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Overview

Sister Mary Corita Kent developed an avant-garde art studio within the Immaculate Heart College that became particularly active and influential during drastic social changes of the Vietnam Era in Southern California. She hosted many significant artists and designers during this time, who made the studio a well-known setting for art instruction and socio-political debate.

Building History

The trailblazing nun of the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary Order, Sister Mary Corita Kent (née Frances Elizabeth Kent, born 11/20/1918 in Fort Dodge, IA-d. 09/18/1986 in Boston, MA), operated a print-making studio for the progressive Immaculate Heart College at this address during the 1960s. Kent worked primarily in the silkscreen medium, believing that printmaking could be a way that brought an appreciation of art to large numbers of people. She developed an approach grounded in consumerism and popular culture, avant-garde art and philosophy, religious scripture and Christian humanist activism. Writer Neyat Yohannes, observed of Kent's influential studio: "Kent redefined what a religious life could be, maintaining pursuits as an artist, educator, and advocate for social justice. Throughout the height of her career in the 1960s, she used the Immaculate Heart College printmaking space, located at 5518 Franklin Avenue (now an unassuming dry cleaner), as her classroom and studio. During this time she also sought dispensation from her vows, pursuing life as a secular artist. It was at the Franklin Building that Kent made some of her most iconic serigraphs, cementing her place in the Pop Art movement and later leading to major commissions from the Boston Gas Company and the U.S. Postal Service. In their urgent call-to-action arguing for the approval of historic status, the Corita Art Center team describes the vast impact of the studio on the creative community. Over the years, Kent hosted leading artists, such as John Cage, Charles and Ray Eames, Buckminster Fuller, and Saul Bass, at the Immaculate Heart campus, and influenced an entire generation of young creators." (See Neyat Yohannes, Contemporary Art Review.la, "Hidden Archives: L.A.’s Historic-Cultural Monuments and the Women They Leave Out," published 05/18/2021, accessed 10/15/2021.) Kent worked at the Immaculate Heart College for thirty years, between 1938 and 1968, assuming the Chair of its Art Department in 1964. The school became a hotbed of progressivism and experimentation within the Catholic Church, particularly after the Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican (1962-1965) sought to update church liturgy and practice.

Her progressive political involvements and that of the College inevitably led to conflict with the Archdiocese and its head, Archbishop James Francis Aloysius McIntyre (1886-1979), who ultimately curtailed the operations of the local Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary Order in education. He forced either compliance with conservative church doctrine or requested that the sisters receive dispensation from their vows, which most did, including Kent. After leaving the order, she moved to Boston, MA, where she set up a studio in which she painted with watercolor and did occaisional serigraphy. Kent developed cancer in 1974 and lived with the illness for twelve years, working all the while, only to succumb to it at age 67.

The building became occupied by Sun Cleaner c. 2021.

Building Notes

The Sun Cleaner Building and a larger commercial building to its south were combined within the 5544-004-035 Los Angeles County Parcel Number.