The Brief

Artist Alison Saar remembers being in a meeting before she was awarded the commission to create a sculpture of Lady Justice in front of the renovated L.A. County Hall of Justice. Lee Baca was still the L.A. County sheriff.

“He came into the office," Saar said, "and plopped down a traditional Lady Justice and he says, ‘This is what I want.'"

Baca’s statuette wielded a sword, held scales and her eyes were covered with a blindfold. That traditional depiction is thousands of years old.

To Saar, the image was jarring, given her life experiences and world views.

“The sword… which to me just talked about the violence in the judiciary system… and the scales… they're monetary scales. It felt to me like if you’ve got money, you've got one kind of justice,” she said.

And the blindfold? To Saar, it makes Lady Justice blind to compassion.

The sculpture Embodied, by artist Alison Saar.

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Adolfo Guzman-Lopez/LAist

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Saar’s 12-foot-tall bronze sculpture was unveiled in 2014, when the L.A. County Hall of Justice was re-opened after extensive renovations.

The piece is called "Embodied" and it is one of many pieces of public art in Southern California that have rich back stories which reveal important aspects of the region’s history and changing demographics.

This corner has seen a lot of injustice

Stand in front of the statue facing east, toward the L.A. River, and despite the many buildings that block much of the view you can sense the natural slope of the land.

From the 1850s to the 1870s, when most of the buildings were one story, you may have seen mobs congregate here, some in broad daylight, carrying out dozens of lynchings. Vague accusations were made against the victim before they were violently killed.

The sculpture Embodied, is located at Temple and Spring streets in downtown Los Angeles.

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Adolfo Guzman-Lopez/LAist

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The L.A. County Hall of Justice was finished in 1925 and re-opened in 2014 after repairs from earthquake damage.

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Saar was thinking of that history as she made the sculpture.

“I think the last documented lynching took place up on that hill; a lot of bad stuff happened on that hill,” Saar said.

The nearly 90-year-old U.S. Court House, across the street from the statue, sits on property that was a slave market in the mid-1800s. During that time a California state law was used to sell incarcerated Indigenous people into bondage.

Alison Saar created Embodied for the re-opening of the L.A. County Hall of Justice.

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Adolfo Guzman-Lopez/LAist

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Add to that the false charges in the 1940s Sleepy Lagoon case, the infamous people jailed at the Hall of Justice, and autopsies of famous Angelenos in the building’s morgue, and you get a sense of how much has happened on that site.

“It's a powerful, kind of intense space,” Saar said.

She chose to depict Lady Justice with elements that reflect people rather than the institutions represented by the building.

Men charged in the Sleepy Lagoon murder case exit the L.A. County Hall of Justice after being exhonerated.

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© Phil Stern www.philsternarchives.com

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L.A. is in the statue

Walk up to the bronze statue and you’ll see words in English, Spanish, Chinese and other languages. They include “advocate,” “punishment,” “virtud,” and “kousei.”

Words inlaid into the bronze surface of the sculpture Embodied.

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Saar gathered the words from students at the nearby Cortines high school for visual and performing arts, Valley College, from L.A. County Art Department staff, as well as people she encountered outside courthouses. The prompt? What words come to mind when you hear the word “justice.”

“Peace we have, I think, in every language,” Saar said. “The idea that people could come and see this piece and find the word that they submitted, or find words that really were in their language, was really important to me."

Preliminary drawings by artist Alison Saar for the sculpture, Embodied.

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Saar wants people to use their eyes and their hands when they’re up close to the sculpture. She wants "Embodied" to appeal to the intellect and to the touch.

The figure’s face is a composite of different races and ethnicities of people in the L.A. area. From the back of her head, a long braid falls down her back and loops up and over the figure’s right arm. Saar says the braid’s three strands symbolize law enforcement, the courts, and the people. The interconnection of these three is needed for justice to work.

Detail from the sculpture Embodied, by Alison Saar.

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L.A. Louver

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“We see that these things are more crucial than ever,” she said.

Visit Lady Justice

Public art is an important part of Saar’s practice. She created an outdoor memorial to Harriet Tubman in Harlem, New York, and the International Olympic Committee chose her to create a sculpture for the 2024 Paris games. Closer to home, a public art piece at the Artesia Transit Center highlights a nearby willow marsh, one of the last of its kind in L.A. County.

The sculpture, Little Big Sister by Alison Saar.

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L.A. Louver

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“[Public art] is a really important component of what Los Angeles is,” she said.

That's because it’s free and when it’s located where people congregate and meander, it gives them the opportunity to stop and look at the art and meditate on what they see and the art’s ideas, she added.

“I think it's just really important to have art that's available to everybody,” Saar said.

A community organization in Los Angeles is criticizing how the FBI enforced a strict no-drone policy around World Cup venues after federal agents disrupted a community gardening event in South L.A.

The incident took place the first Sunday of the tournament, while crowds were watching matches at the FIFA Fan Festival at the Los Angeles Coliseum. Nearby, the Los Angeles Neighborhood Land Trust was hosting a celebration for teenagers who had created a native plant garden on a patch of land that used to be an oil drilling site.

Then someone flew a drone to photograph the moment. Minutes later, Department of Homeland Security agents and Los Angeles police officers were on the scene, according to Bz Zhang, a project manager who was helping run the event. Soon the FBI arrived. They confiscated the drone and fined the person operating it.

The Neighborhood Land Trust was hosting a celebration for teenagers who had created a native plant garden on a patch of land that used to be an oil drilling site when authorities arrived.

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Wendy Salvador

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" We were unknowingly in violation of federal airspace, and we were told that we were a threat to national security," said Zhang, who witnessed the encounter.

The drone had violated temporary flight restrictions implemented for the World Cup. The Federal Aviation Authority has banned unauthorized drones within "3-nautical-mile radius and up to 3,000 feet above ground level" around stadiums on match days and also prohibited them around certain fan events, like the one at the Coliseum.

Since the tournament started in L.A., federal authorities have seized dozens of drones near SoFi Stadium and the Coliseum, according to the FBI. In total, more than 600 drones have been confiscated across the country.

The crackdown is part of an effort across all 11 U.S. host cities to identify and remove unauthorized drones from the skies around World Cup venues and fan events. Ahead of the tournament, FEMA awarded host cities $250 million specifically to combat drone usage.

"We knew we needed to act quickly to keep the World Cup safe from the rising threat of unmanned aircraft systems and that’s exactly what we did,” said Karen Evans, FEMA's acting cdministrator, in a statement announcing those funds.

But Zhang said that the incident at the garden represented the unintended consequences of hosting mega-events like the World Cup for ordinary community members.

" It's one thing to be aware of construction. … It's another to be expected as residents to know, to the 10th of a mile, that I'm in a particular zone and that, to the hour, I need to be in compliance," Zhang said.

Laura Eimiller, FBI spokesperson, disagreed. She said drone operators are responsible for knowing the rules and that every person in L.A. who had a drone confiscated during the World Cup also received a fine.

"There's been a zero-tolerance approach," Eimiller said.

Hiding out among the luxury beachfront condos in the Newport Beach neighborhood of Corona Del Mar is an outpost where scientists have been conducting important marine research for nearly a century.

And you can go check the place out for yourself.

A ‘magical’ marine station 

With its Spanish style architecture that includes a central tower and red-tiled roof, Caltech’s Kerckhoff Marine Laboratory looks like it’s been teleported in from another time and place.

Originally built as a boat and club house, it was purchased by Caltech in 1929 for use as a beachfront science outpost.

Victoria Orphan, James Irvine Professor of Environmental Science at Caltech and director of the Kerckhoff Marine Lab, said the place is one of the oldest running marine labs on the West Coast.

“There’s something just really magical about marine stations. They’re rustic, so it’s not like you’re going into a fully polished clean room. But that’s part of the charm and you really feel the history,” Orphan said.

One of her favorite spots? The tower. That’s where Orphan said some famous papers were written.

“Sometimes when I have writer’s block, I’ll go and sit in the tower and try to channel the scientists of old,” she told LAist.

That would include the work of Wheeler North, one of Orphan’s heroes. From 1962 to 2002, he conducted pioneering research on the ecology of kelp forests. Orphan said North’s work was instrumental for learning how an imbalance in the sea urchin population can decimate kelp forests.

These days that important research continues, with scientists at the lab looking at how microbes can capture carbon dioxide, mitigating global warming. They even have a 4-foot, bright yellow autonomous vehicle that scans the seafloor so scientists can learn more about seagrasses, which are important for oxygen creation and carbon capture, serve as fish nurseries and help protect the coastline from storm surge.

Kerckhoff Marine Laboratory in Corona del Mar

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Courtesy Caltech photo archive

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“In areas where you have seagrass, you get less sediment erosion [and] a little more protection of the property on land, which people who live on the coast care about,” Orphan explained.

Engineers from Jet Propulsion Laboratory are also interested in using autonomous vehicles in cooperation with the lab to see how they can help study the deep ocean right outside the harbor.

You can visit the lab to learn about all of the science going on there, with free open houses on Tuesdays and monthly ‘Science and Sunsets’ events that include dinner and cocktails at the historic outpost.

A pop-up book that’s seeking to break the world record for size has unfolded at the Central Library in downtown Los Angeles.

The art piece is 31 feet wide, more than 11 feet tall, and weighs in at 1,800 pounds.

Luceros y Penumbras, which roughly translates to “starlight and shadows,” is rooted in L.A. artist Daniel González’s experience visiting the library and his family in Mexico as a child.

“It's a knowledge tree that's been shaped by all these different things that I've learned at the library, about myself, about the city I grew up in, [and] about the town where my family's from,” González said.

The nonprofit Library Foundation of Los Angeles collaborated with the library to commission the piece as part of the Central Library’s centennial celebration.

The project is inspired, in part, by the library’s Toy Movable collection, an archive of more than 2,000 pop-up books.

“Normal pop-up books … they seem so simple, but something amazing pops out when you open the page,” said Todd Lerew, the foundation’s director of special projects. “That sort of childlike wonder that you feel that's persistent, even as an adult, is something that was really important to capture and dial up to 11 with this project.”

The origin of 'Luceros'

The foundation asked González in June 2025 to create a book that told the story of his personal relationship with the library. As González pondered questions including  ”What did the library do for me as a young person?" and "Why was I so attracted to it?" he thought about how knowledge was passed down in his family through the generations.

His grandmother told him stories about the stars above her farm near Teúl, Zacatecas, in Mexico. She said those that emerged at dawn — luceros — were among the most special because they signaled the start of a new day.

“ I looked at those stars … and the histories that my grandparents were sharing with me as these guiding lights,” González said. “Just like the library is a guiding light for many people.”

Daniel González's maternal grandmother, Isabel Gómez, told him stories about the creatures that lived near her farm, including owls, that could teach healing.

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Courtesy Daniel González

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González grew up blocks away from the Benjamin Franklin Library in Boyle Heights.

“ I spent summers there because it was literally the coolest place to be,” González said. “It just gave me the opportunity to explore anything that I had an interest in.”

Daniel González, as a child, after an unsuccessful attempt to make a kite after a trip to the library.  "My dad's like, 'I'm gonna take a picture of you so you can see what you look like when you get grumpy,'" he said.

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Courtesy Daniel González

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Later, he’d visit the Central Library during a middle school field trip and return on the bus to wander the stacks and ask the staff questions.

“ I'm really lucky that I met the people that nurtured that curiosity,” González said.

From sketches to ‘paper engineering’

First, González sketched the images, carved them into linoleum, printed them with ink and digitized them to add color and other details.

A few of Daniel González's tools. In the future, he plans to sell prints related to "Luceros y Penumbras."

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Mariana Dale

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Matthew Reinhart, children’s book author, illustrator and “paper engineer,” was tasked with translating the images into three dimensions.

“ My job is really making mistakes,” Reinhart said. “Making mistakes, figuring out where they are and solving them and — of course — making them look good.”

The construction and the fabrication of the book took the work of more than 30 people over a series of months. At least a dozen people using giant poles capped with cushions turn the pages.

Luceros y Penumbras is four pages that open to create two scenes — one of the Central Library building and another of a sprawling tree with an I Spy-like collection of creatures and images throughout. The featured pages will change throughout the exhibition, which is open until mid-November.

There are at least a dozen different symbols throughout “Luceros y Penumbras."

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Mariana Dale

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LAist

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The sea turtle at the base of the tree is a reference both to the creatures that live in the San Gabriel River and to the original inhabitants of the L.A. basin. The Gabrielino-Tongva Tribe tells a story that connects the region’s earthquakes to the turtles.

“When we think of sea turtles, we think of these faraway places where they live, like tropical places,” González said. “But they exist here and they've had to adapt to a changing climate, a changing environment, and find places to call home, just as people do.”

Other images include:

• A star resting in an outstretched hand in honor of Octavia E. Butler, the science fiction writer who also spent time in the library. 
•  Quetzalcoatl, the feathered serpent Aztec deity and a frequent motif in East L.A.’s murals. 
• An owl, a symbol of knowledge associated with the Greek goddess Athena and the Roman goddess Minerva. 

González said the goal is for viewers to create their own narrative about what they see.

“ I just hope that people carry with them a sense of curiosity to further explore the things that I present, but also maybe something within them,” González said.

Visit the pop-up book

Central Library Centennial Festival

On display

For the most up-to-date information about the fire:

• CalFire incident page
• Latest evacuation map
• L.A. County incident response page
• L.A. County Fire Department social media
• Angeles National Forest social media

Multiple evacuation orders were in place Friday for residents near a fast-growing fire in the Antelope Valley and the Angeles National Forest, near the L.A. County and San Bernardino County line. A smoke advisory is in effect for parts of L.A. County.

As of Saturday morning, the Summit Fire had burned more than 2,600 acres since it sparked earlier in the day and was moving south toward the foothills below Wrightwood.

Evacuation orders are in place for multiple areas in the Antelope Valley near the Angeles National Forest; multiple evacuations are also in place in L.A. and San Bernardino counties.

An evacuation shelter has been opened at the Antelope Valley YMCA in Lancaster. Small pets are allowed in the evacuation shelter. Small animals can also be taken to the Los Angeles County Animal Care Center in Palmdale.

L.A. County and Angeles National Forest fire crews are working to contain the blaze. Authorities said structures are threatened, but they have yet to specify the type of structures or how many. Several aircraft are involved in the firefight.

The L.A. County Fire Department responded to the reports of the brush fire at 12:49 p.m.

The basics

• Acreage: over 2,600 acres as of Saturday morning.
• Containment: 0%
• Structures destroyed: None reported (though authorities said structures are threatened).
• Deaths: None reported.
• Injuries: None reported.

Evacuation map and orders

Up-to-date evacuation information for L.A. County can be found here. Check for San Bernardino County alerts here.

• Evacuation orders have been issued for the following zones:

  • Los Angeles County
    
    • LAC-E107
    • LAC-E127-C

• Evacuation Warnings issued for the following zones:

  • Los Angeles County
    
    • LAC-E107-B
    • LAC-E126-A
    • LAC-E127-A
    • LAC-E127-B
    • LAC-E127-D
    • LAC-E128-A
    • LAC-E1340
  • San Bernardino County
    
    • PIN006
    • PIN005
    • WWD03

A camera looking northeast from Mount Disappointment in the San Gabriel Mountains captures smoke rising from the Summit Fire.

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Alert California

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UC San Diego

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Evacuation shelter

• Antelope Valley Family YMCA
  43001 10th St W, Lancaster, CA 93534
  (661) 723-9622
  Small pets allowed.
  Open as of 5 p.m. Friday

Animal shelter for small animals

• Los Angeles County Animal Care Center – Palmdale
  38550 Sierra Highway, Palmdale
  (661) 575-2888
  palmdale@animalcare.lacounty.gov

What we know so far

The Summit Fire was first reported early Friday afternoon near Llano in the Antelope Valley. It is burning near the L.A. County and San Bernardino County line. It grew rapidly throughout the afternoon. Weather conditions are expected to stay warm with gusty winds for the rest of the day and into the night.

The area where the Summit Fire began is sparsely populated.

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CalFire

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Fire resources and tips

Check out LAist's wildfire recovery guide

If you have to evacuate:

• Why fire officials don't want you to stay and defend your home
• How to get packed up
• How to leave your house
• What evacuation terms mean and how to sign up for alerts

Navigating fire conditions:

• How to drive in high winds and fire danger
• How to prep for power outages
• How to navigate poor air quality

How to help yourself and others:

• Resources for fire victims, evacuees and first responders
• If you want to help fire victims, resist the urge to volunteer
• How to help find lost pets

How to start the recovery process:

• What to do — and not do — when you get home after a wildfire
• How to make an insurance claim
• How to safely clean up wildfire ash

What to do for your kids:

• How to talk to children about wildfires and losing a home
• What parents should know about wildfire air quality

Prepare for the next disaster:

• Fire season is here. Make sure you're signed up for these alerts
• Every day is now fire season. Let's get you ready for the next wildfire
• Yes, wildfires are getting worse. The history that got us to this moment