Kinetic Flow, 2006
Los Angeles MetroRail Vermont/Santa Monica Station Entrance
Porcelain enamel on steel, 20 panels, 18' x 24' total area


A visualization for a leaning 18' x 24' concrete wall above a staircase and escalator unit at the entrance of the Vermont/Santa Monica subway station. The design concept derived from the kinetic experience of the downward movement on both escalator and staircase, one smooth, the other sequential. The abstract visual rendition uses statistical data sampled from LA metro traffic circulation to seed the image generating equation.

The design evolved from a set of conditions addressing the site-specificity of the installation which is situated adjacent to the Los Angeles City College campus. A Science & Technology building is to be built in close proximity to the entrance within the next few years. The tilted concrete wall above the escalator and staircase conveys a dramatic presence and is suggestive of kinetic and cinematic motion. The experience of movement down the stairs is a reminder of the 19th Century scientist Jules-Etienne Marey's photographic recordings of movement experiments that eventually influenced Duchamp and the Futurists. Some of the design metaphors that came to mind include descriptions such as kinetic, downwards dynamic flow, vibrations, energy, electronic, etc. resulting in modulated sinewaves generating visualization to signify movement.

Los Angeles Metro Rail Commission Proposal

This project was realized as part of a series that explored frequency modulation, a technique used extensively in electronic music composition, where frequencies from one sinewave modulated another sinewave at a different frquency.

A related artwork realized at the time includes The Ising Model consisting of a 2D matrix of cells that set their values based on their neighbor's assigned values according to a mathematical model of how magnetic particles behave under different conditions.