Los Angeles-born-and-based artist Lauren Halsey has shown her immersive installations all over the world, from New York’s Met to the Serpentine in London to the Venice Biennale. But she began as a student at El Camino Community College in Torrance, California, dreaming of a new park for her neighborhood in South Central. It would be a space where children could come to both make art and learn about its origins, where weekend concerts could be held, and where people could gather for street fairs and cookouts.
Sixteen years later, Halsey’s vision is finally coming to fruition on the corner of Western Avenue and 76th Street. The artist has made a name for herself with vibrant, large-scale works that pair her distinct visual reference points—street tags, Egyptology, public signage—and her new, public sculpture park is the largest expression of that vision yet. “ I always knew very early on that I would present in my neighborhood,” says Halsey, when we speak about the opening. “I thought how cool it could be if I could open something and democratize all of it where you don’t have to pay to play.”
The park, titled sister dreamer, is an open square decorated with eight 22-foot-tall pillars reminiscent of ancient Egyptian monuments. Unlike those monuments, which bore the faces of kings, these are modeled after local heroes, including Robin Daniels, CEO of the community organization Sisters of Watts; Rosie Lee Hooks, director of the Watts Towers Arts Center Campus; and Margaret Prescod, founder of the Black Coalition Fighting Back Serial Murders. They’re flanked by a cluster of sphinxes, benches, fountains, native plants, and fruit and vegetable gardens, merging the monumental with the natural. The installation will remain up for the next 18 months until it finds a more permanent home.
Halsey’s new park will also serve as a physical hub for her nonprofit Summaeverythang Community Center. She’s got plenty of projects in the works. So many, in fact, that she runs out of breath trying to explain them all when we speak. Her public programming falls under three general pillars. There’s art, which includes partnering with the Broad to bring public school students to the park for classes, as well as collaborations with LA arts organizations and the estates of creatives like Sister Corita Kent.
There’s education, including drop-in tutoring and a class on architectural imagination. Finally, there’s wellness: yoga, community dinners with James Beard-nominees like Chef Alisa, and walking and running clubs. (Act fast; the first running club has already raked in more than 300 sign ups.) On top of all that, sister dreamer will also hold jazz nights and film screenings. First on the docket is Arthur Jafa’s Love Is the Message. For Halsey, this kind of more-is-more maximalism is the natural evolution of her practice, and of what she’s grown up seeing as a need in the community. The kicker? It’s free. All of it.
For a taste of what’s to come, Halsey is launching the project with a block party-on-steroids on March 14, headlined by the surviving members of Parliament-Funkadelic. Interested in seeing a crumping clown? One will be there. Looking for a drum line? Would it be an LA street fair without one? Double dutch, DJs, and a pop up skate park? Sure, why not? The space has come a long way since it was Halsey’s childhood ice cream shop, and she’s happy to help bring even more joy to the block. “The community always knew how to activate those spaces,” she says.
For now, Halsey says, the ambition is simple. Build something beautiful. Open the gates. See what happens next.
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