The Written Word is Tom Van Sant’s public art treatment for three concrete facades of the Public Library. His concrete cast treatments are on exterior stairwell column facing Manchester; the lower level of an interior lobby; and an exterior wall of the Gladys Waddingham Lecture Hall.

Van Sant explores written expressions of numbers, letters, theories, and histories from global cultures including Egyptian hieroglyphics, Polynesian counting systems, European cave painting, and mathematical equations. The Written Word required special reversed concrete molds a technique requiring a high degree of craft. This poured-in-place concrete bas-relief is one of the largest in the world.

Tom Van Sant is a sculptor, painter, and conceptual artist with major sculpture and mural commissions for public spaces around the world. His art is collected globally. His professional skills and interests include architecture, planning, education, and advanced technical invention.

Van Sant was a fellow with the MIT Institute for Advanced Visual Studies and founder of the GeoSphere Project, the environmental display system for Earth’s resource management. He has received numerous national awards for his work in art, architecture, astronomy, and kite making. A polymath who earned his BA from Stanford University and his MFA from Otis College of Art and Design, Van Sant was born in 1931. He resides in the Pacific Palisades.

Date: 1972
Collection: City of Inglewood Permanent Public Art Projects
Medium: Bas-Relief Public Art Treatment
Material: Poured-in-place concrete
Size: Architectural scale in three sites

Location:
Inglewood Public Library
101 West Manchester Boulevard
Inglewood, California 90301

Tom Van Sant on The Written Word