And of course, well-wishers waited to pay their respects to the honorees, with Leigh taking selfies with Govan and catching up with Law Roach. When I congratulated Baz, whom I’ve gotten to know a little bit over the years (he even met my daughter as a six month old, in the lobby of the Chateau Marmont) he spoke in typical word-of-god proclamations, humbled by the approval of his peers in the industry, and in the art world.
“We’ve been on this journey for a long time,” he told me.
Govan began the evening’s program by reaching across the aisle to his fellow Los Angeles museum directors: MoCA’s Burton, Cameron Shaw of the CAAM, Sandra Jackson-Dumont of the soon to open Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, Amy Homma of the Academy Museum, and Ann Philbin, the outgoing director of the Hammer Museum
“I call her Annie Philbin—the director of the Hammer Museum for the past two decades, who is stepping down after 25 years of helping to build Los Angeles and the arts as a true leader,” he said. “Annie, we love you.”
Guests finished up the sliced cuts of wagyu provided by Simon Kim’s grand, gussied-up, NYC-based Korean BBQ joint Cote. Andrew Garfield, jammed beside Dev Patel and Javier Bardem, came up to congratulate Luhrmann after Laura Dern did. Then everyone was rushed to their seats for the speeches. Sarandos made it back to his from the bar just in time, each fist clutching a martini, one for him and one for his wife, former U.S. Ambassador to the Bahamas Nicole Avant.
“My formerly enslaved great-grandparents raised a little girl who was my grandmother,” said Bryan Stevenson, the social justice activist—and inspiration for the film Just Mercy—in his introduction of Leigh. “My grandmother was a powerful force in my life. She would whisper things in my ear, she would teach me things.”
He explained that he discovered Leigh’s work shortly before she represented the U.S. at the 2022 Venice Biennale, and was shocked when he walked into the Arsenale and saw the artist’s 16-foot Brick House, which he later helped install in the entrance to the Freedom Monument Sculpture Park in Montgomery, Alabama.
