Bay View – Hunters Point – Public Art and Architecture from Around the World

Arelious Walker Stairway

Posted by Cindy on May 5, 2014

May 052014

Innes Avenue
Bay View / Hunters Point

This was the proposal that was written for the Call for Artists by the SFAC:

The Arelious Walker Drive Stair replacement is a dynamic community project in partnership with the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency and the Department of Public Works to create ceramic tile mosaic steps on the Arelious Walker Drive extending uphill from Innes Avenue to Northridge Road in the Bay View Hunters Point neighborhood. The stairway provides a vital connection from an isolated low-income community to the India Basin Shoreline, the Bay Trail, Herons Head Park, and future development at Hunters Point Shipyard. The mosaic steps project will enhance the character and livability of the surrounding area so that it becomes a gathering place consistent with the nature and spirit of the neighborhood. The project will also beautify the site by landscaping it with California native plants, succulents, and other drought tolerant species to attract birds, butterflies, and other wildlife.

The new stair comprises 87 equal steps, each measuring four feet wide (4’) and seven inches high (7”). Each riser will be faced in ceramic tile mosaic ½ inch thick.

The artists chosen are the same lovely ladies that are responsible for two tiled stairways in Golden Gate Heights, Colette Crutcher and Aileen Barr. Both ladies have been in this website many times before. The cost for the installation was slated to be $90,000.

Islais Creek Park

Posted by Cindy on October 4, 2011

Oct 042011

Islais Creek Park

Quint, Third and Berry

The Ohlone Indians were harvesting mussels, clams, and shrimp on the shores of Islais Creek long before Europeans arrived in 1769. The creek appeared on Mexican maps in 1834, named for Los Islais (is-lay-is), a hollyleaf cherry and favorite Indian food. On today’s map it is the gateway to (the former) Butchertown, Bayview/Hunters Point neighborhoods.In the 1850s Islais Creek provided fresh water to Franciscan friars from Mission Dolores and irrigated the produce that Portuguese, Italian, and Irish vegetable farmers grew in the Bayview district. The Gold Rush marked the start of the creek’s decline when hordes of forty-niners swarmed out of the city and settled into the makeshift housing on the water’s edge. In 1870, the slaughterhouses of Butchertown came in, and Islais Creek, red with blood and offal, reeking of garbage, sewage, and unfit for any use, was diverted to a culvert and its contents sent out to the Bay.

Until the 1950s, the waterway was an open sewer, known colloquially as “S____ Creek.” Things changed in the 1970s with construction of a water treatment plant nearby and the clearing out of Buchertown’s auto-wrecking yards. But it was not until 1988 when neighbors banned together to create this wonderful little park. Today it is even greater, and bigger than they imagined.

The piece above marks the entry, and yet I could find nothing out about it or its artist. (Read update below)

I have always loved this structure, you see it just before you enter San Francisco coming from the airport. The five-story high copra crane unloaded dried coconut meat at Islais Creek’s copra dock from 1947 to 1974. Rescued as a San Francisco landmark, it will tower over the new promenade slated for this area.

A new note. In November I contacted Robin Chiang, an architect and active participant in the Islais Creek Renovation. He told me this about the sculpture.

The tower in your photograph was rescued from the Granax property on the north side of the channel when SFMTA bought it from the Marcos family (of the Philippines). It was used for hanging hoses. I designed the metal fish with cut out letters and commissioned metal artist Todd Martinez to fabricate and install it. When the SFPUC was expanding its booster pump station (at 3rd & Arthur) they asked us what we wanted. We wanted the expansion to be all glass so people could see the pumps, but that was not allowed for security reasons. So I sketched the marquee that proclaims ISLAIS LANDING and SFPUC had it fabricated for the pump station as a marker for the northern gateway to the Bayview.

Bayview/Hunters Point Muni Stop

Posted by Cindy on October 3, 2011

Oct 032011

Bayview/Hunters Point

3rd Street Light Rail

Kirkwood/Oakdale Station

The Marquis Pole

Horace Washington was the artist for the third station. His work represents the tradition of shipbuilding and the history of WWII in the neighborhood.

At the start of World War II the Navy recognized the need for greatly increased naval shipbuilding and repair facilities in the San Francisco bay area, and in 1940 acquired property on the waterfront and named it Hunters Point Naval Shipyard. The property became one of the major shipyards of the west coast.

The first USS Pike (SS-6) was a Plunger-class submarine in the service of the United States Navy. She was laid down on December 10th, 1900 at San Francisco, California by Union Iron Works, launched on January 14th, 1903, and commissioned on May 28th, 1903 at the Mare Island Navy Yard with Lieutenant Arthur MacArthur, Jr. (the elder brother of future General of the Army Douglas MacArthur) in command. Pike operated out of the Mare Island Navy Yard for over three years, operating principally in experimental and training roles. Members of the Pike’s crew took part in the relief efforts following the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and subsequent fires.

Launched on the 20th of August and commissioned on the 16th of October 1916 at the Union Plant of the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation in San Francisco, California. This ship was the sixth Astral, a name originating as a brand name for a water-white kerosene refined at the Pratt Works in Brooklyn, NY. In appearance Astral was easily distinguished by three masts – the only tanker in the fleet so provided. The Astral disappeared without a trace, and no documented reason. Some feel she simply sank, others that she was torpedoed.

Horace Washington studied at Columbus College of Art and Design in Ohio before moving to California to study sculpture at the San Francisco Art Institute and then completed his graduate studies at Cal State University, Sacramento. He is a San Francisco sculptor and muralist whose works include numerous projects in a variety of materials for public facilities in California.

Bayview – Hunters Point Muni Stop

Posted by Cindy on October 2, 2011

Oct 022011

Bayview/Hunters Point

3rd Street Light Rail Project

LaSalle/Palou Station

The Marquis signpost

The Canopy

This station designed by Frederick Hayes deals with Afro-Centric issues. Hayes uses a kente cloth roof design and African language and cowrie shell symbols on the platform.

Kente cloth, known locally as nwentoma, is a type of silk and cotton fabric made of interwoven cloth strips and is native to the Akan people of Ghana and the Ivory Coast.

Cowrie shells, throughout Africa and South and North America, symbolize the power of destiny and prosperity. Spiritually, according to African legend, if you are attracted to cowrie shells you could be family to an ocean spirit of wealth and earth. It also represents Goddess protection which is very powerful and connected with the strength of the ocean.

This is Frederick Hayes self description: I use portraiture to as an impetus to act and react to various stimuli within the urban environment. To form first impressions, last impressions and indeliable marks. I also believe the portraiture can take many forms and to that end I include cityscapes and the facade. For me all three share my strong desire to frame, name and reconstruct the human condition based on the initial act of looking.

Hunters Point – Muni Stop

Posted by Cindy on October 1, 2011

Oct 012011

Hunter’s Point

3rd Street Light Rail Project

Revere/Shafter Station

A Second team led by Horace Washington created stops in the Bayview/Hunters Point neighborhood. These artists attended many community meetings for input and direction about what kinds of concepts were desired for inclusion by neighborhood members. Many ideas were proposed including futuristic, ethnic, ecological and Victorian. Joe Sam was the developer of this one about birds.

The Canopy

Mosaics on the platform.

Joe Sam makes a home on both coasts of the U.S. One in San Francisco and one in Connecticut. Here is what he says about himself on his website: “I was born and raised in Harlem, New York City. I vividly remember looking at colors and textures. I spent a lot of time looking at hues of peeling paint. It was that old lead-based paint that peeled periodically, especially when the ceiling leaked. We always had these incredible designs on our walls.

I am a mixed media artist. Whenever possible I use materials in the state in which they were found. Whatever the media, the surface if my work is textured or shaped. My work reflects the fact that I’m a Black artist. My colors, patterns, and designs are multi-faceted and combine many parallel elements in a single piece of work analogous to the way African derived music combines parallel rhythmic and melodic elements. The content of my work reflects issues and ideas concerning people of color.”

Etchings on the Platform