Image Credit: Museum of Flying, “Douglas DC-3 ‘Spirit of Santa Monica’,” 3 March 2019, direct link.

February is one of Art Muse LA’s busiest months. It is a time when art fairs, collectors, afficiandos, and general art lovers come to town. During this month, we provide VIP tours for our client Deutsche Bank where we lead private tours of Frieze art fair. Frieze began its Los Angeles iteration of the fair in 2019 when it premiered at Paramount Pictures Studios in Hollywood. It was held again at Paramount in 2020, just weeks before the pandemic, and then was canceled the following year. When Frieze returned to LA in February 2022, the fair had moved, once again, to the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills.

Now back for its 4th year, Frieze will be held in an architecturally-considered tent at the Santa Monica Airport, including its Barker Hangar. In the past, the local art fair Art Los Angeles Contemporary, or ALAC, which was active from 2010 to 2020, was held for 9 years in the hangar. With so much art activity at this location, one question we wanted to ask is: What is the history of the Santa Monica airport?

Used at the astonishingly-early date of 1917, the airport started off as just a landing strip. In the early 1920s, the airport’s name changed to “Clover Field,” a tribute to Greayer Clover, a fighter pilot who had lost his life in World War I.

Later in the decade, Clover Field became the site of the Women’s Air Derby, a transcontinental flight race from Santa Monica to Clevland, Ohio. Among this group of avivators, Amelia Earhart is the most recognizable contestant.

Image Credit: Santa Monica Airport, “Santa Monica Airport World War II History: These are views of Santa Monica Airport during World War II. Notice the mesh that sits above the factory and cars of the Douglas Aircraft Company. This was a fake neighborhood designed to hide the factory from possible enemy planes,” 27 February 2014, direct link.

The Barker Hangar was originally part of the Santa Monica Airport. In 1954, the hangar was built as an aviation manufacturing site. In the 1960s, it was the home of the DC-3s, the world’s first commercial plane. The DC-3s made their earliest voyages starting in 1935; once World War II began in 1939, the planes were also converted for military use.

In the 1970s, Barker Hanger was a storage site for planes owned by the reclusive billionaire Howard Hughes.

The 1980s saw a transition for the hangar, turning it into an event space. It has hosted some of the most exclusive events in Los Angeles, including the Critics Choice Awards, NBA Awards, and MTV Movie Awards, among many others.

For Frieze 2023, the Santa Monica Airport will host 20th- and 21st-century art that displays cutting-edge concepts – at one of the oldest airports in LA County – we can’t think of a better site to experience and take in the past and present simultaneously. The airport will close in 2028 to be replaced by a park, completing the life cycle of the airport, starting from one green space to another in the span of 100 years.