The big Mar Vista street art skirmish took place shortly after 8 a.m. Tuesday.
Neighbors who love the whimsical metal sculptures that artist Lori Powers has been discreetly attaching to utility poles since 2017 clashed with hard-hatted Los Angeles Department of Water and Power workers unscrewing one of her signature pieces.
For the record:
5:01 p.m., August 14, 2024An earlier version of this article misspelled Los Angeles City Councilwoman Traci Park’s name. It was Park, not Parks.
No one on either side seemed happy.
Opinion columnist
Robin Abcarian
“We have to chain our bodies to the posts,” Powers, 67, told the two dozen residents who had gathered outside his house before several gleaming white DWP trucks pulled up a block away.
“I swear to God I will,” said Scott Baldyga, 55, a novelist and screenwriter who has lived in the neighborhood for 13 years. The sculptures, he said, many of which entertain travelers on Palms Boulevard between Walgrove and Beethoven avenues, give the neighborhood a sense of “home.”
Paul Von Blum, a retired UCLA professor and neighbor of the victim who has written and taught about Powers’ art, addressed the DWP workers who had begun dismantling one of the works. “Why are you doing this?” he asked indignantly. “Are you just following orders?”
They didn’t respond, but their supervisor, Dan Grout, politely asked Von Blum to step away from the truck.
Lori Powers and one of her sculptures in the backyard of her Mar Vista home.
(Michael Owen Baker / For The Times)
The neighbours had been informed last week that the artwork, which another neighbour had complained about (no one, including the DWP, could tell me), was going to be removed. In response, Powers’ fans launched a social media and email campaign to save the artwork.
But Powers and his allies, including former Los Angeles City Councilwoman Ruth Galanter, had been led to believe that the DWP had granted them a reprieve, pending the return this week of the district’s current City Councilwoman, Traci Park, from Paris for the Olympics.
Grout, however, told me he was unaware of any change of plans. And, as he understandably implied, he was dreading the assignment. “Last weekend, I was thinking, ‘This job is going to be fun,’” he said somberly.
A few minutes later, after a phone call or two, Grout told his crews to “finish up,” and soon the men in hard hats and their shiny white trucks were gone.
Of the 28 sculptures, all but two have been spared. At least for now.
A few hours after everyone had moved away, I returned to the intersection of Rosewood Avenue and Marco Place.
Powers had just finished reinstalling “Beam Love,” one of the artworks the DWP had removed.
“Beam Love” is made from a toolbox attached to a small fire extinguisher. It features large eyes fashioned from a Coleman camp stove grate with eyelashes salvaged from a neighbor’s leftover artificial turf. Flat glass beads on the “body” of the extinguisher sparkled in the sunlight. Each of Powers’ pieces contains a gold sports medallion, usually disguised, in homage to her years playing for a prize-winning three-on-three senior girls basketball team. “That’s my signature,” she said.
Her whimsical creations, some of which bear heartwarming messages like “Be yourself,” are welded together from all sorts of scrap materials, painted brightly and securely attached to utility poles with bolts and four-inch chains. She says she inspects them weekly, repaints them and repairs them as needed.
She started making them after retiring from her career as an IT consultant and realizing she needed a hobby. She took up soldering and her whimsical creations quickly evolved.
I was alerted to the turmoil last week when Galanter emailed me. She represented this ward for all 16 of her years on the city council and has little patience for stubborn bureaucracy. She contacted Park’s office and was informed by one of the councilman’s staff that an anonymous DWP official had outlined the department’s unwavering position in an email that Galanter forwarded to me:
“The attachments are illegal,” the DWP said in a vaguely threatening email. “We have chosen not to pursue criminal/civil action this time. We are simply removing the items as quickly as possible to mitigate the obvious and present safety risks to utility workers who need to access the pole, and to mitigate the damage they have caused to the pole by illegally climbing the pole and illegally attaching items to it. We are not making any statements about this. We are not meeting with constituents about this. We are not responsible for any damage or destruction of the illegal items.”
I could practically hear Galanter stuttering.
“There’s no doubt that art on poles is illegal,” she told me. “So what? There’s a process to make it legal. And if anyone cared, they would.” I’m not sure there is such a process. East a real process, but I understand his point: Angelenos need to remember that they can push the city in the direction they prefer.
Mar Vista neighbors came together to support the art and the artist on Tuesday.
(Michael Owen Baker / For The Times)
As an example, Galanter reminded me that during her tenure, the city planned to demolish the storm-damaged Venice Pier, until Galanter, the Coastal Conservancy and her constituents fought to save it. The pier’s reconstruction helped revitalize the shops and restaurants near what is now Washington Square. And that city engineers once refused to install a stop sign on Rose Avenue in front of the Venice Family Clinic because there wasn’t enough traffic, until she pointed out that the issue was pedestrian safety.
On Tuesday afternoon, DWP communications director Elena Stern struck a more moderate tone but said the department was firmly committed to removing Powers’s pieces. The state Public Utilities Commission sets the rules, she said, and prohibits foreign objects on poles.
“We want to find a solution that is beneficial for everyone,” Stern said, although it’s unclear what that would entail — perhaps moving the sculptures to a more appropriate public space. “We have to be respectful, we’re willing to think and listen to the community.”
Whatever happens, at least Powers knows that his neighbors – well, most of them – are big fans.
“I’ve received so much love and support,” Powers said, “I probably won’t need to go to therapy this week.”
@robinkabcarian
