Artist Gives LA Motel a 'Ghostly' Makeover

A French artist has completely covered a derelict Los Angeles motel -- palm trees and all -- with a dazzling coat of white paint to create an enormous, ghostly artwork.

Called "Projections," the piece by Vincent Lamouroux was publicly unveiled Sunday in LA's trendy Silver Lake neighborhood, and instantly became a local attraction, with fascinated passersby stopping to snap images of the motel.

Lamouroux used an environmentally friendly limewash to cover the so-called Bates Motel, including several towering palm trees and the fence around the rundown property.

The seedy motel, which has been closed for years, got its name from its proximity to nearby Bates Avenue and its passing resemblance to the hotel in the Alfred Hitchcock masterpiece "Psycho".

"The idea behind this project was to cover the entire building and to think about the building as a giant sculpture (on) the scale of the urban landscape ... with this idea we could provoke ... a strong change in order to create some attention," said Lamouroux, a Paris resident, who has made frequent trips to Los Angeles over the past 15 years.

He chose white because it "could bring the most light, could cause a sort of bedazzlement. It also creates something rather positive; perhaps the idea of a blank projection screen for our desires and wants, and for all our imaginings," he said.

The installation is the culmination of two years work and will be guarded for two weeks before the weather and graffiti artists inevitably reclaim the building.

The motel is eventually expected to be torn down and replaced with a new development.