Embarcadero Center

Creazione by Dimitri Hadzi

Posted by Cindy on October 24, 2012

Oct 242012

Dimitri Hadzi’s Creazione, a bronze sculpture with a spirited sense of movement was inspired by the music of Mozart.

Dimitri Hadzi (1921-2006) was born in New York City. As a child he was sent to a Greek after-school program, where he received instruction in Greek language, mythology, history, and theater. His artistic ability won him a drawing prize and his strength in math and science gained him admission to Brooklyn Technical High School. Upon graduating he worked as a chemist by day while continuing to study chemistry by night. On July 4, 1942, he enlisted in the Army Air Force and served in the South Pacific, where an officer encouraged his efforts at drawing. After the war, he returned to New York, decided to turn away from chemistry, and became a student of painting and sculpture at Cooper Union. At the age of 29, a Fulbright Scholarship took him to Athens where he studied the history of Greco-Roman sculpture while learning the technical demands of carving in stone. The GI Bill subsequently allowed him to continue his studies in Rome, where he set up his first studio. At his death, Mr. Hadzi was emeritus professor of visual and environmental studies at Harvard, where he had taught sculpture and printmaking for many years.

University of Wisdom in the Financial District

Posted by Cindy on October 10, 2012

Oct 102012

310 Battery Street
Financial District
Embarcadero

This piece sits on the other side of the Old Federal Reserve Building from Dionysus and Hermes, also by Armand Arman.

The French-born American artist Arman told an interviewer in 1968. “I have never been — how do you say it? A dilettante.” Arman’s vast artistic output ranges from drawings and prints to monumental public sculpture. His work—strongly influenced by Dada, and in turn a strong influence on Pop Art—is in the collections of such institutions as the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Tate Gallery in London and the Centre Pompidou in Paris.

Titled University of Wisdom this piece, done in 1989, is part of the Embarcadero Center Art Collection. The collection was created by Embarcadero Center developer David Rockefeller and Embarcadero Center architect John C. Portman, Jr., who shared the vision of integrating fine architecture with fine art.

Hermes and Dionysus Shake it Up

Posted by Cindy on August 30, 2012

Aug 302012

411 Sansome Street
Financial District

This bronze, done in 1986, titled Hermes and Dionysus-Monument to Analysis is by Arman. (1928-2005)

Born in Nice in 1928, Armand Pierre Fernandez signed his early work with his first name only; he retained a printer’s 1958 misspelling of his name for the rest of his career. After studies at the Ecole Nationale des Arts Décoratifs in Nice, Arman went to Paris to study art history at the Ecole du Louvre.

Enamored by the artistic energy of New York in the ’60s, Arman moved into the Chelsea Hotel in 1967, and became an American citizen (adopting the official name of Armand P. Arman) in 1973.

Throughout his career, Arman remained passionately engaged with human rights issues important to him. For five years, he served as President of the New York Chapter of Artists for Amnesty International. In 1990, on the occasion of a major retrospective of his work that was to be the inaugural attraction at the Museum of Contemporary and Modern Art in his hometown of Nice, Arman made a major statement against religious prejudice. Only weeks before the scheduled opening, Nice hosted the convention of the Front National, a right-wing French political party whose guest of honor had been a German Neo-Nazi. The Mayor of Nice honored the F.N., and in the uproar that followed made anti-Semitic remarks. In protest, Arman cancelled the retrospective, and, as a consequence, waited until 2002 for his work to be exhibited in the city of his birth. Some friends had advised Arman not to mix politics with art. He responded, “If you are not willing to mix with politics sometimes, politics may one day mix with you—whether you want it or not.”

After passing away in 2005 his wife, Corice Canton Arman, formed the Arman P. Arman Trust, which handles his work today.

Hermes and Dionysus is part of the Embarcadero Center Art Collection. The collection was created by Embarcadero Center developer David Rockefeller and Embarcadero Center architect John C. Portman, Jr., who shared the vision of integrating fine architecture with fine art.

Embarcadero Center – La Chiffonniere

Posted by Cindy on April 4, 2012

Apr 042012

Embarcadero Center

Jean Dubuffet – La Chiffonniere

With “La Chiffonniere,” French artist Jean Dubuffet conveyed a woman dressed in rags by utilizing petal-like layers of curved stainless steel edged in epoxy

Dubuffet (1901-1985) was a French painter and sculptor. His idealistic approach to aesthetics embraced so called “low art” and eschewed traditional standards of beauty in favor of what he believed to be a more authentic and humanistic approach to image-making. He pioneered Art Brut, featuring amateur art made primarily by children and people in mental institutions, which he considered the purest form of expression.

While not the best website, the Dubuffet Foundation maintains a site where you can see a nice collection of his works.

Embarcadero Center –

Posted by Cindy on July 9, 2011

Jul 092011

More on the Embarcadero Center, San Francisco.

Walk inside the Hyatt Regency adjacent to Embarcadero Center One, ride the escalator up and, behold, Charles O. Perry’s “Eclipse”, a 40-foot high geodesic sphere consisting of 1,400 pieces of curved metal tubing joined together in pentagons and supported by three massive steel legs.

Continue out onto Justin Herman Plaza. Justin Herman was the Executive Director of the Redevelopment Agency. According to SPUR (San Francisco Planning and Urban Research) “Justin Herman was responsible for guiding the Agency during its early years. As Executive Director of the Agency from 1960 until 1971, Herman oversaw the construction of a number of schools, playgrounds, churches and low-income apartments. He was the architect of much of the changing face of San Francisco at that time. But for all of the benevolence he bestowed, “redevelopment” remained highly controversial. Much of the reason lies in the fact that urban policy in the 1950’s through the 1970’s was distributed in a top-down fashion. It was formulated and implemented by “experts” who knew what was “best” for cities and communities – even in cases where the cure might seem worse than the problem. This professional detachment was to be incendiary when applied to the simmering unease that existed in the many communities of color in San Francisco at that time.”

The Plaza is dominated by the Vaillancourt Fountain. Near the ground floor restaurants between the Hyatt Regency and Embarcadero One is this wonderful sculpture. Jean Dubuffet’s La Chiffonniere, a stainless steel structure with black epoxy that represents a cartoon-like ragged woman. Walking around this gem evokes different pictures with every angle.

*Behind the fountain on Market Street you will bump into these two fellas. “Yin and Yang” by Robert Arneson they were originally commissioned by the University of California at Davis where Arneson taught until 1991 (he died in 1992).

Robert Arneson gained notoriety as an artist in the 1960’s when he became associated with the Bay Area’s funk art movement. At a time when ceramics were relegated to “craft”, his use of clay in irreverent, unorthodox ways challenged the art world’s conceptions of what was considered fine art. His offbeat sense of humor created a firestorm with his portrayal of the murdered mayor, George Moscone.

It is one of the most notorious conflicts between an artist and city politics, the bust was ultimately rejected by the Arts Commission for its inclusion of references to Moscone’s assassination and the subsequent trial of Dan White. Currently the bust is in a private collection.

As a professor at UC Davis, Arneson was an easily accessible member of the community, many people I have known through the years had the pleasure of taking classes from him, and walked away feeling they had made a friend not just taken an art class.

The Arneson pieces were part of the 2006-2007 SFAC budget, they were purchased for $225,000.

The Embarcadero Center

Posted by Cindy on July 8, 2011

Jul 082011

When urban renewal laws took hold in the 1950’s, city planner M. Justin Herman spearheaded a plan to redevelop the site where Embarcadero Center now stands into a mixed-use “city within a city.” David Rockefeller, John Portman, and Trammel-Crow submitted the winning proposal to develop the 8.5 acre site.

Embarcadero Center’s four office towers were built in phases, beginning in 1968 and ending in 1983. The office towers, have a daily population of 16,000.

In building two on the lobby level, this little gem is tucked away in a corner near the entry to the office towers. It is titled “Rhythm of the Metropolis”. Oil on concrete, by San Francisco artist Zheng fu Lu, painted in 2000.

I tripped over this piece, and have no information about it at all. Tucked way in a corner near the Embarcadero Cleaners on the street level of building two. It has a sister piece next to it.

This is the signature piece of the Embarcadero Center. Architect and sculptor John C. Portman, Jr. makes a statement with The Tulip, a bold concrete tulip-shaped sculpture outlined with lights that spans three levels. As you can see, it functions as a ramp from one level to another, it is in water and beautifully landscaped at the base. Co-incindentally this piece was manufactured by Western Art Stone, (a large concrete casting company, no longer in business) they also cast Jaques Overhoff’s piece at City College of San Francisco.

Just outside of Embarcadero Four walking towards the Hyatt Regency and Market Street you will come across “Mistral”, a cast bronze sculpture by Elbert Weinberg that represents the warm winds that originate in Africa and sweep upwards to southern Europe.

Posted by Cindy on July 7, 2011

Jul 072011

The Embarcadero – San Francisco

Two Columns with Wedge by William Gutmann

Visiting San Francisco, like many cities in the world, leaves one with the need for more time or many visits. The first few visits people very rarely get out of Union Square. Some people are able to get to the Ferry building and its environs. For the next couple of days I want to bring to you the Embarcadero Center. Shopping, Dining and art all in one spot. Because of the San Francisco public art laws, there is quite a bit to see at the four Embarcadero buildings and their surroundings. The collection was created by Embarcadero Center developer David Rockefeller and Embarcadero Center architect John C. Portman, Jr.

The collection changes, so I am going to bring to you the ones that are permanent and will most likely be there on your visit.

The Embarcadero buildings are really wonderful areas to be, each building has a central courtyard with a piece of art plunked down in a water feature. These all have long seating areas to lounge around with lunch or just tired feet. The public spaces are beautifully landscaped and are a magnet to office workers on lunch breaks and shoppers alike.

The above sculpture is in building one. It is a 17-ton stainless steel sculpture by William Gutmann that was fabricated out of an 82-foot long cylinder in a San Francisco wok manufacturing company, located just outside the Embarcadero theaters. The theaters, by the way, show foreign, and “art” films, a wonderful resource for offbeat movies.

Encircled by a spiral stairway between the LeMeridien San Francisco and the Old Federal Reserve Bank Building on Battery and Commercial Streets is this bronze sphere with black etchings, an untitled work by German artist Fritz Koenig.

At Two Embarcadero Center is Nicholas Schoffer’s Chronos XIV, a steel sculpture with 49 light projectors and 65 movable discs.

Still in Embarcadero Two on the Lobby level is Anne Van Kleeck’s bronze sculpture “Blocks”.

A difficult shot because of its massiveness, and shooting straight into the sun, the last piece for today is by one of my absolute favorite artists, Louise Nevelson’s Sky Tree, a soaring structure of black Corten steel set in a reflecting pool.