Chris Burden

The photo shows me walking at sunset on the hillside above my studio. I have installed the sculpture Urban Light around two sides of my studio. Urban Light is an artwork that I created by amassing a huge collection of 1920s cast-iron streetlamps from Los Angeles and its many adjacent cities.

By placing 170 antique lamps close together in long colonnades, I have usurped the streetlamp's function. Together they form a sculpture. The viewer's experience of traversing these fluted columns is an exalted one that recalls the marvel of walking through classical Greek and Roman architecture or a European cathedral. The feelings of recollection and wonder transform the streetlamps into the sculpture, Urban Light.