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Jan 302000
Jan 292000
The Embarcadero The Ferry Building, built in 1898, sits at the foot of Market Street. In 1953, San Francisco proposed the Embarcadero Freeway that was to connect the Bay and Golden Gate Bridges. Construction started at the Bay Bridge end; after 1.2 miles of freeway were built, neighborhood organizations began to gather and oppose the project. In 1959 the Board of Supervisors voted to stop the construction, marking the first time a government body had ever taken such an action. For years, the stub of freeway running across the waterfront stood as a monument to both grand freeway construction and Continue Reading
Jan 282000
The Embarcadero Waterfront Transportation Project Historic and Interpretive Signage Program * * * * * This interpretive signage program was created in 1996 and covers 2.5 miles of the Embarcadero. The project includes 22, 13 foot high posts, vertical history stations and bronze inlays. these metal black-and-white-striped pylons are imprinted with photographs, stories, poetry in several languages and drawings commemorating the waterfront’s historical significance. They are a collaboration between historian Nancy Leigh Olmstead and artist Michael Manwaring. This was funded by a grant from Americans for the Arts, and California State’s Transportation Enhancement Activities
Jan 272000
162 King Street South Beach Here is a map of San Francisco prior to 1852. In this map Townsend is the western-most street on the waterfront, one block northwest of King Street. Thanks to Found SF and the Oakland Museum, you can see what the area looks like today: If you are interested in more information about the water that lies under our fair city, I suggest you take one of Joel Pomerantz’s Thinkwalks. He is a local expert on the indigenous water of San Francisco, and gives fascinating tours around different parts of the city. The waterfront art project is Continue Reading
Jan 262000
These plaques run along the south side of King Street, between the Caltrain station and AT&T Park. There are 104 of them embedded in the sidewalk. On them are engraved all of the known words of a language called Rammaytush. The Rammaytush language is one of the eight Ohlone languages, historically spoken by the Ramaytush people, indigenous people of California. Historically, the Rammaytush inhabited the San Francisco Peninsula between San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean in the area which is now San Francisco and San Mateo Counties. Ramaytush is a dialect or language within the Costanoan branch of Continue Reading
Jan 252000
* * Lou Seal is the official mascot of the San Francisco Giants. “Born” on July 25, 1996, Luigi Francisco Seal has been a regular part of the Giants baseball team since then. The name is a play on the name “Lucille.” Todd Schwenk, an Oakland Athletics Fan, named the mascot in a KNBR Sports Radio phone-in contest. Schwenk named Lou for the seals always hanging out on the wharves at Fisherman’s Wharf. It also refers to the San Francisco Seals, the baseball club that was a mainstay of the Pacific Coast League from 1903 until 1957. The Seals Plaza Continue Reading
Jan 242000
The Embarcadero Sea Change by Mark di Suvero At Pier 40 on the lawn near the baseball park is this giant sculpture, that you can see from blocks away. Constructed in 1995 it is 70 feet tall and weights 10 tons. The circular top moves with the wind. Marco Polo “Mark” di Suvero is an American abstract expressionist sculptor born Marco Polo Levi in Shanghai, China in 1933 to Italian expatriates. He immigrated to San Francisco in 1942 with his family. From 1953 to 1957, he attended UC Berkeley to study Philosophy. While working in construction, he was critically injured in a freight Continue Reading
Jan 232000
2 Harrison Street The Embarcadero * This is the Hills Brothers Coffee Drinker. He is located at 2 Harrison Street in the plaza of the original Hills Brothers Coffee Building. This sculpture was created by a dear friend of mine Spero Anargyros. (1915- 2004) Spero finished this sculpture in 1992. It is a 9′ tall bronze beauty. The “drinking man” or “Taster” was designed by a San Francisco artist named Briggs, in celebration of vacuum packing. It is said that the original was a tribute to the Ethiopian roots of the coffee itself. After gracing the first vacuum packed can, the Continue Reading
Jan 222000
Embarcadero Foot of Folsom Street Cupids Span Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen 2002 This is the artists statement regarding this piece: “Inspired by San Francisco’s reputation as the home port of Eros, we began our project for a small park on the Embarcadero along San Francisco Bay by trying out the subject of Cupid’s stereotypical bow and arrow. The first sketches were made of the subject with the bowstring drawn back, poised on the feathers of the arrow, which pointed up to the sky. When Coosje van Bruggen found this position too stiff and literal, she suggested turning the image Continue Reading
Jan 212000
The Embarcadero Electrified Earth by Jill King The Cool Globes project came to San Francisco, set up in Crissy Field, in 2008. Cool Globes: Hot Ideas for a Cooler Planet, is a public art exhibition designed to raise awareness of solutions to climate change. Cool Globes grew out of a commitment at the Clinton Global Initiative in 2005, and was incorporated as a non-profit organization in 2006. It is their hope that the millions of people who have experienced the exhibit, leave with a vast array of solutions to climate change, and with one clear message….we can solve this. The Continue Reading
Jan 202000
The Embarcadero Aurora by Ruth Asawa Ruth Asawa is an American artist, who is nationally recognized for her wire sculpture. Ruth, at the age of 16, along with her family, was interned in Rohwer camp in Rohwer, Arkansas at a time when it was feared the people of Japanese descent on the West Coast would commit acts of sabotage. It was the first step on a journey into the art world for Ruth. In 1994, when she was 68 years old, she said of the experience: “I hold no hostilities for what happened; I blame no one. Sometimes good Continue Reading
Jan 202000
Corner of Mission and Steaurt An Injury to One is an Injury to All – The rallying cry of the Wobblies. That is the name of this sculpture found on the corner of Spear and Mission Streets, San Francisco. The brass plaque that accompanies it reads “In memory of Howard Sperry and Nick Bordoise, who gave their lives on Bloody Thursday, July 5, 1934, so that all working people might enjoy a greater measure of dignity and security. Sperry and Bordoise were fatally shot by San Francisco police at the intersection of Mission and Steuart Streets, when longshoremen and seamen attempted Continue Reading
Jan 202000
1-21 Mission Street The Embarcadero Hippolite d’ Audiffred gave San Francisco this Second Empire, Parisian Style masterpiece. In 1850, Audiffred left his native France for Vera Cruz, Mexico. By 1865, French-appointed Maximillian, Emperor of Mexico, was making it difficult to be French in Mexico, so Audiffred loaded all of his belongings onto a donkey and walked the 2,000 miles to San Francisco. He began selling coal to Chinese laundries and eventually began speculating in real estate. Audiffred and a partner purchased this lot, at the corner of Mission and Embarcadero in 1873. After a falling out with his partner, Audiffred Continue Reading
Jan 192000
Pier 14 Waterfront/Embarcadero This 637-foot-long pedestrian span opened in 2006. It is the newest recreational pier on the San Francisco waterfront. The reason it exists is the breakwater on which it rests, a shield for ferries from winter storms; the design, by ROMA Design group was to top the pier with a 15-foot-wide corridor of concrete framed by long thin rails of horizontal steel. This $2.3 Million was done in two phases. Phase I construction was completed in 2004, and included building a 115-foot pier extension to connect the breakwater to the Embarcadero Promenade, a 30-foot diameter terminus at the Continue Reading
Jan 192000
Pier 14 The Embarcadero Titled “Boats on the Bay,” the project was designed and created by students of the Build San Francisco Institute . These simplistically drawn, colored tiles depict tugboats, cruise liners, and military ships. The Architectural Foundation of San Francisco has created the Build San Francisco Institute, a half day high school program for students interested in design, construction, engineering and architecture. The Build San Francisco Institute is a unique community educational partnership, involving AFSF, San Francisco Unified School District and more than two dozen major San Francisco firms. The program combines a rigorous academic program with mentorships Continue Reading
Jan 182000
1 Market Street The Embarcadero San Francisco has many laws regarding open space and art work. This piece sits just inside the doors of 1 Market Street. Both pieces of this installation are available to view through the windows, or are available to see up close between 7:00 am and 6:30 pm. This installation is part of the POPOS and the 1% for Art programs. Privately-owned public open spaces (POPOS) are publicly accessible spaces in forms of plazas, terraces, atriums, small parks, and even snippets that are provided and maintained by private developers. In San Francisco, POPOS mostly appear in Continue Reading
Jan 172000
Ferry Building Foot of Market Embarcadero This statue of Mahatma (Mohandas) Gandhi is by Zlatko Paunov. Presented to the City of San Francisco by the Gandhi Memorial International Foundation, it sits on the water side of the Ferry Building. Its location is intentional, as to honor Gandhi’s “Salt March to the Sea” Its objective is to foster principles of nonviolence. Zlatko Paunov was born in Tryavna, Bulgaria and emmigrated to New York during the communist era. This seemingly benign statue is not without its critics. In 2010 the Organization for Minorities of India asked for the removal of the statue Continue Reading
Jan 162000
Justin Herman Plaza Embarcadero American Lincoln Brigade Memorial Painted Steel, Onyx, Concrete and Olive Trees In 1936, General Francisco Franco led a military uprising to overthrow the elected government of Spain. Forty thousand people went to Spain to fight for democracy. The 2,700 Americans who joined the fight were known as the Abraham Lincoln Brigade (ALBA). After Franco gained control of Spain in 1939 with help from both Hitler and Mussolini, the Nazis invaded Poland and World War II began. The members have continued to fight injustice, supporting various international causes ever since. On Sunday, March 30, 2008, the Continue Reading
Jan 152000
The Embarcadero The San Francisco Bay Trail is a bicycle and pedestrian trail that will eventually allow continuous travel around the shoreline of San Francisco Bay. As of 2011, approximately 310 miles of trail have been completed. Twenty six miles of the trail lies in the City of San Francisco one half of which is finished. The portion in San Francisco is expected to be completed in 2030 at a cost of approximately $6 million. The stretch along The Embarcadero is decorated with wonderful brass plaques set into the sidewalk explaining the fauna found in the area. The following plaques Continue Reading
Jan 152000
Vaillancourt Fountain – the controversy in Justin Herman plaza – San Francisco. This fountain has been the center of controversy since the day it was installed. Created by Armand Vaillancourt in 1971, it is actually entitled “Québec libre!” It is representative of the relationship between Vaillancourt’s art and his political convictions. It is a huge concrete fountain, 200 feet long, 140 feet wide and 36 feet high. The night before its inauguration, Vaillancourt inscribed Québec libre! in red letters, to note his undying support for the Quebec sovereignty movement and more largely, his support for the freedom of all people. Continue Reading
Jan 142000
Embarcadero Center Susan Bierman Park Drumm Street Movement: The First 100 Years – by Man Lin Choi The First 100 Years, is also known as the Korean Monument. It was created to symbolize the bond between our two countries. On May 22, 1983, the sculpture was donated to the City and County of San Francisco by the government and people of the Republic of Korea to commemorate the centennial of diplomatic relations between the United States and Korea. Then Mayor Diane Feinstein and California Secretary of State March Fong Eu presided over the ceremony. Formal diplomatic relations between the Republic of Continue Reading
Jan 132000
Pier 15 Embarcadero The Electric Sun Wall, along the south side of Pier 15, references a modified schematic of the museum’s complex photovoltaic energy system. The design elegantly expresses what’s going on behind the ten-foot wall of half-inch-thick steel plates, where photovoltaic energy gathered from the museum’s solar panels is converted into usable electricity. The project was designed by Mark McGowan. The Exploratorium intends to become the largest net-zero energy use museum in the U.S., if not the world. This goal is being supported by the Exploratorium’s new partnership with SunPower, a Silicon Valley-based manufacturer of high efficiency solar Continue Reading
Jan 132000
Pier 15/17 The Embarcadero San Francisco’s Exploratorium has moved to a new and much bigger location. This new location is allowing lots of outdoor exhibits that anyone can enjoy without paying the entry fee. This fun piece is titled Sun Swarm and is by Chris Bell. According to the Exploratorium’s website: This is an elevated topography of silvered squares inserted between the water and the sky, Sun Swarm is an architectural intervention that collects and disperses bits of sunlight across the deck of Pier 17. Clusters of tiny mirrors on the end of steel rods reach up from a series Continue Reading
Jan 132000
Piers 17-19 Embarcadero The Fog Bridge sits to the right of the new Exploratorium very near the entrance and was designed by Fujiko Nakaya. Nakaya’s fog installation stretches across the 150-foot-long pedestrian bridge that spans the water between Piers 15 and 17. Water pumped at high pressure through more than 800 nozzles lining the bridge creates an immersive environment shrouding participants in mist and putting their sense of themselves and their surroundings at the center of their experience. Although Nakaya’s fog environments have been presented around the world, this is her first project in the San Francisco Bay Area, a Continue Reading
Jan 132000
Pier 7 Embarcadero Bay Bench by Steve Gillman in 1996 Sunset Red Granite and Bronze These two identical sunset red granite benches with curved bronze grill insets, are reminiscent of ship’s hatch covers. Steve Gillman received a BA from San Francisco State College and and MFA in sculpture from the University of Oregon. His work is site specific. This is what he had to say about Bay Benches: Bay Bench granite and bronze, 17″H x 8’6″ square. The bronze grill provides visual access to the undulating bay water below. What’s important here is not how the sculpture looks, but rather, it is Continue Reading
Jan 112000
1155 Battery The Embarcadero In 1982, the Haas family (heirs to Levi Strauss) were looking to build a new corporate campus for the Levi Corporation. They called upon Lawrence Halprin to design the plaza for the campus. While prolific, Halprin is best known for Sea Ranch in California and the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial in Washington D.C. Sometimes referred to as “Modernism’s Olmsted,” Halprin is one of the most celebrated landscape architects of the late-20th and early-21st century. From the beginning, the Haas family requested that the company’s values be incorporated into the design. They desired a “sensitivity to detailing and high standards of workmanship” and Continue Reading
Jan 102000
The Embarcadero Belt Railroad Engine House Lombard, Sansome and the Embarcadero According to the National Park Service: The State Belt Railroad of California was a shortline that served San Francisco’s waterfront until the 1990s and played an important role in World War II. Its tracks extended the length of the Embarcadero from south of Market Street to Fort Mason and the Presidio. The Belt transferred cargo between ships and main line railroads such as the Southern Pacific, Western Pacific and the Santa Fe. It also loaded trains onto car ferries for ports across the Bay. Although locals nicknamed the line Continue Reading
Jan 092000
The Embarcadero Skygate by Roger Barr This is not the first time, and I am sadly sure, it will not be the last, when researching an artist I find the information in their obituary. The San Francisco Chronicle carried Roger Barr’s obituary on January 14, 2000 and it was so eloquent I will simply repost it here. Roger Barr, a prominent sculptor among whose works is “Skygate,” the first piece of public art along San Francisco’s Embarcadero, died Friday in a hospital in Joshua Tree from complications of diabetes. Mr. Barr had lived in Santa Rosa for 25 years. His Continue Reading