Located in the south wing of the main hospital, the new Psychiatric Emergency Service provides dedicated support facilities for adolescent patients ranging in age from 12 to 19 years old. Susan Logoreci’s three original drawings are part of a growing collection of commissioned artworks for the facility, as the prominence of art in the healing environment has been an important feature at the Harbor-UCLA Medical Center.

Inspired by a visit to the existing psychiatric wards at Harbor UCLA Hospital, artist Susan Logoreci installed three, large scale, colored pencil drawings of recognizable South Los Angeles County areas to simulate windows into distant views. For the benefit of the patients and hospital staff, the highly detailed drawings are colorful and cheerful, as they depict the Los Angeles Downtown Skyline as seen from the hospital, the Vincent Thomas Bridge and the Manhattan Beach Pier. Conjuring up fun and relaxing associations, these original drawings in plexiglass frames have been installed in the vestibule, triage consultation and multipurpose rooms of the new psychiatric emergency expansion project. In addition to the three frames artworks, Susan Logoreci designed a paint scheme for the entryway using sunny colors inspired by the palette used in the drawings. 

Susan Logoreci received an MFA in painting from California State University Long Beach in 2003, and a BFA from San Francisco Art Institute nine years earlier. Each of her pencil drawings starts with a collage, made of low-resolution images from various sources. Viewed under a loop, each of these collages becomes a miniature universe, she says. In the resulting pencil drawings, Logoreci incorporating figurative elements of the collage as well as embracing its technical surprises, such as lines and smears generated by the poor image-quality or printing. Her work has been exhibited in solo shows in California and group shows across the United States.