Artwork Detail

East LA Landscape

Artist: Montana, Star

Date: 2021

Medium: Photographic print on porcelain tile

Artwork Dimensions: 240 x 360 x 0 1/2 in.

County Department: Health Services

Artwork Site: Los Angeles General Medical Center Restorative Care Village

Supervisorial District: 1

Location Status: Permanent

About the Artwork:

The Los Angeles General Medical Center is home to one of the country’s first four Restorative Care Villages (RCVs), which will provide a new model of holistic care for people experiencing homelessness. These LA County Restorative Care Villages will provide a new kind of environment for this vulnerable population, one with a comprehensive, holistic approach to the interrelated and complex needs of homelessness, substance abuse, mental illness, job training/housing, and medical co-morbidity. Accompanying the completion of the Los Angeles General Medical Center RCV, The Civic Art team is pleased to present four new ceramic tiled murals on the facades of the new facilities by local artists, Lorenzo Hurtado Segovia, Jaime Scholnick, Patrick Martinez, and Star Montana. 

Artist Star Montana was commissioned to design a ceramic tile mural for the Crisis Recuperative Care Center. A Boyle Heights native, Star Montana grew up visiting the neighborhood's hilltops where people in the community go to escape, meditate, or watch the sunset. East LA Landscape is a photograph of the hilltop views that Montana had tried to create for many years; in 2015, Montana was finally able to capture this layered, scenic image on film from the top of the City Terrace/East Los Angeles area. For the LAC + USC Restorative Care Village mural, Montana chose to digitize the photograph of this special moment to create an almost life-size artwork that represents the Boyle Heights community and beyond.

About the Artist:

Star Montana is a photo-based artist who lives and works in Los Angeles, CA. She was born and raised in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of East Los Angeles, which is predominantly Mexican American and serves as the backdrop to much of her work. Her work has been shown in museums and galleries such as the Vincent Price Art Museum, The Main Museum, ArtCenter, internationally in Brazil, Ecuador, and Mexico, and in the L.A. Metro Vermont/Beverly station from 2014-2016. She has also been featured in articles in Aperture and Hyperallergic. To learn more, visit: https://starmontana.net/