Today's mosiac is at the Blue Line's Artesia station on Acacia Blvd. in Compton.
Artist Lynn Aldrich installed "Blue Line Oasis" in 1996, and besides the mosaics, the artwork includes etched concrete and posts with ceramic tile messages from the community.
Why water images in Compton?
"The area is well-known for its artesian wells, a well that reaches surface through it's own pressure," said Aldrich, who often uses water in her artwork as a metaphor for life and energy. "I thought that was an appropriate metaphor for urban experience and our constant striving for renewal."
Artesian wells...Artesia. Nice.This post from the SubwayNut has many more pictures, though they are of the station and tracks, not of the artwork.
There's even a Pinterest page for Blue Line Oasis. Pinterest . . . (Downton Abbey fans, remember when the Dowager Countess sat on a chair with rollers (in 1920) and nearly screamed when the chair moved? And when she was told the chair was from America she said, "Why is it that everyday involves a fight with an American?" I know how she felt. Why is it that everyday involves a new social media platform that must be investigated lest I be labeled obsolete?)
OK, I digressed. I'm done.
Lynn Aldrich's own website has pictures of mosaic and sculpture, all of it bright and full of movement, and pipe-y. The Los Angeles African American Museum is featuring her work "Go Tell It On the Mountain" through April. Aldrich matriculated (love that word) at the Art Center for Design in Pasadena. Currently, she teaches at Azusa Pacific University.
To the left is the wishing well feature and a close up of the well, with coins. But not real coins--these are part of the artwork.
These pictures come from the Public Art in LA site, except for the last one that shows the wishing well at the entrance to the station. That accompanied an article in Aqueduct Magazine, December 2001.
"Blue Line Oasis" won a Liquid Art Award from the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.
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