Exploratorium – Public Art and Architecture from Around the World

SFGH Healing Garden

Posted by Cindy on March 28, 2013

Mar 282013

1001 Potrero
San Francisco General Hospital

The artist designed this small garden, in 1993, as an extension to an existing hospital memorial garden and as a place to provide seating sheltered from the wind. A red gravel walkway, edged in white granite city-surplus curbstones, forms a double helix, which is symbolic of life. The seating is made from salvaged granite.

Look closely, you can see the double helix in the planter on the left.

Benny Bufano’s Madonna graces the back of the garden.

Peter Richards is a long-term Artist in Residence at the Exploratorium (an innovative science museum in San Francisco, California) Peter shares his enthusiasm for nature and the elements through his work. His engaging outdoor public sculptures and immersive landscaped environments bring such phenomena as wind and tidal movement into a larger cultural context. Peter is responsible for the Wave Organ in the bay, and the Philosophers Walk at McClaren Park. He holds an MFA from the Rinehart School of Sculpture in Baltimore, Maryland and a BA in Art from Colorado College.

The garden is part of the SFAC collection.

Philosophers Walk on the Top of the World

Posted by Cindy on November 22, 2012

Nov 222012

John McLaren Park
Mansell Drive and John F. Shelley Drive
Excelsior and Visitacion Valley

This is the view towards downtown San Francisco from John McLaren Park. Named for John McLaren, the superintendent of Golden Gate Park from 1887 to 1943, it is the second largest park in the city, after Golden Gate Park.

Within McLaren Park’s 312 acres are lawns and planted gardens, a lake and a reservoir, a golf course, picnic areas, playgrounds, baseball diamonds, basketball and tennis courts, an indoor swimming pool, a soccer field, dog play areas, and an amphitheater. Rich in native plants and animals, the park also contains 165 acres that have been designated a significant natural resource area and are managed by the Recreation and Parks Department’s Natural Areas Program.

Miles of paved and unpaved trails wind through and around McLaren Park’s rolling hills, many of them built during the Depression by the Works Progress Administration (WPA). You can hike through a variety of habitats, both native and introduced, including forests, grasslands, and marshy riparian areas, where springs feed Yosemite Creek.

In the 1840s, the land that is now McLaren Park was part of a rancho granted to a pioneer merchant by the Mexican government. In 1905, a subdivision was proposed for the area, but architect Daniel Burnham proposed setting the hilly areas aside for a public park. In 1926 the city’s Board of Supervisors began the process of creating the park, and in 1934 John McLaren took part in its dedication. In 1958, the final properties were purchased, bringing the park to its current size.

The view towards the bay, includes the San Francisco airport and the Cow Palace.

All through McLaren Park is a Philosophers walk. Designed by Peter Richards and Susan Schwatzenberg. The walk is a 2.7 mile loop around the parks perimeter and includes places to rest and view the landscape. Conducive to personal thought and contemplation the route was chosen to highlight the interrelationships between the area’s ecology, geography and history.

One of the many educational stops found along the Philosophers walk

Philosopher’s walks exist in many cities. In the hills above Heidelberg are trails where scholars and students walk, ponder and debate issues of the day. A path through the University of Toronto traces the route of an underground stream. A path along a canal in Kyoto is lined with cherry trees where Kitaro Nishada, an early 20th century philosopher walked in meditation.

Granite markers show the way

Peter Richards is a long-term Artist in Residence at the Exploratorium (an innovative science museum in San Francisco, California) Peter shares his enthusiasm for nature and the elements through his work. His engaging outdoor public sculptures and immersive landscaped environments bring such phenomena as wind and tidal movement into a larger cultural context. Peter is responsible for the Wave Organ in the bay. He holds an MFA from the Rinehart School of Sculpture in Baltimore, Maryland and a BA in Art from Colorado College.

Susan Schwatzenberg is a senior artist at the Exploratorium, where she has been a curator, photographer, designer, and artist, and served as director of media. At the museum she has participated in many exhibit development and Web-based projects. She was a Loeb Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, and has taught at the San Francisco Art Institute, the California College of Art, and Stanford University.

Philosopher’s Way is a joint project of the San Francisco Arts Commission and the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission in connection with the replacement of the La Grande Water Tank located above the park reservoir, popularly known as the Blue Tower. Some architectural enhancements for the new tank were suggested but not implemented, and funds that might have been used on the tower building were made available for public art in the park. The project cost $145,000.

Here is a link to a map that covers the walk and all the “musing” stations.

Firefly on the new SFPUC Building

Posted by Cindy on September 17, 2012

Sep 172012

525 Golden Gate Avenue
Civic Center

This is the new Public Utilities building in San Francisco. It is touted as one of the more “green buildings” built in the US. Four egg-beater-like wind turbines are on view behind a 200-foot-high, 22-foot-wide curtain of polycarbonate squares called Firefly.

Ned Kahn’s Firefly is a lattice of tens of thousands of five-inch-square, clear-polycarbonate panels that are hinged so that they can freely move in the wind. During the day, the ever-changing wind pressure profile on the building appears as undulating waves. At night, this movement is converted into light. As the wind presses the hinged panels inward a small embedded magnet connected to an electrical reed switch triggers the flickering of tiny LED lights. The lights are colored to mimic fireflies which are a threatened species due to their dependence on riparian ecosystems. The entire sculpture requires less energy than a 75-Watt light bulb.

An artist from Northern California, Kahn replicates the forms and forces of nature. Kahn combines science, art and technology to integrate natural, human, and artificial systems, and his specific works emphasise natural elements, such as water, fire, wind and sand; how these behave independently, and how they interact.

After graduating from college with an environmental studies degree, from 1982 to 1996 he designed educational exhibits at the Exploratorium in San Francisco. He apprenticed there to Frank Oppenheimer, the centre’s founder and brother of atomic physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer. Ned Kahn presents projects both in scientific settings and in art contexts.

Wind Turbine taken from inside the building

Fort Mason – Wind Arrows

Posted by Cindy on May 26, 2012

May 262012

Sailboat wind indicators mounted at on 3-foot intervals on a flagpole at the east end of Fort Mason illustrate how the laminar flow of wind changes with the height. This variation is often more complex and dramatic than expected. Along the San Francisco shoreline, for example, the difference of only 20 feet in altitude may mean a 90 degree difference in the wind direction.

This is part of the Outdoor Exploratorium. It was created in partnership with GGNR (Golden Gate Recreation Area) and the Fort Mason Center. The interactive exhibits are designed to help visitors notice the subtle phenomena of the outdoors.

The Exploratorium is our museum of science. It was founded in 1969.

The Electric Sun Wall

Posted by Cindy on January 13, 2000

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 technology. The Exploratorium’s new home uses a 1.3-megawatt SunPower solar power system to offset its electricity demand.

“This project combines an effort to both innovate and think critically about the impact science can have on the world. Our net-zero goal is, in part, a way to reduce our global footprint and help improve the community we’ve been a part of for more than 40 years,” said Dennis Bartels, PhD, Executive Director of the Exploratorium. “Net-zero is a process – and an opportunity for the public to learn with us.”

Mark McGowan is the art director for the Exhibit Environment for the Exploratorium and head of the EE Design department with a staff of five artists and designers. He and his staff work with artists, exhibit developers, writers, and scientists to create meaningful environments and clear signage and labels for the hundreds of exhibits on the museum floor. Before joining the Exploratorium, Mark received his undergraduate degree in San Diego in Filmmaking/Photography/Architecture and an MFA in Filmmaking from the San Francisco Art Institute.

Sun Swarm at the Exploratorium

Posted by Cindy on January 13, 2000

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 of pier pilings, swaying with the tide in unpredictable ways. Stretching for nearly 100 feet, Sun Swarm is an understated and elegant complement to the natural light play that occurs elsewhere over the water.

Chris Bell is an artist and a Sculptor who makes site-specific installations: total environments, considering all features of an interior space and using these to construct a place with a cause. Bell was born in Sydney, Australia in 1966. Two years study in Industrial design was followed by his Bachelor of Arts degree in Sculpture at Sydney College of the Arts, graduating in 1992. He has since exhibited sculpture or installations yearly, mostly with experimental art organizations. He has received support from The Australian Council of the Arts, Arts Victoria and the Pollock-Krasner foundation, (1999). He won Melbourne’s Fundere Sculpture Prize in 2003 and a major public commission for Melbourne’s new civic square in 2000. He has worked as resident artist at Belfast’s Flax Art Studios, the Noosa Regional Gallery and California’s Headlands Center for the Arts. He currently lives in San Francisco, having recently completed his MFA with Stanford University.

Fog Bridge #72494

Posted by Cindy on January 13, 2000

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 region famous for its dramatic fog. With the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Golden Gate Bridge, the completion of the new eastern span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, the America’s Cup, and the reopening of the Exploratorium on the San Francisco waterfront, 2013 is being viewed in San Francisco as the Year of the Bay. Amid all of the water-related activity, Nakaya’s project will heighten public awareness of San Francisco’s dynamic weather and bay ecology for an international public.

Japanese artist Fujiko Nakaya is the daughter of the physicist and science essayist Ukichiro Nakaya, renowned for his work in glaciology and snow crystal photography. Like her father, Ms. Nakaya’s lifelong artistic investigation engages the element of water and instills a sense of wonder in everyday weather phenomena. Working as part of the legendary group Experiments in Art and Technology (E.A.T.), she enshrouded the Pepsi Pavilion at the 1970 World Exposition in Osaka in vaporous fog, becoming the first artist to create a sculptural fog environment.

Since that first project, Nakaya has created fog gardens, falls, and geysers all over the world. You can experience her permanent fog landscapes at the Nakaya Ukichoro Museum of Snow and Ice in Ishikawa, Japan; the Australian National Gallery in Canberra; and the Jardin de L’Eau, in the Parc de la Villette, Paris. She recently created a fog sculpture for the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao and consulted with architects Diller Scofidio + Renfro on the Blur Building for the Swiss Expo in 2002 on Lake Neuchatel. Nakaya has also collaborated with artists Trisha Brown, David Tudor, and Bill Viola to develop fog performances and stage sets.

Nakaya collaborated with Thomas Mee, a Los Angeles-based engineer, in the development of her first fog installation in 1970. Mee had originally developed techniques for generating chemical-based artificial fog to protect orchards from frost. Through their collaboration and perseverance, Mee figured out a system for generating water-based artificial fog. The company he founded, Mee Industries, is now operated by his children. Nakaya has been collaborating with Mee for the last forty years.