feather2pixels

In 2009 when I was furiously producing a screenprint on wood for every intersection of Twenty-Fourth Street in the Mission District, I had the foresight to print a few copies on paper.  Here in 2012 I wish my 2009 self had even more foresight because a few copies is not enough.  This delayed regret comes to the fore only now because I just saw a professionally-framed version of Mission Street and it looks fantastic.   Ever the wise art collector, Z-Mom purchased this diptych at my Fall Open Studios with top secret plans to spend three times the amount on a frame job and hang the result on a very prime bit of dining room wall.  Last night in Santa Cruz I saw it for the first time at its new home and I immediately wished I made more.  I don’t really like frames, but this could change my thinking.  At least for multi-panel prints on paper.  It looks great.  It looks better matted and framed than it does unframed.  So thank you, Ziggy.

These are photos of my exhibition of Twenty-Fourth Street Cityscapes on Wood in the office of San Francisco (District 9) Supervisor David Campos at City Hall.  If one is on the premises, getting married or applying for bankruptcy, one could mosey upstairs and check it out.  Every intersection of Twenty-Fourth Street in the Mission is represented except Shotwell and Osage.  They are in an undisclosed location.  A third rate video of this installation is here.

A generous helping of my next generation prints on trash is now installed at the next generation Philz in Noe Valley.

The original Philz, located just an extended stumble down Twenty-Fourth street from Noe Valley, is one of the Mission District’s most gloriously funky and popular coffee shops.  Hard as they try, no other contenders can seem to offer their customers ancient sofas quite as cozy nor Scheffleras quite as overgrown as the original Philz.  However the new breed of Philz are different beasts altogether, with each new iteration reimagined to accommodate  its indigenous clientele the way a young Lothario might modify his affect to the preferences of women in each new territorio.

Phil is ever the shrewd businessman.

For my own selfish reasons, this works to my advantage.  Not only was this the first official “installation” at Noe Philz, but I got three beautiful new walls to fill with recent screenprints.  The only question was could I improve them by hanging my art on them?

I took the opportunity to dig a little deeper in to this ongoing project, focusing on the disposable nature of the cardboard and the act of editioning and framing trash.   Some of the more visually compelling of these pieces were beat up from being installed on the floor of  a CELLspace show, so I decided to spend some time putting others through the ringer, too.  I soaked them, sanded them, smacked them, derided them with harsh language.  Actually I was pretty impressed by how hard it was to make screenprints on cardboard look beat up.

In addition, I let myself go with an idea for completely transforming a few of these into mini dioramas, which was fun.  I cast one of them in prehistoric amber (a.k.a. casting resin) with embedded prehistoric flies (already dead). I custom fit a beautiful tree branch in another, complete with functional pine cone.  A plastic dinosaur is eating one piece from the inside and another is a simply a plastic-faced box containing the remnants of a print.   Even if it’s just me and a few kids who think this was a good idea, I stand by it.  I think.

Here some snaps.  Thanks to Tamara S for staying up till midnight helping me install.

Big fire in my previous apartment last night.  Woah.

To the piece of shit who tagged my art at CELLspace last Thursday night:

I couldn’t help but find myself wondering if you consider yourself some kind of artist.  If so, you have a lot to learn about personal standards.   I’m not sure if the stickers you planted all over my screen prints represent your strongest work, but they really weren’t ready for the garden show.

Or maybe felt tipped marker just isn’t your medium.  Either that or you need to cut down on the caffeine before you hit the studio–any cokehead can make neater lines than these.

Maybe I am wrong.  It could be that you are more into the ruining other people’s art angle.  On that count, you’ve come up pretty short too, and this is coming from a dude who’s 5’6”.  I mean, stickers?

Is everything you do this half-assed?

This pretty much says, “I wanted to be a badass who doesn’t give a fuck about the rules, but I didn’t quite have the balls to execute a proper tag.”  You should have just printed some business cards at Kinko’s and taped them to the door.

Anyway, the irony is that some good graffiti would have probably improved the art.  Instead we get this.

Hey I am co-presenting at an architecture conference in San Francisco this September.  My friends Kelli and Seth have reassembled the Local Mission team to disseminate our thoughts on promoting community through food as part of the American Institute of Architect’s Architecture in the City Festival. Dinner included!

Look, an article about the Local Mission Eatery design.  My esteemed colleagues, architects  Seth and Kelli do a good job of articulating their concept in this piece.

Woah! Today’s stormy morning took down one of Folsom Streets beautiful and humungous Chinese Elms.

It was so big, the entire street was blocked.

Also--not to make everything about me, but the way this tree took down a 1992 Toyota Camry with it was eerily reminiscent of the the way my own was hit by a Chinese Banyan on Hyde Street five years ago.

The aftermath.

This made me think of the Urban Forest Map, which is internet information overload at its best.

I have been trying to be proactive about documenting this year’s fantastic February light.  Here’s some more dispatches from the winter:

34th Ave.

Lincoln Park

Lincoln Park

Geary Avenue

JFK Drive, Golden Gate Park

26th Street

Yo! Local Mission Eatery just won California Home & Design reader’s choice award for best designed restaurant in San Francisco!

I would like to think that my 30-foot long installation of geographically ordered screenprints on wood tiles that visually map the Mission District by intersection had something noteworthy to contribute to the execution of this concept, but alas there is no love for (nor even mention of!)  Valencia to Vermont to be found anywhere on the website’s otherwise triumphant press release.

Eh, that’s okay. It’s my friends friends Kelli Franz and Seth Pare-Mayer (architects),  Sterling Tougas (contractor), Yaron Milgrom and Jake Des Voignes (co-owners) who deserve the kudos for a thoughtfully realized project.   I was just happy to be along for the ride.

Check it out here.

The first cherry blossoms of the year,  amazingly early, sighted across Capp street from two teenagers smoking pot.

If somehow the streets of San Francisco could be in the throes of euphoric riot over its baseball team the night before an imminent Republican takeover of Congress, I would be proud.  Behold Mission and 20th at approximately 8:45pm on Monday night:

[flv:world_series_party.flv 640 480]

What a great American city.

I ask you this: what is better than a good ol’ fashioned German restaurant?  Answer: A good ol’ fashioned East German Restaurant!  After my favorite schnitzel place shut its doors a few months ago with a truly sad and unexpected farewell,  a void was left in the city’s breaded-meat and 2 liter beer dining options.   Luckily, Walzwerk on South Van Ness not only stepped in quickly to fill the vacuum, but it also happened to be on my 2010 restaurant Bucket List.  So me, CW, and Nowell checked it out on the Thursday night of my very first group show at my very first gallery.

We missed the show.

Our absence was on account of a terrible accident which required the paramedics and ambulance, but the food was damn good.  In sum we sat at a long table with two San Francisco old timers who seemed tickled by us, all ingesting unhealthy quantities of food and drink.  Enough so that I found myself waiting in agony outside the lone bathroom,  crying “Mr Gorbachev tear down this stall!”

Sorry, that was stupid.  (And why would I want the stall torn down if I needed to use it so badly?)

Anyway, Walzwerk was just as great as Schnizelhaus and later that week I went to new-to-me Chinese and Japanese places that were touted as the Sunset and Inner Richmond’s Dumpling King and Sushi Zone, respectively.  They were fine.

So the art opening for the 24th Street project isn’t on March 5th anymore.  Actually, I think the art opening for the 24th Street project isn’t happening anymore.  Luckily, aside from feather2pixel’s five loyal readers who were expecting free booze and sandwiches, I anticipate next to nobody will care.  I’ll just have to get the next round for you guys.  If it was my space and I had my way, then there would be an art opening for the 24th Street project.  Every day.  But it is not and that is okay.

Regardless, beginning next week, the art will be open to the public until the end of time.  Or at least for as long as combination locally sourced gourmet sandwich shops/patisseries remain financially solvent in the Mission District.  And hopefully that is a long long time.

In the meantime, you have to check out my Twitter debut!   From the Local Mission Eatery account, this is me in the space, rounding corners of the 360 blank art wall tiles.  I have finally become the modern man I knew I could be.