Category: All of SAN FRANCISCO
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St. Josephs of San Francisco
1401 Howard at 10th SOMA St Joseph’s Church was founded, at 10th and Howard, in 1861, by Archbishop Joseph Alemany. The church, home to over 300 mostly Irish families, was destroyed in the 1906 Earthquake and Fire. The church we see today was constructed in 1913. By that time, the Irish of the neighborhood had…
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Moya del Pina at Acme Brewery
The Boardroom at the old Acme Brewing Company 762 Fulton Western Addition Moya del Pina is responsible for these murals at the Acme Brewery murals in He completed them inn November 1935 between commissions at Coit Tower for the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP) in 1934, and a series of Bay Area Post Office…
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The Acme Brewing Company in San Francisco
762 Fulton Western Addition On March 12, 1917, the San Francisco Call-Bulletin reported: “Six San Francisco breweries, facing financial loss, or insolvency, through proposed legislation regulating manufacture of maltuous drinks, have pooled their interests into one association for the manufacture and distribution of beers and malts. The body is to be known as the Acme-National…
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John Park WPA Murals
John Muir Elementary 380 Webster Hayes Valley As you enter John Muir Elementary school you are greeted with three lunettes. In the lunettes are WPA murals by artist David Park. These murals were done in 1934, the same year that park joined the WPA. These three are painted in the Socialist Realism style. The three…
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John Muir Elementary School
John Muir Elementary School 380 Webster Hayes Valley In the ten years between 1920 and 1930 San Francisco erected 49 new school buildings, with a 50th approved in 1931. This was all accomplished just 80 years after the birth of the San Francisco School System. These 50 school buildings represented an investment, at that time,…
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The Art and Architecture of San Francisco’s Universalist Church
1187 Franklin The modern portion the First Unitarian Universalist Church of San Francisco was built in the 1960s and designed by Charles Warren Callister of the architectural firm of Callister, Payne, and Rosse. The church is a grand display of architectural beauty in its simplest form. The highlight of the Church is the elegant and historic…
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Hell Mouth on Golden Gate Avenue
The corner of Franklin and Golden Gate This interpretation of the Pallazo Zuccari on the Spanish Steps in Rome, Italy once graced the front entry to San Francisco Italian restaurant Vivande. Vivande was the run by Chef Carlo Middione. Middione lost his sense of taste and smell in an auto accident in Spring of 2007 and…
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Inflatable Bunnies Hop to San Francisco
Inflatable bunnies, an art installation by Australian artist Amanda Parer has stopped in San Francisco for a few days. The monumental rabbits, each sewn in nylon, inflated and internally lit. will be in San Francisco from April 4, 2016 to the 25th. The giant rabbits will travel throughout North America, making stops in Washington D.C., Toronto, New…
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Murals of the Merchant Exchange Building
465 California Street Financial District Julia Morgan was responsible for the artistic elements, under architect Willis Polk, in the Merchant Exchange Building. Miss Morgan chose William A. Coulter, the leading marine artist of his time to fill the bays between the marble and bronze columns in what is now a bank lobby. William Alexander Coulter,…
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Art at the Merchant Exchange Building
465 California Street Financial District As you enter the lobby from the California Street side of the Merchant’s Exchange Building you will be greeted by many of San Francisco’s founders. These ceramic/clay sculptures are each about 36″ x 24″ and were sculpted by Mark Jaeger of Marin County. Mark was born in San Francisco and…
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Chinatown Public Library
1135 Powell Street Chinatown The Chinatown Branch of the San Francisco Public Library started its life as the North Beach Branch. It was changed in 1958. Andrew Carnegie left the City of San Francisco, then under Mayor James Phelan, $750,000 for a main library and branches. One half was for the main library and the…
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The Lone Sailor
Golden Gate Bridge Vista Point Marine County Side This statue, in the center of Vista Point on the Marin County side of the Golden Gate Bridge, is a replica of the U.S. Navy Memorial on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C. by Stanley Bleifield The Lone Sailor, represents a sailor’s last view of the West Coast as he…
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Aplique da Parete
535 Mission Aplique da Parete – Gordon Huether – 2014 This piece is a pattern of dichroic and mirrored glass mounted to a stone backing. The piece extends through the lobby to the exterior. This and The Band are intended to enliven Shaw Alley. Shaw Alley is a public right-of-way that has been closed to…
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The Shipyard
Hunter’s Point has a wonderful naval history in the City of San Francisco. The Shipyard is a housing development by Lennar Corporation that has overtaken the entire site, building housing where the Army once resided. Originally, Hunters Point was a commercial shipyard established in 1870, by the Union Iron Works company, later owned by the Bethlehem…
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Bayview Horn
Bayview/Hunters Point at the Shipyards 11 Innes Court The Shipyards at Hunters Point is a new Lennar Development. Part of the project is $1million in art provided by a Federal Grant to the San Francisco Redevelopment Commission. This piece titled Bayview Horn is by Jerry Barish and was purchased for $125,ooo. Jerry Ross Barrish is…
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The Band
535 Mission Street The Band by Anton Standteiner -2014 This piece is part of the City’s art requirement for new construction. The artwork is a sculptural composition by Anton Josef Standteiner entitled “The Band”, constructed of bronze, copper, and steel, situated at the corner of Minna Street and Shaw Alley. The piece consists of four separate…
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Jaques Overhoff and Margaret Mead
150 Otis Street Mission/South of Market This sculpture, by Jaques Overhoff, has sat on the side of 170 Otis Street, The Social Services Building, since 1977. The abstract sculpture is accompanied by a poem by Margaret Mead. At this time I am unable to determine whether or not this is part of Overhoff’s intent…
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Our Silences
Harry Bridges Plaza Until October 15, 2015 The Consulate of Mexico and Rivelino are touring Nuestros Silencios (Our Silences) sculptures, to deliver a message about freedom of expression. Each sculpture has a metal plate covering its mouth as an allusion to censorship. The artist hopes the installation will prompt reflection about the importance of speaking…
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Trader’s of the Adriatic
The banking lobby at the Sansome Street entrance to the Bentley Federal Reserve contains a mural by Jules Guerin. “Traders of the Adriatic” features prominently in the entrance to the main lobby. It pays homage to the world of banking with its depiction of Venetian shipping merchants accepting receipts for goods on deposit and slaves attending…
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Fillmore Car Barn and Powerhouse
Corner of Turk and Fillmore This was one of the first and one of the largest substations built at the turn of the century when street cars were first converted to electric power. The construction date has been documented as both 1902 and 1907. United Railroads owner, the owner of the line when the building…
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Handsignals
McCoppin Plaza Market Street and Valencia Titled Handsignals, this piece sits in a small park made available after the tearing down of the Central Freeway that once bi-sected the area. The McCoppin Hub Project was a joint project between SFMTA, SFAC and SFDPW. For this reason it was impossible for me to garner from the hundreds…
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Lincoln Park Steps
Lincoln Park End of California Street Lincoln Park was dedicated to President Lincoln in 1909. At the terminus of California street just past 32nd Avenue sits the Lincoln Park Steps. These steps date to the time of the park and were the access for the surrounding neighborhood. If you simply sit on the benches at…
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Promised Land
10th and Market Streets Mid-Market As part of San Francisco’s 1% for Art program this 3500 square foot Public Open Space, at the corner of 10th and Market Street, was designed by Topher Delaney and Calvin Chin. The “official” description reads:” …cartographic layers of maps reflecting the exact location of the site in graded finishes of…
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Center of San Francisco
UN Plaza Civic Center What in the world is that brass cross in the middle of UN Plaza? That is Joel Pomerantz of Thinkwalks pointing to something most San Franciscans probably don’t even know is there, or why. This is the spot used to measure the distance to and from the City of San Francisco…
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Hellenism in San Francisco
This plaque sits, somewhat neglected in an ivy bed at the corner of 3rd and Folsom Streets at the Moscone Center. I, like so many people, have seen it, read it, and continued on my way. I began wondering what was behind it. The Greek immigrant community was one of the largest and most conspicuous…
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Compton’s Cafeteria
Corner of Turk and Taylor Tenderloin Funny how a plaque can stop you and educate you about something you may have known nothing about, and at the exact same time leave out so very very much of the story. If you were to hear about this event during those times you would have been told that…
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Playground Mosaics
Father Boeddeker Park 295 Eddy The Tenderloin These little eggs sit in the playground area of the newly revitalized Father Boeddeker Park. They were created by Laurel True of True Mosaics. Laurel has a degree from School of the Art Institute in Chicago and Parson’s School of Design of New York. She presently is balancing…
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Bruce Hasson’s Ark
Father Boeddeker Park 295 Eddy Street The Tenderloin The Ark – 1985 – Bronze This piece, by Bruce Hasson, sits in Father Boeddeker Park. The statue, as well as the park have essentially been inaccessible to everyone until the parks 2014 renovation. According to the plaque that sits with the statue “Following a 1983 trek…
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Redding School Self Portrait
Boeddeker Park 295 Eddy Street The Tenderloin Redding School Self Portrait by Ruth Asawa and Children of the School The Asawa piece is a tribute to Father Alfred Boeddeker. Boeddeker was the Franciscan priest who founded St. Anthony’s Dining Room and he is the park’s namesake. The 4- by 16.5-foot bas relief wall mural is…
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Labyrinth in Duboce Park
Scott Street Lower Haight Duboce Triangle This labyrinth was part of Duboce Parks revitalization plan. The plan, funded by Friends of Duboce Park, began with fundraising in 1997 and took years to accomplish. The labyrinth was laid in 2007. It was proposed by Friends’ Janet Scheuer, who had walked labyrinths all over the world. “We…