Part of a sculpture entitled "The Four Ladies of Hollywood", this work is located on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at the intersection of Hollywood and La Brea.
The 1993 work by Harl West and designed by Catherine Hardwicke depicts four famous actresses of different ethnic backgrounds as caryatids upholding a stainless-steel art-deco gazebo.
Wikipedia (
visit link) adds:
"The Four Ladies of Hollywood gazebo —known officially as the Hollywood and La Brea Gateway—stands upon a small triangular island formed by the confluence of Hollywood Boulevard, Marshfield Way, and North La Brea Avenue at the westernmost extension of the Walk of Fame. It was commissioned in 1993 by the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency Art Program and created by the architect, production designer, and film director Catherine Hardwicke as a tribute to the multi-ethnic women of Hollywood. The gazebo is a stainless steel stylized Art Deco lattice structure. The roof is an arched square supporting a circular dome, which is topped by a central obelisk with descending neon block letters spelling "HOLLYWOOD" on each of its four sides. Atop the obelisk is a small gilded weathervane-style sculpture of Marilyn Monroe in her iconic billowing skirt pose from The Seven Year Itch. The domed structure is held aloft by four caryatids sculpted by Harl West to represent the African-American actress Dorothy Dandridge, Asian-American actress Anna May Wong, Mexican actress Dolores del Río, and the multi-ethnic, Brooklyn-born actress Mae West.
The gazebo was dedicated on February 1, 1994 to a mixed reception. Los Angeles Times art critic Christopher Knight called it "the most depressingly awful work of public art in recent years," representing the opposite of Hardwicke's intended tribute to women. "Sex, as a woman's historic gateway to Hollywood," he wrote, "couldn't be more explicitly described." Independent writer and film producer Gail Choice, however, called it a fitting tribute to a group of pioneering, courageous women who "...carried a tremendous burden on their feminine shoulders. Never in my wildest dreams did I believe I'd ever see women of color immortalized in such a creative and wonderful fashion." Hardwicke contended that critics had missed the "humor and symbolism" of the structure, which "embraces and pokes fun at the glamour, the polished metallic male form of the Oscar, and the pastiche of styles and dreams that pervades Tinseltown.'"
The sculpture of West depicts her as a tall and slim woman with wavy hair...although West was rather short and more curvaceous in reality. (She was only 5 foot tall!") The viewer can see the traces of a sheer full-length dress. The work is probably close to life-sized...but no doubt adjustments in height had to be made to have all four corners of the gazebo supported at the same height.
Wikipedia (
visit link) also informs us:
Mary Jane West (August 17, 1893 – November 22, 1980),[1] known as Mae West, was an American actress, singer, playwright, screenwriter and sex symbol whose entertainment career spanned seven decades.
Known for her bawdy double entendres, West made a name for herself in vaudeville and on the stage in New York before moving to Hollywood to become a comedienne, actress and writer in the motion picture industry. In consideration of her contributions to American cinema, the American Film Institute named West 15th among the greatest female stars of all time. One of the more controversial movie stars of her day, West encountered many problems, including censorship. When her cinematic career ended, she continued to perform on stage, in Las Vegas, in the United Kingdom, on radio and television, and recorded rock and roll albums. She used the alias Jane Mast early in her career.
The plaque below her statue reads:
1893 MAE WEST 1980
Writer and Star of a string of hits including "I'm No Angel" and "My Little Chickadee."