Tag: San Francisco
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Fabric Collage
Laguna Honda Hospital 375 Laguna Honda Boulevard Foreshill These collages by Merle Axelrad Serlin are comprised of thousands of small pieces of fabric, fiber, paint and cloth. The fragments are carefully arranged, layered, pinned and sewn together onto a cotton canvas. The artist uses a variety of fabrics including, but not limited to, cotton, linen,…
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Point of View
Pier 27 Point of View is comprised of two sculptures that resemble lighthouses — one is installed at the Port of San Francisco, and an identical tower is in Haifa, Israel. Viewers look into a periscope-like screen to see a live feed of the other location. The installation is dedicated to San Francisco’s late…
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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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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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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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Castro District History
Castro Street The Castro Street Design Project was a street improvement project by the City of San Francisco that improved the cable car turn around at Market Street and Castro Street between Market and 19th. This included the fabulous rainbow cross walk you see above and historic markers placed in the sidewalk up and down…
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Whispering Dishes
Market Street and Yerba Buena Lane Financial District This exhibit is the first of a series titled Living Innovation Zones. Living Innovation Zones (LIZ) are new public spaces opening up along Market Street between Octavia and The Embarcadero. The LIZ’s are collaborationa between the community, innovators, and the City to enhance the public good, foster learning…
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Eng-Skell
1043 Howard Street SOMA It is hard to believe that in a world of corporate mergers and gentrification of neighborhoods, that the original company that built this wonderful deco building still occupies it. In 1900 W.A. England and H.D. Skellinger founded the Eng-Skell Company. The company made flavoring extracts for the bakery and bottling trades…
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Tudor Revival and Craftsman Style Firehouse
1088 Green Street Russian Hill The SFFD History site says: After the 1906 Earthquake and Fire, Newton J. Tharp was named city architect and was charged with rebuilding city government buildings. He designed this firehouse along with a number of Beaux Arts-style firehouses. Located on top of Russian Hill, this firehouse was designed to conform…
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Takaroa
1086 Green Street Russian Hill Takaroa Fountain by David Ruth 2004 Pyrex Glass This fountain sits outside a condominium complex on Green Street, and was a private commission. According to David Ruth’s website: The Look of ice comes from the fusing of borosilicate glasses like Pyrex. After I was introduced to the material I tried…
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Underwriters Fire Patrol
147 Natoma SOMA/Financial District According to the History Department of the SFFD: On May 24, 1875, the City’s insurance companies joined together to organize and fund the Underwriters Fire Patrol. The UFP was like a fire department; it had its own firehouses, alarm system and firemen whose only task was salvage practices. The patrol worked…
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Engine Company #13
1458 Valencia Street Mission Built in 1883, this is the City’s oldest standing firehouse. In the heart of the Mission District, this rare brick firehouse in the Victorian Italianate style has a front surface made entirely of cast iron detail. Such buildings are very rare in San Francisco with most clustered in the Jackson Square…
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Film Vaults of the Tenderloin
245-259 Hyde Street The Tenderloin I have driven by this area with these stunning Art Deco/Art Moderne buildings all in a row, and never pursued the history. An evening of beers at the Brown Jug with Mark Ellinger and my eyes were opened. Originally theaters purchased the films they showed their patrons. Then Harry,…
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Mid Market Sees Black and White
1125 Market Street Mid Market Area This piece is a collaboration of Cannon Dill and Feral Child. Cannon Dill is from Mill Valley and presently lives in Oakland. Feral Child is a California based artist who has been working in the streets for the past five years. Influenced by folk art, activism, and the geometry within…
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Fire at Fire Station #24
100 Hoffman Castro/Cole Valley * Fire by Jaap (Jacob) Bongers – 1993 Jaap Bongers was born in Stein, Holland and studied at the Jan Van Eyck Academie of Fine Arts and the Stadsacademie of Fine Arts, both in Maastricht, Holland. In addition to his travels to Africa, Bongers also visited the United States for the…
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Honoring San Francisco Vets
Tenderloin Shannon Alley between Geary and O’Farrell These murals were done in 2011 around Veterans Day. They are part of the SF Vets Mural Project. According to their website: The alley will contain murals painted by veterans which will tell their story. The significance of this alley is that the art regarding veterans is very…
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The Great White Way
My interest in the revitalization of Market Street came about when I wrote this piece for Untapped Cities about the Hibernia Bank Building. A friend who has a wonderful website about the architecture of Mid Market and other areas of San Francisco, titled Up From The Deep, introduced me to this project, and I feel so…
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Goddess of Democracy
Portsmouth Square Chinatown During China’s 1989 Tianamen Square protests, when hope for sought-after reforms seemed to be fading, artist activists unveiled a 33-ft. tall paper mache and foam sculpture of the “Goddess of Democracy.” The statue, in the tradition of other giant torch-brandishing women, became an icon for the Democratic Movement, though it was…
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The Jungle on Clarion Alley
Clarion Alley The Mission * This gorgeous woman is by BODE. This mural is in Clarion Alley in the Mission District. Clarion Alley runs just south of 17th Street from Mission to Valencia. CAMP, or the Clarion Alley Mural Project originated in 1982, inspired by San Francisco’s Balmy Avenue just down the street. None of…
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Sirron Norris Paints Calumet
* As you can see, this piece by Sirron Norris is huge. This is what Sirron had to say about the piece before it began. (The scaffolding came down on August 31st). This mural will be funded by Calumet and will be a collaboration with Precita Eyes (www.precitaeyes.org)and the 3.9 art collective (www.threepointninecollective.com). My hope…
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The Presidio Pet Cemetery
Presidio McDowell and Crissy Field Avenues This military pet cemetery is a hidden treasure of San Francisco. If you are in the area when construction of Doyle Drive is completed, have a stroll, it is a really sweet place to wander. Surrounded by a white picket fence and shaded by Monterey pines, the pet cemetery…
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Fire creates Firehouse Art
1091 Portola Drive St Francis Wood/Mt. Davidson Station #39 * This 30″ Blown Glass Rondella, done in 1997, is by Mark McDonnell. Mark McDonnell (1945- ) is a visual artist whose work can be found in the permanent collections of the Louvre, the Smithsonian Institution, and the Corning Museum of Glass. He has extensively…
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Arnold Genthe’s Photography at CCSF Chinatown Campus
Washington and Kearny Chinatown Diligence is the path Up the mountain of knowledge Hard work is the boat Across the endless sea of learning This is the Washington street side of the new Chinatown campus of San Francisco City College. This particular window is the library. The archival photograph is by San Franciscan Arnold Genthe.…
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Dancing Dahlias on Claude Lane
8 Claude Lane Union Square/Financial District * This mural, (on the outside of Claudine Restaurant) is by Vogue TDK. According to an interview he did with 1:AM he got into graffiti in late 1984, after school, I turned on the TV to the local PBS station and caught the start of the documentary “Style Wars”. There…
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Muni brings art to an industrial building
700 Pennsylvania Potrero Hill * The Muni Ways and Structures Facility is located at 700 Pennsylvania Street at the base of Potrero Hill. The facility centralizes several Muni functions, including, among others, a machine shop, welding, carpentry, painting, and locksmith. Although the size and shape of the complex is unchanged from its former role as…
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Joseph B. Strauss, Golden Gate Bridge Engineer
Golden Gate Bridge Joseph Strauss (1870-1938) was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, to an artistic family of German origin, having a mother who was a pianist and a father, Raphael Strauss, who was a writer and painter. He graduated from the University of Cincinnati in 1892. Strauss graduated with a degree in economics and business.…
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San Francisco’s Fire Chiefs House
870 Bush Street In Memorium Dennis T Sullivan 1838-1906 By fire shall hearts be proven, lest virtue’s gold grow dim, and his by fire was tested, in life’s ordeal of him. Now California renders the laurels that we won “dead on the field of Honor” her hero and her son. Dennis T. Sullivan was the…
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Professor Wangari Maathi
Haight and Pierce Street * * * The main character of this mural is Professor Wangari Maathi. Wangari Muta Maathai was born in Nyeri, Kenya (Africa) in 1940. The first woman in East and Central Africa to earn a doctorate degree. Wangari Maathai obtained a degree in Biological Sciences from Mount St. Scholastica College in…
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Get your insane Cheesburger here
7th and Mission SOMA * This hamburger, and many others around town, are by Steel. He is a man in the pursuit of a good time. He enjoys good jokes, good friends and good cheeseburgers. In his spare time he does artwork in San Francisco and anywhere he travels. Another of his talents is designing…
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Herakut and Rusk Paint the Tenderloin
The Tenderloin / Polk Gulch Hemlock and Polk * * * The area under this fire escape in Hemlock Alley has been the home to many worldwide known graffiti artists. Roa was featured here not too long ago. This piece is by Arkut, Hera (who often paint as Herakut) and Rusk, all from Germany. HERA,…