Los Angeles Opens Its Heart of Compassion is located at the busy intersection of Wilshire Boulevard and Vermont Avenue at the heart of Koreatown in Los Angeles, California. The suspended sculpture is comprised of a 75 foot long x 45 foot tall diaphanous, undulating metallic screen behind a 20 foot tall three-dimensional sculpture made of 100 petal-like abstractions of a lotus flower made of laser cut aluminum. The sculpture is bathed in an intense white light while the screen and its corresponding line drawing move through a light show of rich changing colors. The swells of color captured by the curving screen deepen in relation to the amount of natural daylight. The abstraction of the lotus blossom, a recurrent theme in Korean art references the unique history of the Koreatown neighborhood and articulates the image transformed in contemporary materials and light. The motif of the lotus is carried through the plaza in etched glass panels that line the public staircase leading from the plaza to the second-floor balcony overlooking Wilshire Boulevard, a central thoroughfare of Los Angeles. The sculpture covers the floors 2-6 of the parking structure situated between the two towers of The Vermont, a mixed-use development featuring retail and residential space. The two residential towers, 23 stories, and 29 stories, and their 464 units are joined by the illuminated sculpture, Los Angeles Opens Its Heart of Compassion.
