UPDATE, OCTOBER 4, 2021: We are excited to announce this publication received a Grand Award in the American Public Transportation Agency’s (APTA) 2021 AdWheel for Best Marketing and Communications Educational Initiative.
In honor of National Construction Appreciation Week (Sept. 13 – 17), we’re spotlighting Metro Art’s exhibit Deep Connections by Ken Karagozian, which commemorates Metro Rail construction over several decades.
Exhibition views of Ken Karagozian’s artwork in the Union Station Passageway. Documentation of the exhibit by Stephen Nilsson and Jennifer Cheung.
Twelve large-scale, black and white images are currently on view in the Union Station Passageway Art Gallery.
Karagozian’s intimate photographs chronicle a unique view of Los Angeles through the documentation of Metro subway construction over the last three decades. His dramatic images balance the humanity of the workers, the enormity of the machinery and the intricacy of the jobs in the complex underground of the Metro system.
The photographs range from 1990s-era B Line (Red) underground construction through to recent documentation of the Purple (D Line) Extension and Regional Connector transit projects.
This exhibit is just a small selection of this otherworldly passion project by photographer Ken Karagozian. It demonstrates how artists bring a unique perspective to construction history as well as enlivens the public space of transit.
Catch the exhibit in Union Station’s Passageway Art Gallery soon before it closes! It can also be viewed in an online gallery on the Metro Art website.
An award-winning, 62-page catalog, designed and produced in-house, accompanies the exhibition. This publication dives deeper into the history and individual portraits of the workers who built Metro over the years. You can download a copy of the publication here.
The artist signs a limited selection of catalogs at Metro Headquarters.
Ken Karagozian has been documenting Los Angeles transit project construction since the 1990s.
Using medium-format black and white film, Karagozian portrays the constructed world. With subjects ranging from swap meet vendors to subway construction workers to leather-clad motorcyclists, Karagozian celebrates local subcultures through portraiture.
Karagozian’s photography has been widely exhibited locally and nationally, has been featured in LIFE Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, Pasadena Magazine and on television, and his award-winning work is the collections of the Huntington Library, the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority and private collectors. His work documenting Regional Connector construction was also the subject of an exhibition at the Los Angeles Public Library in 2017. A life long Angeleno, Karagozian lives and works in Agoura Hills, California.
Ken Karagozian self-portrait under the Hollywood Hills during Metro B Line (Red) construction in 1995.
Deep Connections has been featured in Hyperallergic, DTLA news, Spectrum News 1, APTA’s Passenger Transport, Hasselblad Magazine, Tunnel Business Magazine and Building Trades News. The exhibition publication also received a 2021 American Public Transportation Association award.
Click here for more information about Metro’s art program. Follow Metro Art on Facebook and Instagram, and sign up for emails directly from Metro Art.
Categories: Metro Art
Thank you for putting the photos in this exhibit on the internet. The COVID-19 disease pandemic makes it difficult for many persons to view the photos in person, at Union Station.