Category Archives: Metro Art

Art for the Orange Line Extension: Western Imaginary by Ken Gonzales-Day

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Bags of glass mosaic pieces created at Perdomo, the artwork fabricator, ready to be assembled into the mosaic artwork. All images courtesy the artist.

Ken Gonzales Day’s artwork presents kaleidoscopic views of native manzanita and oak trees, inviting passengers to find shapes and faces hidden within the patterns at Canoga Station for the Orange Line Extension. These images are currently being translated into two 27-foot long elliptical stone and glass mosaic artworks, which will be embedded into the new concrete platforms being added at the Canoga station. (Here’s a link to more information about Ken.)

There are more photos of the artwork being assembled after the jump.

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Art for the Orange Line: 'Liquid Light, Flowing into the Future' by Sam Erenberg

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Liquid Light: Flowing into the Future in the process of fabrication; the artist's design is visible on the left and bottom.

Inspired by the sense of possibility around the Roscoe Station, Sam Erenberg sought to incorporate a feeling of forward motion into his artwork.

To convey this Erenberg photographed the area from a moving vehicle at night. His images capture bright streams of light created by traffic lights, brake lights and illuminated signs on major local thoroughfares: Roscoe Boulevard, Canoga Avenue and Topanga Canyon Boulevard.

These images are currently being translated into two 27-foot long elliptical mosaic artworks, which will be embedded into the concrete station platforms. More photos are after the jump and here’s a link to more information about Sam.

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Art for the Orange Line: Strati by Anne Marie Karlsen

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Digital rendering of Nordhoff Station, featuring 27-foot long mosaic ellipses embedded in the concrete platforms and 20-foot porcelain enamel art panels.

The Orange Line Extension to Chatsworth is fast approaching and so is new art!

Here’s a peek at the work of Anne Marie Karlsen, who designed two mosaic paving designs and two art panels for Nordhoff Station. The photographs below focus on the mosaic element.

Anne Marie was inspired by the surrounding residential and natural landscape, including the landmark Stoney Point in Chatsworth. She approached the station platform as an outdoor living room, creating wallpaper-like porcelain enamel steel art panels alongside the platform seating areas, and glass and stone mosaic paving patterns designed to read like cozy ellipse-shaped area rugs. The title, Strati, refers to the geologic stratification and formation of the rocks in the northwest San Fernando Valley. (Here’s a link to more information about Anne Marie.)

Detail of strati.

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Art for the Orange Line: Owensmouth/Canoga Park by Margaret Lazzari

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Teams of SICIS artisans piece together mosaic artwork paving designs for Sherman Way Station.

Margaret Lazzari’s designs for Sherman Way Station on the Orange Line Extension includes two, 27-foot long maps that will be embedded into concrete platforms.

A mosaic map and a porcelain mosaic art panel will be displayed alongside station seating.

The west platform will house a map of 1910 era Owensmouth, with a free-flowing Los Angeles River and an undeveloped natural landscape. An adjacent art panel will depict a collection of native plants that once grew alongside the river.

The east platform will include a map of the same section of river 40 years later, in the city re-named Canoga Park. The river has been channelized and is integrated into a growing geometry of housing tracts. Agricultural production has become a powerful industry. Fruit trees replace native plants in the art panel imagery.

Each piece of glass and stone mosaic is hand-placed.

Lazzari hopes riders will make a connection between the physicality of their foot travel and the area’s deeply embedded topographical and ecological history.

The completed mosaic maps are ready to be crated and transported to the job site.

More Art for the Orange Line: Artists discuss station designs

Happy trails: Metro poster recalls iconic Chatsworth

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Artist Danny Heller signs iconic "Chatsworth" poster commissioned by Metro in the "Through the Eyes of Artists" series.
Artist Danny Heller signs iconic “Chatsworth” poster commissioned by Metro in the “Through the Eyes of Artists” series.

In the bright neon glow of Northridge Cruise Night’s convergence of muscle cars and classics, artist Danny Heller was autographing Metro posters for lines of Chatsworth fans lining up at the West SFV Bob’s Big Boy restaurant this past Friday night.

In the poster, Heller paints an iconic Chatsworth scene in photographic detail: a two-toned 1955 Chevy Bel Air cruises past a trio of grazing horses alongside the landmark Stoney Point.

And, there, among the car buffs and local historians and residents laying claim to birthrights, was Joe DiFatta, a Chatsworth resident and owner of the very same 1955 two-toned Chevy Bel Air featured in Heller’s artwork.

Artist Danny Heller, right, greets Joe DiFatta in his '55 Chevy Bel Air featured in Metro's 'Chatsworth' poster pictured here.

Artist Danny Heller, right, greets Joe DiFatta in his '55 Chevy Bel Air featured in Metro's 'Chatsworth' poster pictured here.

The Chatsworth poster is part of the “Through the Eyes of Artists” series commissioned by Metro Creative Services. The posters depicting various neighborhoods served by Metro are displayed on Metro trains and buses.

Missed the signing?  You can pick up a free print of the Chatsworth poster at the Metro Library, on the 15th floor of the Metro headquarters building next to Union Station in downtown Los Angeles. There’s also a few remaining copies of the Whittier, Compton and Azusa posters, but supplies are limited until the next round of commissioned posters go up in 2012.

Here’s a fun photo gallery post  of the event from the Chatsworth Patch.

Metro’s poetry bus card commemorates centennial of Polish poet Czeslaw Milosz

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Consul General of Poland in Los Angeles Joanna Kozińska – Frybes, at left, unveils commemorative "Poetry in Motion/LA" poster honoring poet Czeslaw Milosz. At right, Malgorzata Cup, Consul for Culture. Photo by Gary Leonard

Consul General of Poland in Los Angeles Joanna Kozińska – Frybes, at left, unveils commemorative "Poetry in Motion/LA" poster honoring poet Czeslaw Milosz. At right, Malgorzata Cup, Consul for Culture. Photo by Gary Leonard

Poetry can soothe the soul of many a traveler. The poetry cards on Metro Buses – you’ll find them scattered about in that indented ledge above the windows – have become a welcome respite from a busy day and a pause for reflection, which is not a bad thing when it comes to rush hour.

Launched in partnership between Metro Art with the Poetry Society of America in 1998, “Poetry in Motion/LA” places poetry posters on board Metro buses for the enjoyment of more than one million Metro Bus riders daily.

Czeslaw Milosz

Poet Czeslaw Milosz (1911-2004)

The latest poetry bus card is a gift, literally, from the Consulate General of the Republic of Poland in Los Angeles, commemorating the centennial of the birth of the great contemporary poet Czeslaw Milosz, a Nobel laureate (literature, 1980) and California resident whose professorship at UC Berkeley spanned 20 years.

It is in Berkeley where he was inspired to write “Gift,” the poem selected for the poetry card..

Consul General of Poland in Los Angeles Joanna Kozińska-Frybes, in recognition of Poland’s Presidency of the EU Council and in celebration of the 2011 Milosz Year,  unveiled a poster of the bus card inscribed with the poem at a public reception held Nov. 8 at the Central Library in downtown Los Angeles.

“Thanks to L.A. Metro and the Poetry Society of America, we have been able to achieve a great success and to bring Milosz closer to people in Los Angeles, all that in such wonderful ambiance of common undertaking,” the Consul General noted in her remarks at the reception.

Produced by Metro Creative Services, the poster is being installed this week in Metro buses for a two-month run. The poet’s centenary has inspired a global reflection and literary festival in more than 30 countries.

Here is Milosz, in his own words:

“Gift” by Czeslaw Milosz

A day so happy.
Fog lifted early, I worked in the garden.
Hummingbirds were stopping over honeysuckle flowers.
There was no thing on earth I wanted to possess.
I knew no one worth envying him.
Whatever evil I had suffered, I forgot.
To think that once I was the same man did not embarrass me.
In my body I felt no pain.
When straightening up, I saw the blue sea and sails.

Click here for the news release.

Donald Lipski’s artwork, Time Piece, to be a Landmark for new Metro Transit Hub

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Lipski's 30' high clock tower will be installed in the entry plaza of the El Monte Transit Center. Rendering by RNL Architects.
Lipski’s 30′ high clock tower will be installed in the entry plaza of the El Monte Transit Center. Rendering by RNL Architects.
Artist Donald Lipski

Artist Donald Lipski

Artist Donald Lipski, whose monumental works of art dot public environments throughout the United States, was chosen from a pool of 160 artists to create an iconic, landmark artwork for Metro’s new El Monte Transit Center  at the intersection of Santa Anita Avenue and Ramona Boulevard in El Monte.

The original transit center, built in the 1970s, has been the busiest bus station west of the Mississippi. The new center will more than double passenger and bus bay capacities, add bike storage and accommodate articulated buses. In addition to Metro bus service, the center will offer service for Greyhound, Foothill Transit and El Monte Transit passengers. Future residential and retail development will surround the Transit Center.

Lipski’s artwork, a modern-day clock tower, was inspired by visits to El Monte, and imagining the hustle and bustle at the new transit hub. “As the busiest bus station west of Chicago, and as a new hub of civic activity and development, the new terminal demanded something bold, memorable and dynamic,” Lipski said. “Having a vertical artwork as a focus will add immeasurably to creating a gathering place in the plaza.”

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Metro poster creates a buzz at Whittier Library’s conversation with the artist

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Whittier poster-signing with artist Jane Gillespie Pryor

Photos by Carl Greenlund

The Whittier Public Library was abuzz Thursday morning during a conversation between local artist Jane Gillespie Pryor and a roomful of residents, students, bee lovers and friends.

The event is the second in a series of “Artists in Conversation” events to be held in the local libraries of neighborhoods featured in the “Through the Eyes of Artists” poster series commissioned by Metro Creative Services.

Jane Gillespie Pryor's original artwork

Jane Gillespie Pryor's original artwork

Gillespie’s poster depicts a residential community of houses made of honeycomb and populated by bees. The poster pays homage to the city’s namesake, poet John Greenleaf Whittier, as well as the indigenous population who called the land Sejat, meaning “a place of the wild bees.”

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Art for the Orange Line: Artists discuss station designs

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Sam Erenberg shares his final artwork designs for Roscoe Station with the Metro Orange Line Extension Art Advisory Group.

Artists presented their final designs at a meeting of the Metro Orange Line Extension Art Advisory Group at the Chatsworth Branch Library a few days ago. The meeting marked the end of the design phase and the beginning of fabrication for station artwork along the four-mile busway extension between Canoga Park and the Chatsworth Metrolink station, a Measure R-funded project.

Convened in 2009, the Art Advisory Group is composed of volunteers who live or work in the project area, have a vested interest in the stations and surrounding neighborhoods, have an active interest in the arts and are involved in the community.

Art Advisory Group members view the artworks alongside samples of fabricated sections.

Over the course of many months, the group worked with Metro staff to compile a Community Profile – a document that provided the artists with an insider’s look into the neighborhoods along the Orange Line Extension. The document gathered the area’s history, demographics, natural environment, cultural resources, bicycle resources and film heritage and served as a point of departure for station artists as they began their concept designs.

The five artists were selected from a pool of over 150 who responded to the Call for Artists after workshops held at the Canoga Park Library and the California State University Northridge Art Gallery.

At the last Art Advisory Group meeting, the station artists spoke about their approaches to the projects and the ways in which Community Profile provided a foundation for the development of their concepts. Samples of fabricated sections of the artworks were on display, demonstrating how the artworks would be translated into durable materials appropriate for a transit environment.

Paving designs and art panels will be featured at every station on the Orange Line Extension. Pictured above are Margaret Lazzari's designs for Sherman Way Station.

When the station platforms are completed, each will house a double-sided, twenty-foot long porcelain enamel steel art panel and a twenty-seven foot long elliptical-shaped, glass mosaic artwork paving design.

There are more photos from the meetings after the jump. And more information about each of the artists and their designs is available on the Metro website:

Western Imaginary  by Ken Gonzales-Day for Canoga Station

Owensmouth/Canoga Park  by Margaret Lazzari for Sherman Way Station

Liquid Light: Flowing Into the Future  by Sam Erenberg for Roscoe Station

 Strati  by Anne Marie Karlsen for Nordhoff Station

 A Glimpse of Stoney Point Park  by Lisa Adams for Chatsworth Station

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Art videos return to Metro buses in October and November

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This June Metro riders were treated to a week of moving art thanks to the Out The Window project – a collaboration between Freewaves, Echo Park Film Center, Public Matters and UCLA REMAP.

The videos shown in June were produced by local high school students under the direction of professional artists. Starting tomorrow and continuing through the end of November, the professional artists steal the show with their own videos airing daily on Transit TV.

The work of 60 artists will be showcased – with a different video featured each day to millions of L.A. bus riders. The videos vary in style and content, but all tell stories and share insights about Los Angeles.

The project will also offer an interactive element. Bus riders will be invited to share feedback and answer questions presented in the videos via text message.

The videos are meant to be viewed on the bus (see the schedule here) but they can also be viewed online by visiting http://out-the-window.org/videos/.