds saw a room where he's done kids' activities on special events and he was curious to see someone in there. He opened the door to peek in and a staff member came over and closed the door in his face saying it was a "private camp". Why she didn't say "hi, we're doing a private camp right now. Would you or your mom like some info on our future ones?" is baffling. Even despite all that, the boy said he wanted to do a camp there and his mom was like "no way." So after wandering the tiny sculpture garden, we left. My 5-year-old had brought his allowance for the gift shop, but I was so pissed I didn't even want to give him a chance to look. I was sad because one of the 6-year-olds had been told right before our trip that she "wasn't coloring correctly" and stayed up all night trying to conform to somebody else's ideals. Her mom brought her here to show her that anything can be art. There were about 24 docents working and we were the only ones in the museum other than one other couple I saw at the bag check. I'm not asking the museum to cater to kids, but they could make it more welcoming and if you're going to creepily follow us around, make it fun and act like a guide. The museum obviously has the staff available. When you see that little girl in such awe with her mouth gaping open that she feels the need reach out and try to stroke the painting, don't just ask her not touch it and usher her outside. Ask her not to touch it and then talk about the work and ask the her what she thinks about it. I've worked in the non-profit industry in the past and people would always complain that San Diegans don't care about the arts and don't want to support the arts. But if we don't expose kids to it now, who will appreciate it in 10 or 20 years?

So glad I finally got to visit MCSD! You can sign up for a free membership if you are between 18-25. I spent around 2 hours in there and ran out of time, but I think the Alexis Smith exhibit involves a lot of reading, so with a different exhibit it may take less time. I loved the variety of the pieces they had there, and the view of la Jolla was beautiful. I am definitely considering getting a membership. Just FYI you are not allowed to bring food or drinks into the museum.

It was closed when I went so this review is mainly for the gift shop. Lots of selection and surprisingly a lot were affordable! I bought a decorative vase and the staff wrapped it nicely and asked if I was flying with it. When I said yes, she went above and beyond to package it well.

Modern, thought provoking art located in beautiful La Jolla. My best friend and I were in La Jolla for a quick weekend trip and we happened to find out the second Sunday in the month is free admission. How awesome! We both spent about an hour there but we both loved it. Pictured are some of my favourite pieces!

Finally its open again! I really like what they did with the place, its a lot bigger and better than before. I love the high ceilings. I only wished that we allotted more time here, we underestimated how long it'd take to finish. And trust me, I'm a fast museum person usually and two hours was not enough!

The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego sits on top of a cliff over looking seals and tourists. It's a short walk from shops and restaurants in downtown La Jolla. This makes for a great afternoon; lunch, checking out the seals, and then a stroll through the museum looking at contemporary art. The museum itself is modern and multi-storied. The art work is interesting from the mid twentieth century to today. Visiting The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego is a great way to round out your stay in La Jolla.

This is one of the best museums that I've been to in the last decade it's well curated it's in a beautiful building which makes walking through the galleries flow. Their collection of contemporary or is outstanding The featured show was of Nikki ad Saint Fali Who is a 1960s conceptual artist whose work with splatter and deconstruction precursors Andy Warhol and the feminist art movements of late 60 and 70s The museums location is right near the La Jolla waterfront and the views from the gallery and from the gallery sculpture garden are absolutely fantastic and stunning if I lived in that area I would be a member for sure great thing to go see if you're in San Diego and you want to do a day trip good access from public transportation

I love museums, they are part of my life. This museum used to be a part of my community, also. I got beautiful postcards for each show, and great treatment as a member. I bought decently priced gifts at their store and attended openings. What happened? They spent millions to change into a new something. The first year back, I was excited, I even signed up for a Yoga class. The art is great, but not their management. They seemingly spend a big budget on guards, car valets, and an unwelcoming team of frowning humans who have as default answer "I do not know. They follow you around as in cheap stores to make sure you do not walk out with one of Nikki Saint Phalle's gigantic sculptures.... But when you need them, they do not understand, they are ready to close or they are not in the mood... Invitations? Postcards? All that is gone. I got a half letter flier with suggested donations and ranks that started in the Thousand Dollars. So picky me, I decided to support the San Diego Zoo instead, for the time being!

It is very elegant. This is my first time ever visiting a museum like this and it really captivated my attention. It may take some time to understand each painting, but the more you give it your attention the more you can visualize what the artist's thought process. All of them have a story to tell so read the descriptions carefully!

Park at the church across the museum and ask to be cleansed of your sins before stepping into this great collection of artwork. From physical to abstract works, this 3 level gallery had a wide selection of pieces that resonate with almost any audience. Bucha loved the glass blown works as well as the color gradient panel pieces. For Belly, the oil paintings were a favorite. Great spot with even better fares(for 18-25 yr olds).

Military and first responders are free. Also, children 17 and under are free. Wouldn't recommend for little kids that like tough everything.

Well proportioned displays. The variety of modern art was enlightening. Many or most of the different eras displayed were from west coast people. Some dead and some alive. Would go again.

After a four-year, $105 million renovation, the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego plans to reopened its La Jolla flagship location to the public on April 9th. We enjoyed the free reopening event and the two special exhibitions created for the reopening. The tours that day were great. I hope we can hold an Elite Event here in the near future.

amazing art and views, facility is way bigger than what it seems like! wish they stayed open later

After being closed for an expansion and remodel for almost 4 years San Diego finally has a national level contemporary art museum. There have been many great shows at MCASD over the 35 years I've been visiting, but the space has always held the museum back. The last remodel by Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown in the 1990s helped to a degree. It did give them more exhibition space. However, the remodel contained a cafe that never drew enough to be successful, the unlovable Axeline Court, and a colonnade made of big, fat post-modern Doric columns that gave no sense of where the entrance was. There was a letter signed by some architects and critics, including Paul Goldberger, decrying the 2014 remodel plan. They were all wrong. This brilliant remodel by Annabelle Selldorf has accomplished so much. It's stitched together a jumble of expansions and given them a sense of flow. It's opened the building up more to its location-the ocean. You keep seeing it peaking out around corners, with openings in the wall and easy access to outdoor view spaces. There are more types of galleries now; big spaces, intimate spaces and just fun spaces. The loss of the Venturi/Brown additions were no great loss. And they did keep the Axline Court. However, it seems to simply be a weird space you pass through from the north wing to the gift shop. I guess it's used for events but the space will always be creepy to me. The entrance is still a problem. If you approach it walking south down Prospect you still won't know where it is. First you come across the original facade and entrance of the Scripps house from which the museum arose. No...that's not the entrance. Then you may notice a number of doors to the left. No...that's the entrance from the remodel, they no longer open. Eventually you notice the obvious entrance near the south end. However, the curve of Prospect makes it hard to see from the north. Finally the gift shop now is pretty much a low point. There is not really a lot of inventory. Also they used to have a wonderful art book selection. It's pretty much all gone. I'm guessing that they don't really sell enough to pay for themselves. And anybody buying an expansive art book will want a new copy not one that's been handled a lot. I would have liked them to put them into an onsite library for use during museum hours. I was a fan of the previous long time museum director, Hugh Davies. However, the courage that the new director Kathryn Kanjo, who started in 2016, and the board members displayed in getting this 8 year old project completed so successfully should be called out. They always had an important collection, now they have the space to actually properly display much more of it. Go now!

Best museum in town. Such an awesome layout and the staff was very friendly. Loved the eclectic selection of art and the Shop was great as well!

No I forgot to check in :( but anyways, this museum is pretty small but its something to do if you're visiting SD. Free if you're under 25! Just show ID. I believe students either get in for free or for cheaper. It's only one floor so no map needed. Street parking is available and its free. So if you're under 25, it's pretty much a free trip! The view outside is amazing and theres a lot of political/race issue artwork up which is pretty cool.

"Stories may well be lies, but they are good lies that say true things, and which can sometimes pay the rent." Neil Gaiman I visited to see the The Uses of Photography: Art, Politics, and the Reinvention of a Medium show. My old friend Phel Steinmetz's photos were on display. Many of the black and white images I had seen before. All had a stark beauty to them. I imagine if Ansel Adams was interested in suburbs in the 1970's the photos would look like Phel's. I observed and tried to decipher the story being told. Phel was an excellent storyteller. This one time we were hiking near Julian and we came across deer droppings. He told a story of what the deer was doing and what the deer had eaten previously. It was a long detailed story from just a pile of droppings in the dirt. While Phel's books are on display they were locked in display cases and you could only read a page from each book. Some of my fav photos were the ones he shot for Eleanor Antin's 100 Boots series. It's too bad the placard didn't credit him. You can read about the project here: http://100boots.blogspot.com/ There were some great John Baldessari photos on display as well. I really enjoy seeing his National City photographs. One of the reasons I love this museum is they show local artists like Phel Steinmetz and John Baldessari. Outside there are some cool sculptures including a Niki de Saint Phalle. This museum is a good place to spend an afternoon. It was nice seeing the work of my old friend again.

A small but cute museum. We came here on a Monday afternoon and it was pretty empty. Parking was even easy to find. The exhibit is great for the price which is FREE if you're under 25! Definitely a nice perk. Our whole trip in the museum was under an hour. This is definitely an art museum on the smaller side. Don't plan to be here for too long if you're someone who isn't too into art and likes to just quickly look at all of the pieces. A lot of the art was relevant to our political atmosphere right now. Some of it touched upon undocumented immigrants. There was also an exhibit from Berkeley artists in the 20th century and their views upon the war in Vietnam. A lot of it reminded me of how America is still to this day. Definitely interesting but saddening to see how little our country has changed. Another aspect I appreciated about this museum was a lot of the art featured was by UCSD students. As a current UCSD undergrad, this brought me some pride for my school! Overall, definitely stop by if you're in the area for a free but nice art exhibit.

I was expecting more, but nevertheless was impressed with the museum's interesting space. The Contemporary Art Museum of San Diego has a stellar location, with five-star views of La Jolla's picturesque waterfront. There's a charming room tucked away in the back, where squares have been cut from its glass walls. In float the coastal breeze and melodic sounds of waves crashing at a distance - it's unbelievably soothing. Just steps from oceanic sounds and smells is a pretty special Álvaro Blancarte collection. His textured pieces have great dimension and are reminiscent of fissured mountains and rock. Blancarte's exhibit is, in my opinion, the crown jewel of the current gallery. While there are several other interesting pieces throughout the museum, I was continually bothered by one major installation faux pas - my reflection! In short, the museum's lighting is terrible. Instead of being able to focus on the art before me, I continually felt like I was gazing into a mirror. The fluorescent bright lights cast extremely pronounced reflections on cased artwork, and ultimately detract from both the art and a visitor's experience. The gift shop is quite interesting, though it doesn't strongly highlight the current exhibits. Either way, there is a mélange of creative areaware, books, stationery, and jewelry, with contributions from several local artists.

I've been here a few times over the years. I'm not a huge fan of contemporary art but some of it is just plain fun and makes me smile. As I told my husband, sometimes it gives me an idea for a project we could do ourselves around the house! We went today using the Macy's Museum month pass...making it quite a deal. And the cool thing is that our tickets are valid for 7 days, so if we want to go to the downtown location in the next week we can do that. We had just come from Birch Aquarium - which was fun but super crowded & noisy with lots of kids on field trips. This was a good "decompression" experience, very calm & peaceful. Like some others have said, there are great views from inside the museum that can be as interesting as some of the art! The outdoor garden is nice, too.

I love the museum because I got a tour whenever you get their. There's also a gift shop at the front door. and the the sculptures and Paintings are beautiful . They also have lockers to keep your bags so you don't have to carry them everywhe you go.

I'm not the caftan-and-martini type who can look at a piece of modern art and wax on about its meaning. Do you remember Woody Allen's classic pick-up scene in "Play It Again, Sam"? (clip: http://bit.ly/1xHH8UO)... Allan: That's quite a lovely Jackson Pollock, isn't it? Museum Girl: Yes, it is. Allan: What does it say to you? Museum Girl: It restates the negativeness of the universe. The hideous lonely emptiness of existence. Nothingness. The predicament of Man forced to live in a barren, Godless eternity like a tiny flame flickering in an immense void with nothing but waste, horror and degradation, forming a useless bleak straitjacket in a black absurd cosmos. Allan: What are you doing Saturday night? Museum Girl: Committing suicide. Allan: What about Friday night? The art excels, but for the life of me, I couldn't name any of the pieces on display here. The ocean view setting is what resonates the most in this sparse modern museum. I happen to get there at sunset, and I was probably more entranced by the Pacific framed by the golden hue of the sun than I was of the art in the room (photo: http://bit.ly/1BjDzba). Once the residence of philanthropist Ellen Browning Scripps, it's not a huge space by modern art standards, only 60 pieces, but that apparently is changing since they are readying to triple the size of the museum. I shall return when the expansion is complete because they have over 4,000 pieces in storage now. I assume they must rotate the pieces since I didn't see the Warhol or Ai Weiwei works I was hoping to see. If you come a half-hour before closing, they let you in for free, and I took advantage of that just to save the ten bucks. I entertained myself in their gift shop in the meantime. But you should come regardless. It is a spectacular location, and there was even a donor cocktail party in full swing in the patio below. Perhaps they can tell you about the deeper meanings of the paintings and the sculpture garden. I sure can't. No caftan on me. Yet.

Came here for the first time today, and it was a Sunday afternoon well spent! The best part? It was free :) For you living-on-budget students under 25, show your ID and school ID (but the worker believed me and didn't ask for mine) and you're good to go. If you're over 25, admission is $5, and general admission is $10. Pretty inexpensive overall, but once you're there you'll understand why. The exhibit is on the smaller end, and if you're one of those people who briefly look at pieces, ponder the description and walk away, you'll be in and out quick. I came with some artistic friends so you know we took our time reading the descriptions and listening to the audios. Can't complain because I enjoyed myself. I've never been a huge fan of contemporary art, but I love that it ties into social issues and real life stories. You'll also see a lot of pieces by artists that attended UC San Diego, which is where majority of the work was created. As a current Triton, it was cool to see work from the alum being featured! Overall, worth a visit but don't come with crazy high expectations. Parking is free, admission cost is minimal, enjoy the view and have a good look.

Loved the location and how it's in the heart of downtown LJ. I love love love coming to LJ, unfortunately, was disappointed with this visit. It's museum month, so visitors are offered admission for half off ($5). If you're 25 and under, you're free. We expected more and was done browsing within an hour. I thought it would be bigger, but there were only several rooms with art pieces. Maybe I'm missing something ??? Sure I like art, but maybe I'm not that artsy fartsy to appreciate and understand a sitting donkey or framed confetti pieces... It was def an experience...

" Very Nice Small & Unusual Museum " My wife and I visited the Museum of Contemporary Art in La Jolla the other day. For you living-on-budget students under 25, show your ID and school ID (but the worker believed me and didn't ask for mine) and you're good to go. If you're over 25, admission is $5, and general admission is $10.The Museum is on the smaller size, and if you don't spend too much time looking at Artwork, you will probably be in and out of this place very quickly. But if you take some time took look and read the descriptions, and listen to the audios presented, the Artwork will make much more sense to you.. I enjoyed it myself. I've never been a huge fan of contemporary art, but I love how it ties into social issues and real life stories. You'll also see a lot of pieces by artists that attended UC San Diego, which is where majority of the work was created. Nice Museum !

I've passed by this museum so many times, as it's recognizable by the boat sculpture outside facing the beach, and was a college student nearby. But I actually visited it for the first time recently. I came for The Shore Thing that was an ongoing Thursday evening event for the summer. Along with complimentary admission to the exhibits, there was food, drink, and music out on their ocean view patio. It was a nice event with a good crowd, and you can't beat the view, especially during sunset. Even from inside, their wall to ceiling windows provide a beautiful backdrop to the art you're observing. Before coming here, I read a few reviews and took note of the security guards. I actually didn't really have an issue with them when I visited. I suppose they were a little more lax because it was an event. Their presence was known, but not necessarily felt. However, before I entered each gallery, I asked each guard whether it was okay to take photos, kind of as a way to let them know I came in peace. And they were very helpful and nice about informing me what was appropriate. That being said, I liked walking through the exhibits and looking at what they had on display. Outside, the pizza and craft beer booths only accepted cash, but the DJ played some nice beats. The whole ambiance of the event was really laid back and social, and I noticed the majority of the staff during that hour to be outgoing 20-somethings. I'll have to visit during normal hours to see if there's any difference.

Small quaint museum located in front of the beach, what more can you ask for? Came here for some respite from the hot La Jolla sun on Saturday. It was a small, charming museum that housed some abstract art, light installations, and other random things. Apparently weddings could also be held in this museum for we saw a couple getting married with the reception in the front facing the ocean. There was no fee when we entered the museum. Although they do ask you to check in the front and get a sticker. The people who man the museum do seem to take their job seriously for they watch your every move. You can probably finish the whole museum in 20 minutes. Their bookstore is small with random kitchy items. There are cards, shirts, sake glasses, and other miscellaneous items.

Review for SHERWOOD AUDITORIUM ONLY: Came here for the Tokyo String Quartet. The nice auditorium did enhance this musical experience. The concert hall has good acoustics with a modern decor. Acoustics is everything about a good concert hall, and I'm glad the sound was good enough to make the concert enjoyable. The auditorium is on the small, cozy side, which is perfect for an ensemble concert. The seats are comfy and are spaced in a way without having the person in front of you blocking your view. There are only 4 stalls for the women's room, so you either get out there early to get in line or just hold it during intermission...... by the time you're done, it's probably time to go back in. (yes, long lines!!!) The lobby area is pretty small for the crowd but I'm glad they have enough outdoor space where you can hang out with a nice view of the ocean in front of you. Staff at the box office are very nice and helpful too! Pretty decent place for an ensemble concert!

Okay, so I rant. I've been here before and enjoyed the contemporary ART exhibits very much. But I'm no architect. I am nothing more than an appreciative art aficionado and the current exhibit (MIX) belongs in an architectural museum, not here. So when this place resumes normal ops, I'll be back. Call me old-fashioned but art should excite, inspire and question not bore me with how many 2x4's were used to support a ceiling joist or whatever. P.S., Photography was prohibited. See photos. P.P.S., The permanent exhibits still excite (check the flying boats)

Cool exhibit in a fabulous location. The staff were super helpful. The sculpture garden was interesting. But . . . We dawdled. Looked at every painting, sculpture and installation. The bookstore. The garden. And we were out the door in 45 minutes. Maybe I'm spoiled by the museums in DC, Ottawa, Richmond, Toronto and Raleigh. (Yes, Richmond, VA and Raleigh, NC.) But MCASD was like a sweet little appetizer. With a huge endowment. There were very few visitors on a lovely Saturday afternoon. The gift shop wasn't ringing up sales. But the walls were covered with huge contribution recognition boards. What's going on here? Bottom line. Worth a visit if you're in LJ and want to spend an hour looking at thought provoking pieces. But it's not worth an excursion from very far away.

It was a Saturday night in mid-December. After 10 years together, my sister and her husband had finally gotten married earlier that day (*note to my boyfriend: this is unacceptable). Anyway, after an obscenely early morning, coupled with pouring rain and my sister, the bride, coming down with some demonic flu that very day and thus sniffling and hacking all over her $6,000 wedding gown, we were ready to party. Thank God my sis chose MCASD in La Jolla for her reception as it was too stunning for words once outfitted for her fete. We began with a cocktail hour on the patio overlooking the ocean. Post-rain surf and a cool ocean breeze - cocktail hours don't get much better. We were then effortlessly shuffled indoors (transitions are key to a good wedding and I give MCASD's logistics high marks) where we proceeded to dine, dance and drink (mostly the latter, especially in Sicky the Bride's case). The entire space was beautiful, which made for a truly memorable night. Gorgeous lighting, flawless set-up, fantastic sound - everything was perfection ... until I got tipsy before making my maid of honor speech. Shooooot.

Interesting. The lamp musical piece being my favorite when I last visited. Do I know anything about art? No. Do I love checking out new art? Yes. A fun way to spend an afternoon and enjoy an ocean view from the patio. Love that 25 and under is FREE! Seniors $5 and all others $10.