Western Addition – Blue Wall

 Posted by on December 28, 2011
Dec 282011
 
Western Addition
San Francisco
Geary and Fillmore Streets

This is Geary Street in San Francisco.  On the left is Japantown and on the right is the Western Addition.

The Fillmore street overpass has stretches of blue glass on either side.  This installation is titled 3 Shades of Blue by Mildred Howard.

The piece is a “Tribute to the music the continues to define the Fillmore”  It is 20 blue glass panes inscribed with a poem by poet laureate Quincy Troupe – Shades of Blue for a Blue Bridge for Mildred Howard, Joe Rudolph and Yori Wada.

three shades of blue
evoke minnie’s can do,
soo chow’s, yori wada

jimbo’s bop city
john lee’s boom boom room,
history riffing blue matzoh balls,
fried chicken, soba

the jigoku club inside
j town, bold rebels jamming
cross from black town, udon,
grits, barbecue

cherry blossoms blooming
in lady day’s hair, greens and fat back,
sashimi staining kimonos

you walking filmore,
crossing geary with duke,
street cars running over ghost-tracks,
pigfeet in vinegar

indigo-blue & white
red satin, sticky fingers handling
chop sticks, hot cornbread,
sweet potato pie

Mildred Howard has been in this site before.  She is an artist that best uses words as her medium.  The mixed cultures of this area are well represented in the poem.  The neighborhood has a long history of struggle not only between cultures, but between the city and it’s residents as well as the visions that everyone has versus reality.  There have been books written about this strife, suffice it to say I think the poem sums it up very, very well.

Due to the light, it was almost impossible to get a good shot of the etched words, here is a small sampling.

Walking across the Fillmore overpass.

The Tenderloin – GEDC Family Housing

 Posted by on August 20, 2011
Aug 202011
 
The Tenderloin – San Francisco
125 Mason

Walking this section of Mason street, I noticed a profound difference in its essence.  It was far cleaner, and brighter than I remembered from the past.  This is most definitely due to two new housing buildings that have recently gone up.  This one is 125 Mason Street and is the GEDC Family housing.  Glide Economic Developement Committee is part of the Glide Memorial Family.  The front of the building is covered with these wonderful three dimensional sayings, that lend a sense of respect to the building.

The installation is by Mildred Howard. The Chronicle describes Howard thusly: Mildred Howard takes full advantage of the latitude that modernism won for artists in the use of materials and expressive idioms. She has used photographs, glass, architecture, housewares and other found objects of all kinds.

Because she maneuvers so freely within the conceptually soft borders of “installation” work, people tend to think of her as a sculptor, but she prefers the vaguer, more open term artist.

A native San Franciscan, Howard, began her adult creative life as a dancer before shifting her energies to visual art.

Her work has appeared in exhibitions around the world and has garnered numerous awards, including the San Francisco Art Institute’s Adaline Kent Award, and fellowships from the Flintridge and Rockefeller foundations and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Locks and Keys for Harry Bridges

 Posted by on March 18, 2001
Mar 182001
 

Lining the 200 Block of Stevenson Street
Off of 3rd near Market

 Locks and Keys for Harry Bridges

Locks and Keys For Harry Bridges was commissioned by Millennium Partners/ WGB Ventures Inc and the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency.  The piece is by artist Mildred Howard, who has been in this site before. 

Howard is known for her sculptural installations and mixed media assemblage work, Mildred Howard has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the Adeline Kent Award from the San Francisco Art Institute, the Joan Mitchell Foundation and a fellow-ship from the California Arts Council.

When Howard was asked how she came by the image of a key and lock for the project, she answered that she was inspired by Harry Bridges as he opened up doors and that her locks are open to reflect that.

Locks and Keys for Harry BridgesHarry Bridges (July 28, 1901–March 30, 1990) was an Australian-born American union leader, in the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU), which he helped form and led for over 40 years. He was prosecuted by the U.S. government during the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. His conviction by a federal jury for having lied about his Communist Party membership was overturned by the Supreme Court in 1953.

Locks and Keys for Harry Bridges

 

 

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Mildred Howard

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