Making Waves: Student Art Showcase

Description: Like blood, the LA River flows through the heart of the Southern California metropolis I call home, bringing refuge to waterbirds, migrating fish, and native plants displaced from the wetland regions now carpeted in asphalt and sprawled by urbanites. This relic of biodiversity is on the verge of clotting from invasion of nonnative species, overflow of polluted runoff from the cities flanking it, and mismanagement in the face of California’s everlasting drought.

Los Angeles’ natural wetlands used to capture, clean, and store rainfall, replacing what used to keep our lands fertile and quenched with centers of materialism and excessive wealth. Efforts to restore the LA River are the first step toward bringing back the biodiversity and lifeblood our city was built upon.

This piece’s centerpiece and namesake, the common carp, is one of said invasive species that have carved their way as artificially into this river as the city surrounding it, along with the feathers of a seagull, a magazine clipping of dogs, and a human’s handprint that border the piece, as marks these animals have made on our environment.  However, human waste and pollution do not discriminate as remnants of consumption are scattered about them all.

This piece was created from recycled materials–the canvas picked up off the side of DP after summer move-out, adorned with clippings from magazines, an old shoe box, and a dried bouquet.