Forney got a rooftop view of the completed panels for Walking Fingers (Images: Ellen Forney with permission to CHS)
With Capitol Hill Station fully on track for a March 2016 opening, it’s time to install the art.
Or, the rest of it.
The massive, hot pink Jet Kiss sculpture featuring the deconstructed hulls of two A-4 fighters was hung during construction of the Broadway light rail station’s underground platform.
“The top design is ‘Walking Fingers,’ a 28′ x 20′ mural for the Sound Transit Capitol Hill Light Rail Station’s west entry (near Seattle Central Community College).
The bottom design is ‘Crossed Pinkies,’ a 40′ x 10′ mural for the light rail station’s north entry (the corner of Broadway and John).”
Workers will soon begin installing two giant, paneled murals by local artist Ellen Forney. The panels for the works are still being finished but the walls are up and ready for installation. Forney agreed to let CHS share some behind the scenes looks at the final work.
The ground coat is applied at KVO, the shop in California fabricating the porcelain enamel on steel panels. “It’s a medium I wasn’t familiar with before this job, is extremely durable, the colors are saturated, and the lines are crisp (just like I like ’em). It reminds me of the silkscreened rock posters I used to design, and how much I liked the effect,” Forney writes.
CHS talked to Forney about Walking Fingers and Crossed Pinkies late last year. Now, after getting the gig way back in 2008, Forney is finally seeing just how large scale her first public art will be.
“Working on this scale is very new to me and has me thinking a lot about the effect of size on the feel and meaning of a piece,” she wrote about the project last week. “I’m so curious what these will be like when they’re hung up there for real.”
UPDATE 11/16/2015: Forney reports that installation has begun:
(Image: Ellen Forney)
