First of a five-part series exploring public art sculpture in the city of Santa Clarita.

In 2009 the Santa Clarita City Council demonstrated its commitment to public art when it founded the Santa Clarita Arts Commission.
In a further vote of commitment to the arts the Santa Clarita City Council approved the Arts Master Plan in 2016 which has become the Arts Commission’s guiding document to provide arts, entertainment and cultural development throughout the city.

As part of the plan the following vision statement was issued:

“The city of Santa Clarita will be recognized as a ‘city of the arts,’ where the lives of residents, artists and visitors are enriched through artistic and cultural experiences.”

The plan mandated that public art planning and selection utilize peer review and community input to ensure that public art pieces meet the goals of providing enjoyable and attractive public spaces that reflect the character of the community.

Susan Shapiro, a member of the Arts Commission, said the implementation of an Arts Master Plan was a milestone for the commission.

“The Master Plan made it possible to show the city’s commitment to public art,” she said. “In addition, the Arts Master Plan is an important way to show support for artists in the community.”

Focusing on Sculpture

This five-part series will mostly focus on public art sculptures which reside within the city limits of Santa Clarita. Some of the sculptures are located in city parks and others are located at a variety of city lands and facilities.

Public art sculpture in Santa Clarita includes 46 installations, some installations include more than one sculpture piece. Five are listed on the city of Santa Clarita Public Art Tour as temporary sculpture installations.

This series will explore a selection of public art sculptures with information about the art and how to find each sculpture. Some pieces will also be highlighted with Finding Art videos produced by SCVTV.

To see the full tour visit https://scpublicart.goodbarber.app/art-pieces/c/4.

The first article in this series will feature art found on maintenance hole covers in Canyon Country.

To learn more about the project, which features “the art beneath our feet,” view this video from SCVTV:
https://scvtv.com/2023/10/17/discover-the-art-beneath-our-feet-explore-the-stories-behind-the-c4-maintenance-hole-covers.

The city of Santa Clarita invited artists to submit designs for 10 maintenance hole covers centered around the overarching theme of water. Each iron cover is designed by a different artist and reflects their personal response to the theme.

You can find the 10 maintenance hole covers in the Mercado parking lot at the Canyon Country Community Center, 18410 Sierra Highway, Canyon Country, CA 91351.

Tentacles

18410 Sierra Highway,

Canyon Country, CA 91351

Artist: Julie Kitzes

Date: 2022

Type: Sculpture

Material: Iron

Placement: Maintenance Hole Cover in Mercado Parking Lot

Kitzes is an emerging illustrator and designer based out of Colorado. Her work is heavily inspired by nature and science, particularly all things animal.

Get to know maintenance hole cover artist Julie Kitzes in this video from SCVTV:

https://scvtv.com/2023/11/15/get-to-know-maintenance-hole-cover-artist-julie-kitzes/

Cloud 9

18410 Sierra Highway,

Canyon Country, CA 91351

Artist: Jesse Lindenfeld

Date: 2022

Type: Sculpture

Material: Iron

Placement: Mercado Parking Lot

Cloud 9 attempts to add an accessible visual language to manhole covers, representing not only the purpose of the drainage but also the context of the surrounding area.

“With characters inspired by the many mascots I saw while traveling in Japan, this piece is meant to be lighthearted and fun,” said Lindenfeld.

Cute and disarming characters smile with cartoon eyes and bubbly forms while their orientation changes across the cover. The bison represents the interesting activities within Santa Clarita and the clouds and octopi represent the stages of the watershed, beginning in the sky and ending in bodies of water.

Lindenfeld is an artist/designer from Indiana. His work explores digital culture, craft and subcultures within art and design.

Get to know maintenance hole cover artist Joe Scinto in this video from SCVTV:

https://scvtv.com/2023/11/07/get-to-know-maintenance-hole-cover-artist-jesse-lindenfeld/

Santa Clarita Slider

18410 Sierra Highway,

Canyon Country, CA 91351

Artist: Joe Scinto

Date: 2022

Type: Sculpture

Material: Iron

Placement: Maintenance Hole Cover in Mercado Parking Lot

Inspired by the local flora and fauna of Santa Clarita, the Red-Eared Slider Turtle was the inspiration for this maintenance hole cover design.

Scinto is a public artist, sculptor and high school art teacher living outside of New York City on Long Island. He has created several designs for vinyl banners and traffic box art installations throughout New York, Iowa, Connecticut and Colorado. Scinto is excited to add California to his list of states that provide a placement for his public art.

Get to know maintenance hole cover artist Joe Scinto in this video from SCVTV:

https://scvtv.com/2023/11/28/get-to-know-maintenance-hole-cover-artist-joseph-scinto/

H2O – Water is Life

18410 Sierra Highway,

Canyon Country, CA 91351

Artist: Kirk Seese

Date: 2022

Type: Sculpture

Material: Iron

Placement: Maintenance Hole Cover in Mercado Parking Lot

Seese is a lifetime visual artist, specializing in large scale murals and public sculpture nationwide.

Seese’s Artist statement: “Open love letter to public art: What I love about you, public art, is that you are meant for everyone. You require no entry fee, no cover charge or special invitation. Set free from the galleries, museums and private homes of the past. You’re out there, in the wild, unapologetic, yet vulnerable, and on display for everyone to see! You must be strong, durable, able to withstand all types of weather, public scrutiny and the test of time! You can be interactive, kinetic or stationary and come in so many forms; paint, stone, wood, glass, metal, digital, vinyl, plastic and everything in between! In all shapes and sizes. You invite discussion, and bring the world of visual arts to people’s everyday lives. For all these reasons and many more, I will adore you for the rest of my life! Hopelessly smitten, Kirk.”

Get to know maintenance hole cover artist Kirk Seese in this video from SCVTV:

https://scvtv.com/2023/10/17/get-to-know-maintenance-hole-cover-artist-kirk-seese/

Water One

18410 Sierra Highway,

Canyon Country, CA 91351

Artist: Rose Freeland

Date: 2022

Type: Sculpture

Material: Iron

Placement: Maintenance Hole Cover in Mercado Parking Lot

“The art was created with Adobe Illustrator for this specific project and is part of a collection of 10 works,” said Freeland.
A 1993 graduate of California Institute of the Arts with a Masters of Fine Arts, Freeland was inspired to participate in the project because of “my appreciation of the Santa Clarita, California region.”

Get to know maintenance hole cover artist Rose Freeland in this video from SCVTV:

https://scvtv.com/2023/10/24/get-to-know-maintenance-hole-cover-artist-rose-freeland/

Sunset Canyon

18410 Sierra Highway,

Canyon Country, CA 91351

Artist: Martin Kruck

Date: 2022

Type: Sculpture

Material: Iron

Placement: Maintenance Hole Cover in Mercado Parking Lot

“These images are inspired by a combination of regional natural landscape elements and aquatic/oceanic wildlife,” said Kruck in his artist’s statement.

Kruck’s work has been exhibited in solo, two-person and extensive group exhibitions nationally and internationally. He is the recipient of numerous grants and fellowships including the National Endowment for the Arts. He is currently a Professor of Art at New Jersey City University and lives and works outside of New York City.

Koi

18410 Sierra Highway,

Canyon Country, CA 91351

Artist: Martin Kruck

Date: 2022

Type: Sculpture

Material: Iron

Placement: Mercado Parking Lot

“The designs were created by using traditional woodcut/relief printmaking techniques and then scanned and translated to vector-based software in preparation for forming into the stamped relief maintenance covers,” said Kruck in his artist’s statement.

Hydro-Flora

18410 Sierra Highway,

Canyon Country, CA 91351

Artist: Amy Smith

Date: 2022

Type: Sculpture

Material: Iron

Placement: Mercado Parking Lot

Smith is a mixed media painter currently living and working in Virgina. Inspired by the work her mother and grandmother did in their gardens and around the home, her work speaks about the power of nature and nurture and the strength of the feminine.

Get to know maintenance hole cover artist Amy Smith in this video from SCVTV:

https://scvtv.com/2023/10/31/get-to-know-maintenance-hole-cover-artist-amy-smith/

Golden Dream

18410 Sierra Highway,

Canyon Country, CA 91351

Artist: Deborah Scheon

Date: 2022

Type: Sculpture

Material: Iron

Placement: Mercado Parking Lot

Artist’s statement: “My design was inspired by Santa Clarita’s Oak of the Golden Dream, which is one of the oldest oak trees in Southern California and located just nine minutes from the Canyon Country Community Center. For those not familiar with its legendary story, it goes something like this:

In 1842, a traveling mineralogist stopped in Placerita Canyon to take a nap under the shade of an oak tree. During his nap, Francisco Lopez dreamt he was floating in a river of pure gold. When he awoke – famished, he crossed the river and dug up some wild onions. It was then Lopez discovered gold nuggets attached to the roots of the onions. Some believe this is one of the earliest documented discoveries of gold in California.

Golden Dream (river, oak leaves, wild onions and gold) features a speedy landscape of an energetic river tossing wild onions, oak leaves and alchemy-inspired medallions of gold, all of which embrace the essence, energy and spirit of Santa Clarita’s history. This wood block-style design was inspired by Japanese artist Hokusai’s The Great Wave off Kanagawa.”

Scheon is an interdisciplinary artist who utilizes sculpture, design, textiles, photography, video and interactive installations to support her research-based practice.

Queen Clarita

18410 Sierra Highway,

Canyon Country, CA 91351

Artist: Katrina Alexy

Date: 2022

Type: Sculpture

Material: Iron

Placement: Mercado Parking Lot

“My design highlights the importance water played in the geological formation of Santa Clarita now and when native cultures thrived on the land,” said Alexy in her artist’s statement. “This design is a tribute to the ‘royalty’ of the land which is the water, the earth and the wildlife of the Santa Clarita Valley.”

Alexy was born and raised in Los Angeles where she has been creating public art related to the environment for over 25 years. She has received grants from the state of California, the city of Los Angeles, the Ahmanson Foundation and several commissions to create art using materials that have been diverted from landfills.

Get to know maintenance hole cover artist Katrina Alexy in this video from SCVTV:

https://scvtv.com/2023/11/21/get-to-know-maintenance-hole-cover-artist-katrina-alexy/