Lynn Susholtz and Aida Mancillas
San Diego
Water Marks
Mission Trails Regional Park
1 Father Junipero Serra Trail, San Diego
San Diego County Thomas Guide page 1250, grid D2

"Water Marks," by San Diego artists Lynn Susholtz and Aida Mancillas, is a 200-foot mosaic map of the San Diego river that reveals the area's anthropological history while partially obscuring a water pumping station situated within a 6,000-acre urban nature preserve.

Finished in 2001, "Water Marks" echoes the ridgeline behind it and uses flagstone, handmade ceramic tiles, colored concrete and bronze plaques inscribed in four languages to tell the history of the people, plants and animals who have lived along the river.

There are cast bronze leaves and carved animal footprints, and information
plaques with text in English, Spanish, Braille, and 'Iipay aa, the language
spoken by the Kumeyaay, the indigenous people whose water conservation practices influenced the later settlers' system of dams and flumes.

"The significance of the site, from the first Native American inhabitants,
then the Spanish and European settlers to the American settlers today, is
the river," Susholtz said. "It is the continuing element that makes it possible for us to live here."