Music History and Contemporary Art Destroyed in the Deadly Los Angeles WildfiresAn archive of scores by composer Arnold Schoenberg and the collections of countless contemporary artists have been lost in the blaze The Eaton Fire has devastated the community of Altadena. Public domain via Wikimedia CommonsThe wildfires still burning in Los Angeles have killed at least24 people, razed thousands of homes andhistoric landmarks and destroyed countless treasured itemsincluding creative works stored in the area.One such loss is a collection of music written by 20th-century Austrian-American composerArnold Schoenberg, who developed the 12-tone technique, an innovative style of musical composition. An archive of roughly 100,000 scores and parts written by Schoenberg had been kept in a building behind the house of his son, Larry Schoenberg, in Los Angeles Pacific Palisades neighborhood, which has been devastated by thefires.Its brutal, Larry, 83, tells theNew York Times Javier C. Hernndez. We lost everything. Composer Arnold Schoenberg moved to southern California in the 1930s. Florence Homolka via Wikimedia CommonsLarry runs the companyBelmont Music Publishers, which rents and sells Schoenberg scores. The fires didnt destroy any original Schoenberg manuscripts. But without the archive of copies, upcoming performances of Schoenberg pieces may be difficult. As Leon Botstein, the music director of the American Symphony Orchestra, tells the Times, the collection was an indispensable resource. Belmont provided the orchestra with scores for its performance of Schoenbergs Gurrelieder last year.Born in Vienna in 1874, Schoenberg rose up in the European music scene during the early 20th century. As theWashington Posts Michael Dirda wrote in 2023, the composers increasingly esoteric music regularly elicited catcalls and uproar from early audiences. After fleeing the Nazis in 1933, Schoenberg landed in California, where he began teaching at several universities. Per reports from January 12, the composers longtimehome in the Brentwood neighborhood has been spared from fire damage.Larrys home and the archivewhich included photos, letters, books and other composers arrangements of Schoenbergs workswas completely destroyed.Theres a finality here which is astonishing, Larry tells the Times. Theres no hope left that youre going to find or retrieve anything. And thats a different kind of grief.Los Angeles contemporary artistspainters, potters, sculptors and moreare also suffering the loss of creative works. As multidisciplinary artistKathryn Andrews tellsARTnews Karen K. Ho, There are certain things that cant be replaced.Like Larry Schoenberg, Andrews lives in Pacific Palisades. She evacuated her home before it burned down. This is the second time shes lost a house to wildfire: In 2020, theBobcat Fire destroyed her home in Juniper Hills, north of Los Angeles. This time, Andrews lost her own really lovely collection of art, which included works byRashid Johnson,Jim Shaw,Fredrik Nilsen and others. Shed built the collection over two decades.After the last fire, I had the equivalent of a writers blocka creative block, Andrews tells ARTnews. A lot of animals died in that one. Its not just the loss of stuff, you know, its the loss of nature, its the loss of a community, its the loss of dreams. It has a very intense impact.The fires have razed countless local galleries, including AltadenasAlto Beta, which contained a ten-painting show by artistMary Anna Pomonis when it burned down.PainterRachelle Sawatsky tellsCulturedTara Walters, who lives in the Malibu Village neighborhood, tellsHyperallergics Valentina Di Liscia, Matt Stromberg, Maya Pontone and Rhea Nayyar, Everything is gone from my house. My car. My paintings inside. All my heirlooms. My wedding dress. Everything.Kelly Akashi, an Altadena-based sculptor of glass and bronze, lost her home and studio, report theTimes Robin Pogrebin, Julia Halperin and Zachary Small. The building contained recent and archival work, including pieces shed selected to display in her first exhibition at theLisson Gallery later this month. Per the Times, She had considered naming one of her recent works Monument to Loss. Now it is actually lost.The fires also consumed the livelihood of interdisciplinary artist Ross Simonini. As he tells Cultured, the wildfire destroyed his familys home, his studio and nearly all the work I have ever made.That includes childhood drawings I made with my mom, the drawing that helped me believe I could be an artist and several new bodies of work, Simonini adds. I dont think I will ever stop grieving that loss, but the loving response from the art community has already started transforming that grief into something else: a feeling of deep human connection that Ive looked for all my life. It only took losing everything to get it.Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.Filed Under: Archives, Art History, Artists, Arts, California, Composers, Contemporary Art, Fire, Music, Musical History, Painters, Painting, Sculpture, Wildfire