Bufano in Valencia Gardens

 Posted by on December 20, 2012
Dec 202012
 

Valencia Gardens Housing Project
Corner of Maxwell Court and Rosa Parks Way

These animal sculptures at Valencia Gardens were sculpted by Beniamino (Benny) Bufano. They were done in the 1930s for the Work Progress Administration Project at Aquatic Park.  In the 1940s, when the federal government pulled out of  San Francisco the sculptures were given to the City of San Francisco and became the charge of the San Francisco Art Commission.

There are two other sculptures that were part of this grouping.  The Frog and The Seal are still at Aquatic Park.

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This collection of statuary is by San Francisco darling Beniamino Bufano.  They sit in a courtyard of the completely newly rebuilt Valencia Garden Housing Project.

During the work that was done at Valencia Gardens, the statues were placed at the Randall Museum for restoration and the enjoyment of the citizens of San Francisco.

The $66 million development of the new Valencia Gardens replaced 246 dilapidated and blighted housing units with 260 affordable homes for extremely-low and low-income families and seniors. Valencia Gardens is located on a 4.9-acre site between Valencia, Guerrero, 15th, and 14th Streets in the Mission District, the same location as the previous public housing which stood for over sixty years.

After almost a decade of planning, the revitalization of Valencia Gardens was made possible through a network of partnerships and collaborations at the local, state and federal levels. As a HOPE VI development, $66 million in development financing was provided by both the public and private sectors.

The design and architecture of Valencia Gardens are based on new urbanism principles that have shown to increase the quality of life and sense of community in other HOPE VI affordable housing developments. Most importantly, Valencia Gardens is integrated into its neighborhood with new public roads and walkways, as opposed to being isolated by fencing, as was the case with the previous project.

 

Benny Bufano in the Sunnydale Projects

 Posted by on December 12, 2012
Dec 122012
 

1654 Sunnydale
Visitacion Valley

This Beniamino Bufano statue is of a Bear over the Head of Peace.  It was done somewhere around 1935-1940 and stands in front of the Community Center at the Sunnydale Projects.  Bufano was a prolific sculptor in his time and his work can be found all over San Francisco.

Sunnydale was built in the 1940’s as a means to house military personnel and their families, it was later bought by the city of San Francisco and converted to a low-income housing project.

The Housing Authority was created in 1938 to help poor families build better lives by creating temporary subsidized housing. Over the years, the once well-kept projects turned into havens for crime, and the services that families need to get out and move on – such as child care, job training, legal help and counseling – evaporated with cutbacks.

Sunnydale, is quite possibly the most dangerous, depressed and decrepit area of the city. The dilapidated barracks that make up the development are lined up on a hillside in the shadow of the Cow Palace, opposite McLaren Park.

An estimated 1,633 people live in the square mile of concrete housing. Once considered a nice place for a family to live, the development is now home to those who can’t afford anything else.

The above was from a February 2008 SF Gate article by Leslie Fulbright.  A two part series titled Life at the Bottom.

 

Benny Bufano at Fort Mason

 Posted by on August 17, 2012
Aug 172012
 
Fort Mason Green
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Peace by Benny Bufano

Benjamin Bufano has many pieces throughout San Francisco.

This statue, featuring a child within a larger statue represents the peaceful blending of cultures.

The green sits on the hill above the actual fort.  Called Fort Mason since 1882, the location at Point San Jose, as this area was known, was originally little more than a field of sand dunes. Following the Spanish American War, however, the military realized the need for its own shipping facility on the San Francisco waterfront.

As the United States began establishing a presence in the Pacific, Fort Mason’s shallow cove was soon home to  three piers and  four warehouses.  By World War II, the fort was the headquarters for the San Francisco Port of Embarkation and over 20 million tons of cargo and more than a million troops were deployed through here. Fort Mason loaded ships like the Liberty Jeremiah O’Brien, which can now be seen at Pier 45.  Also active through the Korean War and the early 1960s, Fort Mason ceased transportation depot operations in 1964.

In 1972, due to legislation introduced and supported by Congressman Phil Burton, Ft. Mason and 34,000 acres of shore land were designated as a National Park. Known as the Golden Gate Recreation Area, it became the largest urban National Park in the world.

Fort Mason is once again in for some changes.  On May 6th the San Francisco Chronicle ran a story announcing that the city is hosting a design competition seeking “creative and practical design concepts” for the 13 acres of parking lots and former military buildings that sit midway between Aquatic Park and Marina Green.

 

Madonna by Benjamin Bufano at SF General

 Posted by on July 28, 2012
Jul 282012
 
Potrero Hill
San Francisco General Hospital
1001 Potrero Avenue
Madonna by Benjamin (Beniamino) Bufano 1974

Benjamin (Benny) Bufano was a prolific artist in his time and has many pieces around San Francisco. This Madonna of Red Granite and mosaic sits on the edge of the comfort garden in San Francisco General Hospital, near building 80. The first buildings designated as San Francisco General Hospital were erected in 1872. Outbreaks of bubonic plague, the spread of tuberculosis, the earthquake of 1906, and the influenza epidemic of 1918 were all trials this hospital saw in its early years. Most of the present buildings were constructed during 1915–20. They were designed by city architect Newton Tharp in an Italianate style, laid out “with green lawns and bright flowering plants to add to the attractiveness of the structures.” Early photographs depict lawns, shrubs, paths, and palm trees between the buildings, formally designed, but — apparently — with no seats or benches to encourage use by staff or patients. The Comfort Garden is a small but well-used outdoor space in the sprawling contemporary “campus” of the hospital. It was established in June 1990 as a “living memorial” to hospital employees who had died. A name plaque in the garden, recording its inception, concludes with the words: “It is meant to be a place of solace where nature’s beauty can bring you comfort.”

San Francisco General Hospital was a subject of the New York Times scathing article about the San Francisco Public Arts Commission and it’s inability to keep track of its collection. The article pointed out that the city acquired 496 art objects for the Hospital when it was renovated in 1972 and by 2007 the commission could only find 49 pieces, by 2011 they had found 141. (There are no further updated numbers at this time)

Fortunately this one is still there and not only easy to find, but in such a delightful spot, it is a pleasure to visit.

If you would like to refresh your memory about Bufano there is a great article about his eclectic life in the Nob Hill Gazette.

Benny Bufano at Fisherman’s Wharf

 Posted by on June 29, 2012
Jun 292012
 
Fisherman’s Wharf
Beach and Taylor Streets
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St. Francis of Assisi by Benny Bufano

Born, Beniamino Bufano, in San Fele, Italy, in 1886, he was one of sixteen children. His family immigrated to New York when he was three, and at six he began contributing to the family income by shining shoes and peddling newspapers. He dropped out of school after the third grade, but entered art school as a teenager, working there as a janitor in lieu of tuition. Later he became apprenticed with the sculptor James Frasier, while he continued to work as a janitor.

In 1915, a fellow sculptor, who’d been selected to create works for the Panama Pacific International Exposition, offered Benny a job as his assistant. Once in San Francisco, Benny’s talents were recognized, and he began receiving regular and lucrative commissions. Saint Francis is the patron saint of San Francisco. Born Giovanni Francesco di Bernardone; 1181/1182 – October 3, 1226, Saint Francis was an Italian Catholic friar and preacher. He founded the men’s Franciscan Order, the women’s Order of St. Clare, and the lay Third Order of Saint Francis. St. Francis is one of the most venerated religious figures in history. The statue was brought to Fisherman’s wharf to stand a few yards from the Longshoremen’s Memorial Building honoring famed unionist Harry Bridges.

The statue stands 18 feet tall and weights 12.5 tons. In 1928, while the statue was being exhibited in Paris, where Bufano sculpted it, the late English art Critic Roger Fry wrote that is was “the most significant piece of sculpture done within 500 years.” The statue was brought to San Francisco in 1955 through the efforts of Bufano’s close friend Paul Verdier, owner of the City of Paris department store, mayor Elmer Robinson and the French government. San Francisco is lucky to have many of Bufano’s pieces scattered throughout the city, here are a few others.

Sydney Walton Park

 Posted by on July 5, 2011
Jul 052011
 

This is one of the entries to Sydney Walton Park in the Embarcadero Area of San Francisco.  It sits surrounded by Jackson, Pacific, Davis and Front Streets.  This wonderful park is full of art, and history.  It is just a marvelous oasis in the middle of lots and lots of high rises.  You will also find Kokkari Restaurant across the street on Jackson, one of the best Greek restaurants you will ever have the pleasure of dining in.

The Arch above is the Colombo Market Arch on Front Street, it is the only structural piece remaining from the old San Francisco produce market, a series of brick buildings that occupied this area. This is the part of town nicknamed the Barbary Coast.  By 1892 it had become a raucous district of prostitution, dance halls and thievery. The Coast continued to flourish until 1911, when Major James (Sunny Jim) Rolph initiated a clean-up. Shut down for good in the early 1920’s, it became the Produce District.

Golden Gateway Center, created in the 1960s, was designed as a mixed-use, urban residential community. At that time, it was the largest project of its kind in the country. By law, art was required as part of the project, originally the pieces were slated to be spaced around the project, and indeed some are, but later it was decided to put all the art in the park, and this is the result.   The two-acre site was designed by the well-known landscape architect Peter Walker (managing partner of Sasaki Walker, later to become SWA).

Penquins by Benny Bufano was one of the original pieces and it stands outside the park on Davis Court. Bufano is one of San Francisco’s most prolific artists and you can find his pieces in many places on this website.

“Portrait of Georgia O’Keefe” Marisol Escobar, 1982

O’Keefe sits on an old tree stump like an ancient wizard, loosely dangling her walking stick and flanked by two compact woolly dogs.” This description is based on photographs Marisol Escobar took while visiting the 90-year-old O’Keefe in New Mexico. Her sculpture, with her two pet show dogs, is the product of that visit. Marisol Escobar was born in 1930 in Paris to wealthy Venezuelan parents who were traveling through Europe.  As a child, Marisol was educated in private schools in Los Angeles, then continued her art studies in New York City. In 1963 the Venezuelan Marisol became U.S. citizen.

 

 

Guns and Roses

 Posted by on June 9, 2011
Jun 092011
 
San Francisco City College
Ocean Avenue

At the entrance to San Francisco City College is “St. Francis of the Guns” by Bufano.  Born in Italy, in 1898, Beniamino Benvenuto Bufano taught at the California School of Fine Arts, now the San Francisco Art Institute, (but was dismissed in 1923 because he was considered too modern), the University of California, Berkeley, and Oakland’s California College of Arts and Crafts so his work is (or should be) well known to natives.

Following the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Senator Robert F. Kennedy in 1968, then Mayor, Joseph Alioto, initiated a voluntary turn-in drive that yielded 2000 handguns. He commissioned Bufano to use the gunmetal in a sculpture.  Bufano had it forged in Italy, adding bronze to the gunmetal to keep it from corroding in the city’s foggy weather. A mosaic inlay depicts John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Abraham Lincoln, all victims of assassination by handguns, above a multi-racial children’s chorus. The sculpture was dedicated by Mayor George Moscone who was himself assassinated by a handgun eighteen months later.  Bufano died in 1970.

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