City of West Hollywood Announces Temporary Art Installation in Celebration of Route 66 Centennial: ‘Open Road’ by Luciana Abait

The City of West Hollywood announces the installation of Open Road, a temporary public artwork by Luciana Abait, installed in celebration of the Route 66 Centennial. The artwork has been commissioned as part of the City's Creative Plan and will remain on view through November 2026. Photos of the installation can be found on the City's official Flickr page.

This installation is the first of several ways the City of West Hollywood will celebrate the Route 66 Centennial in the coming months, including temporary art on select street poles along Santa Monica Boulevard, a temporary sculpture in Plummer Park, new WeHo Route 66 signs, and a classic car show.

Luciana Abait's Open Road embodies the City's Creative Plan Theme "Inventing Traditions" by reimagining the enduring legacy of the American road trip through a contemporary artistic lens. Drawing from her personal photographic archives and enhancing them with digital animation processes, Abait transforms familiar western landscapes into a vibrant, futuristic panorama that both honors and reinvents the iconography of United States Route 66.

As the nation approaches the Route 66 Centennial, a celebration of freedom, exploration, and the open highway, Open Road bridges past and present, stitching together a speculative vista that captures the exhilaration of moving fast, slowing down, and pausing in wonder. By merging pointillistic textures with sharp-focus details across an 80-foot storefront installation, the artwork invents a new visual tradition that connects historic travel narratives with the imaginative possibilities of today's creative technologies. Positioned at the City-owned building located at 8315 Santa Monica Boulevard, Abait's work invites passersby to engage with the cultural mythos of the open road while redefining it for a new generation.

Luciana Abait, born in Buenos Aires and based in Los Angeles, creates multimedia works addressing climate change, environmental fragility, and their effects on immigration. Her work has been exhibited internationally in galleries, museums, and art fairs, with solo shows including On the Verge at Hilliard Art Museum, Escape-Route at Laguna Art Museum, A Letter to the Future at LAX, and Nest at Lehigh University, among others. She has also completed major public and corporate commissions, such as the 24-foot mural Vistas for Miami-Dade Art in Public Places and Hong Kong Windows for Swire Properties.

This installation is part of West Hollywood's Bronze Silver Gold Creative Plan (Creative Plan) which outlines an authentic and bespoke vision for citywide cultural programming that centers artistic excellence and community engagement. The intent of the Creative Plan is to create immersive experience-cultural activity everywhere, all the time, and center the City of West Hollywood as a cultural hub during the three years leading up to and during the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games. Whenever a resident leaves their home, or a visitor steps outside their hotel, they will experience something unexpected. For additional information about the Creative Plan and related arts programming, please visit https://www.weho.org/community/arts-and-culture/creative-plan.

The City of West Hollywood's Arts Division delivers a broad array of arts programs including Art on the Outside (temporary public art), Arts Grants, City Poet Laureate, Drag Laureate, Free Theatre in the Parks, Library Exhibits, Summer Sounds + Winter Sounds, Urban Art (permanent public art), WeHo Pride Arts Festival, and WeHo Reads. For more information about City of West Hollywood arts programming, please visit www.weho.org/arts.

For more information about this artwork or City's Creative Plan, please contact Rebecca Ehemann, the City of West Hollywood's Arts Manager, at [email protected] or at (323) 848-6846. For people who are Deaf or hard of hearing dial 711 or 1-800-735-2929 (TTY) or 1-800-735-2922 (voice) for California Relay Service (CRS) assistance.

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For reporters and members of the media seeking additional information about the City of West Hollywood, please contact the City of West Hollywood's Public Information Officer, Sheri A. Lunn, at (323) 848-6391 or [email protected].