An Intersection of Glory in Los Angeles

The Los Angeles based Ball-Nogues Studio is led by Benjamin Ball and Gaston Nogues, and they focus on design that integrates architecture, industrial design and art usually resulting in large public artworks that truly enhance and add a distinct, contemporary aesthetic value and dimension to public places.

Their latest artwork is called, Corner Glory, and is at the intersection of La Brea Avenue and Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood. Corner Glory is a mirror polished stainless steel shape with spikes that create a “blurred distinction between surface and background and give the impression of an immaterial presence emanating from the corner.”

Their inspiration for the public artwork is from the symbols we associate with glory and holiness. Those radiating blades of holy light on religious deities, Ball-Nogues associates in Corner Glory with the deity-like appreciation our culture places on celebrities, particularly in the land of Los Angeles, CA.

From their website:

In historical paintings of religious subjects, artists traditionally represented the spiritual status of gods, kings, and saints by surrounding the body of these holy figures with a luminous formation suggestive of radiating shafts of light. Variously referred to as the aureole, nimbus, or glory, notions of this motif have been in the vernacular since before Christianity and continue to have meaning in cultures throughout the world.