Arts On The Line
Harvard Square MBTA Station

Station Architect:
Skidmore, Owings, Merrill, Inc., Boston, MA

Commissioned for the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority
through the Cambridge Arts Council's Arts On The Line program.
Funded by the U.S. Department of Transportation, the Urban Mass
Transportation Administration, and the Massachusetts
Bay Transportation Authority.

Artist: Ann Norton
Title: Gateway to Knowledge
Date: 1983
Materials: Handmade brick
Dimensions: 20' 6" x 5' 6" x 5'

As designed by Ann Norton, "Gateway to Knowledge" is a truncated obelisk with a narrow slit from its base almost to the top. The two pillars represent knowledge and education. The 6" wide slot separating them suggests that the passageway to knowledge is narrow indeed. One "leg" of the brick sculpture is slightly in front of the other, giving the massive piece the appearance of mobility.

Artist: Joyce Kozloff
Title: New England Decorative Art
Date: 1985
Material: Ceramic tiles
Dimensions: 8' x 83'

Composed on a 1-foot square grid, the mural is divided into 8 sections of varied sizes, color schemes, and imagery. The motifs are drawn from decorative imagery that is typical to New England gravestone carving, wall stencils, quilts, weather vanes, bowsprints, silhouettes, and 18th century engravings of sailing vessels.

Artist: Dimitri Hadzi
Title: Omphalos
Date: 1985
Material: Granite
Dimensions: 21' high

Made of differently colored granites, the sculpture is a cluster of posts holding aloft a variety of shapes and angles. Its mixture of textures includes some sections of rough-hewn stone, and others of hand-polished or flame-polished stone. The granite color bands of gray, black, pink, and red blend in with the colors of Harvard Square's architecture.

Artist: Gyorgy Kepes
Title: Blue Sky on the Red Line
Date: 1985
Material: Stained glass
Dimensions: 7' x 112"

Arriving down at the main lobby, one glimpes a large wall of blue faceted glass, illuminated through a diffusing screen from the back. The rhythmical quality of this luminous stained glass brings forth a substitute sky. Approaching buses light up the slender red glass band which runs the length of the wall.