La Tierra de la Culebra,Highland Park
Los Angeles/Highland Park, CA
About
240 S Ave 57, Los Angeles/Highland Park, CA, US
Get directions
* (323) 257-108
Bio: Consider ourselves a DIY sort of venue, all ages. Outdoor park & Coffee House (Ghetto Grounds)... Mission: Art . . . Community . . . Land . . . Activism! (ACLA, formerly ARTScorpsLA) is a public art and land collective committed to working with youth in under-served Los Angeles neighborhoods to transform fallow urban land into dynamic, community directed ArtParks. As a daily presence in our neighborhoods and the lives of participating youth and families, ACLA ArtParks are able to grow programming that is responsive to the immediate and specific challenges of a community while at the same time addressing itself to the holistic needs of individuals. History: Developed in 1992 in the Northeast district of Los Angeles by artist Tricia Ward under the auspices of ReWing LA, ACLA’s first ArtPark, La Tierra de la Culebra, was initiated as a response to the civil unrest and violence following the Rodney King police trial. Ward selected a derelict parcel of land used for drug trafficking and prostitution, conducted local outreach, and mobilized a group of 35 neighborhood youth volunteers to clear the one-acre site of trash and weeds. In a series of initial neighborhood council meetings organized by Ward, community members described a sense of disenfranchisement and frustration underlying the riots in their neighborhood, and together they imagined into reality the ArtPark's central symbol of strength and regeneration: a 450-foot sculptural serpent constructed from stone, rubble, and piqué tiles found on site. The piece winds through the ground's three levels to connect open spaces, terraced patios furnished with mosaic benches, a large mural garden, and numerous landscaped beds of indigenous plants and flowers. The effect was immediate and powerful, together community members transformed the site from a symptom of blight and neglect into piece of living art, a site of cultural and civic activity whose impact on the neighborhood remains seventeen years later.
