(car horns blare) (upbeat music begins) - Neon was huge back in the day and it's kind of having a rebirth.

- I think I've always been drawn to neon, just 'cause it is a cool art form.

- I was really excited about how the neon is coming back and bringing a lot of color back into State Street.

- I'm Liz Adeola and "This Is Utah."

State Street in Salt Lake City, to be exact.

(upbeat music begins) It's the main artery that connects the heart of downtown with the rest of the state.

But like any well-traveled road, State Street's in need of some major TLC.

Enter the Life on State Revitalization Project.

One aspect of this new plan, the Salt Lake City Arts Council's Public Art Program generated a bright idea, pun intended, commission designs by eight local artists and take those sketches from design to dazzling displays of color.

Hey, we're able to tell these stories due to support from organizations like the Willard L. Eccles Foundation and the Lawrence T. & Janet T. Dee Foundation.

Thank you.

(upbeat music continues) Welcome to YESCO, Utah's century-old neon sign company where art and science collide.

(upbeat music continues) Step inside as artists Kalani Tukuafu and Valerie Jar join another type of artist, Dave Corey, who shows us how to bend glass to create that iconic neon glow.

- I'm working on.

- Every artist has a different story and just a different background behind their piece, and it all kind of ties into what makes State Street special for them.

- Light is not a medium that I usually work in, and so it was really fun to see what that does to a piece of art.

It's getting a little bendy.

Keep going?

- Keep it turning, and when it starts to get softer stay in the fire and keep it.

- I feel like I'm messing it up.

(Kalani laughs) - [Dave] When you come out, just come out of the fire, bringing it in that shape and get right to the pattern.

- [Kalani] Okay.

- What was it like actually holding the glass and having a part in shaping it, too?

- [Kalani] It gave me appreciation for how skilled you have to be to be able to do this.

Oh, wow.

- [Valerie] That's so cool - That color's neon.

This color here you can see at the end there, that blue.

That's argon.

- Ooh.

(Kalani and Valerie laugh) (upbeat music begins) (tools whir) - [Liz] And so there's gonna be two signs on each of these?

- [Wayne] Yeah, it's what we call a double-sided cabinet.

- It'll be fully fabricated and then we will put the pipe on the ground, and we'll bolt that to the J bolts, and then we will use a crane and we'll lift this up, and then we'll drop it down over the pipe, and they'll weld it in the field.

(upbeat music continues) - The art piece that you created, it's dim sum, right?

- Yeah.

Asian American culture, and even like Asian food is not very represented, and so I think it's like cool that they did choose something that is so different than I feel like anything I would've seen when I was little.

Since growing up in Utah County in Orem, I didn't look like everyone else, and I feel like coming up to State Street and just being at a restaurant where I could learn more about my culture, it just kind of made me feel like I wasn't so different as a child.

- How did you get into illustration?

- [Valerie] I can't remember a time where I haven't drawn, I don't know if it's like growing up my grandpa was a painter.

Every time he visited or when we visited Taiwan, it was just like every hour of the day was spent with him painting.

I think that was kind of what first got me into knowing this is something you can do as a career.

I think I've always been drawn to neon, just 'cause it is a cool art form.

After visiting YESCO I was like, oh, I do notice like which ones YESCO has made.

But yeah, I forgot they did that bowling pin sign.

That's really cool.

- [Liz] Because I was like, what does bowling have to do with the apartment complex?

- [Valerie] Yeah, because I actually used to bowl there.

I've been there when it was like an actual bowling alley.

- [Liz] Really?

- Yeah, and now it switched to apartments.

But I like love that they kept the sign.

- Me too.

- Most people know the bowling pin on State Street.

Well, that was in code in the 1950s.

So that thing is very tall.

Well you can't build a sign that high anymore.

Salt Lake has a very unique thing in their ordinance.

They've actually embraced historic signs, and so if a sign is registered with the city as a historic sign, the customer can actually keep it.

- [Liz] A mesmerizing nod to the history of neon technology first patented in 1910, the Golden Age of Neon soon followed, eventually becoming a fixture on Utah streets in the 1930s.

Which of the signs where your favorites?

What if I told you one of the biggest sign companies in the US is here in Utah?

Yep.

YESCO has been lighting up our streets since the very beginning.

- The name YESCO is an acronym standing for Young Electric Sign Company.

It was founded by my grandfather in 1920.

His name was Thomas Young.

Imagine that, he named the company after himself.

So we've kept that name all this time and it's been a great run considering we've hit 100 years.

One of our designers was on the Salt Lake City Arts Council and he was in some meetings, they were talking about this idea, and we're so grateful they picked this project up.

Because if you merge the idea of being able to build signs, put 'em downtown, add neon to them with historical flare, and the idea that local artists are creating the imagery.

We jumped all in.

That corridor between Sixth and Eighth South where this is going, it's gonna be, when people come to town, they're gonna remember driving through that area of State Street and ask, "Why aren't there more of these?"

- [Liz] In a place where moving art, like custom cars drive in an unofficial parade route, State Street reminded artist Alex Billany of the loud bass from his days growing up in Guam and captured his heart from day one, sparking inspiration for his neon design.

- When they asked, what do you think of when you think of State Street?

It was like the cool low riders, you know?

Like these sick cars.

The amount of custom cars, motorcycles going up and down the street, summer nights, it's amazing.

And now with these signs it's even more bright and fun.

- [Liz] It's like the heartbeat of State Street, right?

- [Alex] Yeah, absolutely, definitely.

- You mentioned that this is the first time that you've seen it this close.

What is that like?

- [Alex] It's so cool, I love it.

It's just incredible what they've been able to do with glass and real neon.

Before I got into more fine art and stuff, I used to do spray paint murals, and my main focus was neon.

And so when they were like, here's a chance to do a design in real neon, I was so stoked.

And this program specifically was so cool because they said we want local emerging artists.

And that's something that is such a blessing for new and upcoming artists.

And when you see things like that coming from your community where they're like, "Hey, we want to support you so that this can become real for you," it gives you a lot of hope.

- [Liz] Hope is something artists like Kalani Tukuafu, whose work pays tribute to transformations in life, rely on.

- As you can see, I do a lot of Pacific Island style art, and it was a kind of a way for me to connect with that part of me.

My mom's family's Swedish, my dad's family's Tongan.

This was my first like big, big piece that I had ever done.

It was an entire family activity.

- What was the thought process behind the design that you selected?

- [Kalani] At the time that the call came out, I was still pretty newly widowed, and very much just like, I want people to remember Finau, and I want them to, I want there to be physical reminders for my kids when they see things, that they remember their dad.

Anytime we would drive around town, he would always point out, "Oh, I poured that lot," or, "Oh, we built this or that."

Because he was a concrete finisher.

When the call for the Life on State project came out, I thought, you know, he's not the only one that does this in the Pacific Islander community, and wouldn't it be cool for us to have representation on this street, because we've built so much of it.

(upbeat music continues) - [Liz] Piece by piece, the light from each community coming together to highlight the stories, the people who make this corridor shine.

It took years to get here, but finally this is their night to officially declare that neon and the vibrant culture behind it is back.

- We're celebrating the eight artists that are part of our Life on State public art project.

This is a public art project that we've been working on for quite a long time.

So we partnered with our colleagues in Salt Lake City Transportation to make it happen.

They wanted to make State Street more inviting, and public art was part one of the components in making that happen, so we're super grateful.

- This is definitely something that's gonna make people want to stop their cars, get out, and check it out.

- My name is Renato Olmedo-Gonzalez and I work with the Salt Lake City Public Art Program.

Thank you so much for being here for this walking tour.

- So my design is representative of the Pacific Islander contribution to State Street and to Salt Lake City.

- Most of all, I wanted to express the nature of wilderness.

That's why I chose this rattlesnake.

It feels really vibrant and alive in this way that like, that's what I want, for myself and everybody else.

- I love jazz music.

We are home of the Utah Jazz.

One of the most immediate ways that humans express themselves is through dancing.

- I called the design Ox Cart U-Turn as I was designing it.

It's fun to connect the past and the present through projects like this, and to me being able to do that with just really simple line work and a quick icon, it's just a thoroughfare of storytelling and folklore that we could share.

- [Jeff] You think about the local artists who developed the concepts, you think about our own internal designers who drafted and figured out how to build these things.

Our contribution is bringing the talents and skills of the people who work alongside us to this project is, it's a great honor for us.

- I was really excited to see the whole thing come together and see how each piece speaks to such a different part of life on State Street.

- Now if you thought those colors and details were stunning on your screen, you've got to check them out in person.

They're incredible.

But we are working on so many more new "This Is Utah" stories, and if you wanna be one of the first to check them out, be sure to hit the subscribe button and the notification bell to make sure you never miss out on one of our adventures.

(upbeat music continues)