Audrey Irmas | |
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| Born | |
| Education | Fairfax High School |
| Alma mater | University of California, Los Angeles |
| Occupation(s) | Philanthropist, art collector |
| Spouse | Sydney M. Irmas (dead) |
| Children | Robert Irmas Matthew Irmas Deborah Irmas |
Audrey Irmas is an American philanthropist and art collector. She has donated millions of dollars to Jewish causes, especially the Wilshire Boulevard Temple. She is one of the largest art collectors in the United States.
Audrey Irmas was born in Los Angeles, California. [1] She was educated at Fairfax High School in Los Angeles, and attended the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). [1]
Irmas co-founded the Audrey and Sydney Irmas Charitable Foundation in 1983. [1] In 1997, the Audrey and Sydney Irmas Charitable Foundation donated US$1.5 million to endow the Sydney M. Irmas Chair in Public Interest Law and Legal Ethics at the University of Southern California. [1] It is held by Professor Erwin Chemerinsky. [1] It also endowed the Audrey and Sydney Irmas Campus of the Wilshire Boulevard Temple, [2] a Reform synagogue in Los Angeles, was dedicated in 1998. [3] [4] It is located on the corner of Olympic and Barrington Boulevards in West Los Angeles. [3]
Irmas served on the board of trustees of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MOCA) from 1992 to 2006. [4] [5] She has served as a life trustee since 2006. [5] She served as Chairperson of the Los Angeles Family Housing Corporation, a non-profit organization which tackles homelessness in Los Angeles. [1]
In September 2015, Irmas auctioned a painting entitled "Untitled, 1968" by Cy Twombly that she owned at Sotheby's and donated half the proceeds (an estimated US$30 million) for the construction of the Audrey Irmas Pavilion, a "55,000-square-foot new events center in Koreatown, just east of the synagogue’s historic 1929 Byzantine-Revival sanctuary." [6] [7] The new addition to the Wilshire Boulevard Temple is designed by Shohei Shigematsu of the Office for Metropolitan Architecture's New York office. [8]
Irmas has made political contributions to many Democratic politicians, including Nancy Pelosi, Dick Durbin, Michelle Nunn, Tammy Duckworth, Karen Bass, Kay Hagan, Jeanne Shaheen and Henry Waxman. [9] Additionally, she has donated to EMILY's List, [9] an organization that helps elect pro-choice female Democrats.
Irmas started collecting photographic self-portraits with her husband in the 1970s. [10] In 1992, they donated their collection to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. [10]
The Audrey and Sydney Irmas Collection made its debut at San Jose Museum of Art. Many exhibitions have been held with their daughter- Debora Irmas- as guest curator [11]
Irmas collects paintings and sculptures. [10] She owns Emeralds (1961) by Roy Lichtenstein. [10] She also owns paintings by Cy Twombly. [10] She owned a triptych by Sigmar Polke and two sculptures by Robert Gover, which she donated to the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. [10] She owns additional artwork by sculptor Tony Smith, painters Francis Bacon and Ed Ruscha as well as Mes Voeux by Annette Messager. [10]
Irmas was named one of the largest American art collectors in 2003. [12]
The Audrey Irmas Pavilion- named after the lead donor Audrey Irmas- is located in Los Angeles [13] and serves as a place to hold multiple cultural and religious events. [14]
Irmas is the widow of Sydney M. Irmas, a philanthropist and art collector. [1] They had two sons, Robert and Matthew, and a daughter, Deborah. They resided in a house designed by architect Timothy Morgan Steele in Holmby Hills, Los Angeles, across the street from The Manor and Holmby Park. [10] [15]
Additionally, Irmas owns an apartment in The Mayfair, a historic luxury building on the Upper East Side in Manhattan, New York City. [15]
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits.
Westwood is a commercial and residential neighborhood in the northern central portion of the Westside region of Los Angeles, California. It is the home of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Bordering the campus on the south is Westwood Village, a major regional district for shopping, dining, movie theaters, and other entertainment.
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MOCA) is a contemporary art museum with two locations in greater Los Angeles, California. The main branch is located on Grand Avenue in Downtown Los Angeles, near the Walt Disney Concert Hall. MOCA's original space, initially intended as a temporary exhibit space while the main facility was built, is now known as the Geffen Contemporary and located in the Little Tokyo district of downtown Los Angeles. Between 2000 and 2019, it operated a satellite facility at the Pacific Design Center facility in West Hollywood.
The Buffalo AKG Art Museum, formerly known as the Albright–Knox Art Gallery, is an art museum in Buffalo, New York, United States, in Delaware Park. The museum was expanded beginning in 2021, and re-opened in June 2023.
Miracle Mile is a neighborhood in the city of Los Angeles, California.
The Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) is an international architectural firm with offices in Rotterdam, New York, Hong Kong, Doha, and Australia. The firm is currently led by eight partners - Rem Koolhaas, Reinier de Graaf, Ellen van Loon, Shohei Shigematsu, Iyad Alsaka, Chris van Duijn, Jason Long, and managing partner and architect David Gianotten.
Wilshire Boulevard (['wɪɫ.ʃɚ]) is a prominent 15.83 mi (25.48 km) boulevard in the Los Angeles area of Southern California, extending from Ocean Avenue in the city of Santa Monica east to Grand Avenue in the Financial District of downtown Los Angeles. One of the principal east–west arterial roads of Los Angeles, it is also one of the major city streets through the city of Beverly Hills. Wilshire Boulevard runs roughly parallel to Santa Monica Boulevard from Santa Monica to the west boundary of Beverly Hills. From the east boundary, it runs a block south of Sixth Street to its terminus.
Mid-Wilshire is a neighborhood in the central region of Los Angeles, California. It is known for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Petersen Automotive Museum, and the Miracle Mile shopping district.
Westwood Boulevard is a street in Los Angeles that runs through the heart of Westwood Village and further south in West Los Angeles.
The Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, abbreviated as MNBAQ, is an art museum in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. The museum is located in National Battlefields Park and is a complex of four buildings. Three of them were purpose-built for the museum and one was originally a provincial prison.
The Pavilion for Japanese Art is a part of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art containing the museum's collection of Japanese works that date from approximately 3000 BC through the 20th century AD. The building itself was designed by renowned architect Bruce Goff.
The Wilshire Boulevard Temple, known from 1862 to 1933 as Congregation B'nai B'rith, is a Reform Jewish congregation and synagogue, located at 3663 Wilshire Boulevard, in the Wilshire Center district of Los Angeles, California, in the United States. Founded in 1862, it is the oldest Jewish congregation in Los Angeles.
Holmby Hills is a neighborhood on the Westside of Los Angeles, California, United States.
The Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation is a non-profit arts foundation located on North Carolwood Drive in the Holmby Hills district of Los Angeles, California. Modern and contemporary artwork in the Frederick R. Weisman collection are displayed in a "living with art—house museum" context, with guided public tours by appointment with the foundation.
Fred Charles Sands was an American business executive and real estate investor. He served as the Chairman of Vintage Capital Group.
Urban Light (2008) is a large-scale assemblage sculpture by Chris Burden located at the Wilshire Boulevard entrance to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). The 2008 installation consists of restored street lamps from the 1920s and 1930s. Most of them once lit the streets of Southern California.
Harvey J. Fields (1935–2014) was an American Reform rabbi. He served as the rabbi of Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto, the largest synagogue in Canada, from 1978 to 1982. He then served as the rabbi of Wilshire Boulevard Temple, the oldest synagogue in Los Angeles, from 1985 to 2003.
Sydney M. Irmas was an American attorney, investor, philanthropist and art collector.
The Marciano Art Foundation is a non-profit arts foundation located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Mid-Wilshire neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. It was established by the co-founders of Guess, Maurice Marciano and Paul Marciano. The Marcianos opened the museum on May 25, 2017 as an exhibition space to display their 1,500-piece collection of contemporary art. The museum closed indefinitely in November 2019 after workers attempted to unionize. The Marciano Foundation released a statement a month later that the closure was permanent. The museum reopened to the public and it is free. Visitors must reserve timed-entry tickets in advance.
Steve Leder is an American rabbi, scholar, author and Jewish community leader. Twice-named in Newsweek Magazine's list of the ten most influential rabbis in America, Steve Leder is the Senior Rabbi of Wilshire Boulevard Temple in Los Angeles, which serves approximately 2,400 families at three campuses. Rabbi Leder joined Wilshire Boulevard Temple in 1987, and succeeded Rabbi Harvey J. Fields as Senior Rabbi in 2003.
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