Public Art
Malibu Legacy Park
This public park in Malibu, California, opened in early October 2010. It features 17 acres of rolling hills covered in native grasses and a state-of-the-art water reclamation system to clean and recycle water. Along the pedestrian and bike paths are large mosaic sculptures of California animals, eight sculptures in all.
At the north entrance to the park, three of the animals are clustered together in the Children's Interpretive Area. Here you'll find the bright red, black and white striped Mountain Kingsnake, the orange-bellied California Newt and the Red-Legged Frog. Keep walking, and you'll stumble upon the Coyote, Western Toad and Red-Tailed Hawk. Near the south entrance you'll find the Burrow Owl with his large yellow eyes and the Western Fence Lizard, also known as the Bluebelly.
It took me a year from start to finish to complete this project, but much of that was back and forth negotiations with engineers and making the tiles by hand. The actual laying of the tiles and grouting the animals took about four months.
At home, I made the thousands of handmade tiles that I designed specifically for these animals and I carved many new tile stamps out of clay and bisque fired them. The swirls, feathers, paisleys and snowflake oval tiles feature my hand-carved stamps. The kiln was running every other day, full to the brim!
I worked with friend and fellow tile afficionado, Sarah Campbell, from mid-May to mid-September tiling these big beautiful beasts at Universal Precast in Redding, where they were fabricated. This is the closest I've come to achieving what I believe is my true calling: Great big mosaics!