Artwork Detail

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Bridge Railing

Artist: Price, Al

Object Date: 2012

Medium: Powdercoated steel

Imperial Dims: Overall: 39 x 1320 x 5 in.

Department(s): Parks and Recreation

Address Name: 4th Avenue Park

Supervisorial District: 1

About the Artwork:

Sculptor Al Price found inspiration in the local history of La Puente. According to legend, Don Gaspar de Portola arrived in the area in 1769 and named the region “Llana de la Puente” meaning “Plain of the Bridge,” after making a bridge of poles so his party could cross San Jose Creek. The custom artwork functions as a bridge railing that incorporates shapes and forms indigenous to Avocado Heights. The railing’s repeating moiré effect suggests a sequence of floating horse hooves, indicative of the active equestrian community in the area. Al Prices' sculptural bridge railing is a composition that changes relative to viewing angle. Viewed head on, the rods are as vertical and as straight as pinstripes, but in the periphery of these vertical lines the composition changes quickly to diagonal lines of increasingly oblique angles that generate fascinating matrices of shapes and patterns. Visually, the sculptural railing appears to twist and turn as pedestrians walk across the bridge deck. The look of the bridge will evolve as light and shadow change over the course of the day.

About the Artist:

Al Price has a history of making art that conveys a sense of motion: floating, ascending, and expanding. He employs linear compositions that merge the elegant and simple with the vigorous and dynamic. The artist’s large steel sculptures are activated by the moving viewer whose perspective of the structure and the shadows it casts changes constantly. Price has recently completed projects for the KFC Yum Center in Kentucky, Target Field in Minnesota, and the award-winning Kyrene Monte Vista Pedestrian Bridge in Arizona.