The Hollywood Sign must need a nap. In just the last few months it's been fake-vandalized by Ke$ha, covered up with a series of weird phrases by the Trust for Public Land, reminded of its ugly teen years by The Runaways, and had New Zealand try to bite its style. And now it's going on a road trip. Local architecture firm INABA, with Darien Williams, has created "HLWYD," "a hypothetical proposal for the migratory distribution of the Hollywood sign across Los Angeles."
The artists say that "The Hollywood sign has not only exceeded its purpose [as an advertisement for a real estate development], it has also exceeded its site. Aside from elevation, there are few aspects of the sign’s immediate environs upon which its effectiveness depends. With televised and other media exposure, the sign’s public visibility is not necessarily a factor of its physical visibility within the landscape. It could also be said that the site has exceeded the sign, in that the real estate value of the surrounding Hollywood Hills is independently viable and relies little on the permanent presence of the big white letters. If the Hollywood sign already functions without a site (and the site without it), why limit it to a fixed location?" So they've taken its letters out for a spin. The photographs will be on display at the Pacific Design Center starting March 25, as part of Superfront LA's UNPLANNED: Research and Experiments at the Urban Scale.
· UNPLANNED: Research and Experiments at the Urban Scale opens March 25th 5pm [Superfront LA]
· Hollywood Sign Archives [Curbed LA]
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