Triforium (Los Angeles)

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The Triforium

The Triforium is the name of a six story 60 ton public sculpture in the Los Angeles Mall Civic Center complex, located at the intersection of Temple and Main Streets in Downtown Los Angeles. The Mall's architect Robert Stockwell commissioned artist Joseph Young to create the sculpture and it was installed in 1975. Young's original plans called for the piece to be a Kinetic sculpture, which would use motion sensors and a computer controlled system to detect and translate the motions of passerby into patterns of light and sound displayed by the prisms and carillon. Young predicted that his artwork would eventually become know as "the Rosetta Stone of art and technology" and bragged that it was the world's first "polyphonoptic" tower. He also said that the Triforium was a tribute to the unfinished, kaleidoscopic nature of Los Angeles. In the original concept, Young intended for the sculpture to project laser beams into space, which would have made it the world's first astronomical beacon. Budgetary restrictions, however, curtailed this design element. The initial cost of the sculpture was $925,000 and it was dedicated on December 12, 1975 although an electrical snafu delayed the musical portion's debut.

The Triforium incorporates three two-legged concrete pillars, each supporting a bank of multicolored glass prisms (1,494 in all), as well as a Gerhard Finkenbeiner electronic 79 note glass bell carillon with two octaves of English bells, and two octaves of Flemish bells [1], which were synchronized to lighting effects contained within the glass prisms. Meant to play "everything from Beethoven to the Bee Gees" [2], the carillon was operated manually, or by computer. The primitive computer originally installed in the structure to synchronize the lights and music was plagued with problems.

Unveiled with much fanfare at the opening of the Los Angeles Mall, the Triforium subsequently fell into disrepair and became the object of ridicule [3]. Legend has it that a judge in the federal courthouse across the street claimed that the noise from the sculpture's sound system interfered with his trials and asked city officials to shut it down. Over the years, the sculpture suffered from a leaking reflection pool located at its base and pigeons often roosted in the structure. Reputed to be "too expensive to fix, but too expensive to tear down" [4], the sculpture still stands. In 2002 Joseph Young reflected on the state of disrepair that the sculpture had fallen into. "At times it was very lonely." he said. "When you do something that affects public tastes, you have to be armed to face the extremes of behavior."

Finally, after decades of inoperation, the carillon bells and lighting effects were restored and reactivated on December 13, 2006 [5] following a $7,500 refurbishing. The sound synchronization computer was still due to be replaced when the lights and sound were turned back on.

A December 14, 2006 Los Angeles Times article [6] mentioned several nicknames that the sculpture has acquired over its lifetime: