So Cal art whirl

When schedules suddenly aligned for an unencumbered week, I seized the opportunity and ran drove to southern California. When I go out of town, I like to know what to see, where to go and how to fit it all in. Monday was an eight-hour drive to San Diego. I laid out an ambitious schedule of exhibitions and venues for the next three days:

• Northern Stars: Twentieth Century Finnish Designs at the Mingei International Museum, San Diego (vintage Marimekko)
• Dyed Elegance: Asian Modernism and the Art of Kuboku and Hisako Takadu at the San Diego Museum of Art (roketsuzome - wax resist dyeing)
• Art Meets Science, Thomas Contemporary Quilt Collection, and Magical Mystery Tour: en homage at Visions Art Museum, San Diego (quilts)
• California Design, 1930-1965: "Living in a Modern Way" at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (comprehensive view of modern design)
• Breaking Ground: Chinese American Architects in LA (1945-1980) at the Chinese-American Museum, Los Angeles (googie architecture by Helen Liu Fong)
• Folding Paper: the Infinite Possibilities of Origami at the Japanese American National Museum, Los Angeles (mind-boggling folds)
• Claire Falkenstein at Jack Rutberg Fine Arts, Los Angeles (she sculpted entrance gates for Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice, Italy)
• Pasadena to Santa Barbara: a Selected History of Art in Southern California, 1951-1969 at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art (Karl Benjamin's abstract compositions would make great quilts)
• Carefree California: Cliff May and the Romance of the Ranch House at University Art Museum University of California, Santa Barbara (he was great at marketing)

I didn't have time to see much more at each venue. I just missed San Diego's Craft Revolution: from Post-War Modern to California Design. It looked great even as the Mingei staff were dismantling it. But I maxxed out and even saved the Eames House in Pacific Palisades for another time. But I did manage to connect with friends in San Diego and LA for dinner.

Making it all possible meant a one night stay each in each city - if it's Tuesday, it must be ___ - and two-hour drives each day in crazy southern California traffic. To cap off the trip I spent one relaxing non-scheduled day in San Luis Obispo before returning home.

You may think I'm nuts, but this was a great vacation - full of art and inspiration.