News from the Heart & Soul of San Francisco
A HANDSOME NEW BOOK — melodiously titled A Dream Begun So Long Ago — chronicles the life of photographer David Johnson from his childhood, shuffling through the care of various adults in segregated Jacksonville, Florida, through his on-and-off relationship with the art of photography. Now it’s firmly on again as the 86-year-old relishes his recognition…
ART | MICHAEL SCHWAGER The history of Bay Area art is filled with stories of unique individuals, influential institutions and the social and political climate where artists congregated to live and create. An exhibition now at the Di Rosa Foundation in Napa tells one of those stories: the story of an exceptional group of artists…
ART | JEROME TARSHIS Youthful aspiration, ambivalence toward conventional art world success and a pitifully low budget came together for Bruce Conner and Jay DeFeo in the history of her masterpiece, The Rose. DeFeo worked on it for eight years in her Fillmore apartment, building up layer upon layer of paint to a thickness of…
STORY & PHOTOGRAPHS by Carina Woudenberg He’s been a San Francisco resident for more than 30 years, but Jiro Nakamura still makes a yearly trek home to Japan to search for treasures for his shop on Fillmore Street. The treasures include dolls — crafted hundreds of years earlier in many cases — and puppets, tea…
DESIGN | DIANE DORRANS SAEKS Twenty years ago, interior designer Ann Getty began a large-scale redecoration of the Pacific Heights residence where she lives with her husband, Gordon, a composer. It was built in 1906 to a classic design by architect Willis Polk and offers an entry hall with collections as opulent as any London…
San Francisco’s Fall Antiques Show returns from October 25 to 28 at Fort Mason.
By Julia Irwin “JUST IMAGINE what a bunch of bugs would be doing if they weren’t being watched, and then put that under a glass dome,” says local artist Lisa Wood, describing her otherworldly dioramas that feature insects at work and play. “It’s usually a simple story: a beetle clipping articles out of the newspaper,…
AN EXHIBITION of Jerry Barrish’s sculptures of musicians created from found materials, “rhythm spirit motion,” opens today at the Lush Life Gallery in the Fillmore Jazz Heritage Center at 1320 Fillmore Street. The exhibition opens with a reception from 2 to 5 p.m. and continues through September 30. Art historian Peter Selz writes of Barrish:…
DESIGN | NICK KINIRIS Three years ago, the concept of the Fillmore Stoop was born, with the intention of making the northern stretch of California Street near Fillmore more pedestrian friendly and softening the harsh visual of the busy four-lane highway. The idea was to create a public space where neighbors could meet, relax, take…
DESIGN | Chris Barnett San Francisco graphic designer Christopher Simmons has a long list of powerhouse clients including Facebook, Microsoft, Wells Fargo Bank, Stanford, Kaiser Permanente and the Nature Conservancy. So why in an uncertain economy would he take a flyer on two Fillmore startups that sell Vietnamese sandwiches and rotisserie chickens? For Simmons, owner…