Civic Center art installation a nice distraction from nearby Pioneer Monument.
S.F. installation welcome distraction from old statue
Any great piece of art has more to its story than what’s obvious at first glance. And so it goes with the 40 huge sculptures lined up like soldiers in front of City Hall.
I told you recently about stumbling upon “The Invisible Man and the Masque of Blackness” for the first time and being surprised and pleased to find something so captivating in Civic Center Plaza. Usually, it’s a place to rush through rather than linger over thoughtprovoking art.
It turns out the San Francisco Arts Commission, in a clever, under-the-radar move, chose the 40 sculptures in large part because they stand in such stark contrast to the dreadful behemoth known as the Pioneer Monument just across Larkin Street.
The Pioneer Monument, designed by sculptor Frank Happersberger and unveiled in 1894, has a controversial section called “Early Days” that features a nearly naked American Indian man at the feet of a friar and a conquering vaquero. American Indians have long protested the statue, saying it’s offensive and should be removed.
The Arts Commission agreed, but was blocked by the city’s Board of Appeals, which then agreed in June to let everybody come back to talk even more about the issue Sept. 12. The wheels of justice may be slow, but the wheels of city bureaucracy turn even more slowly. And the widely despised Pioneer Monument remains.
Artist Zak Ové’s “The Invisible Man and the Masque of Blackness” is everything the Pioneer Monument is not. For starters, it was created by a black artist — the first time, incredibly, that’s been the case for any artwork displayed in Civic Center Plaza, according to the Arts Commission. It’s also modern. Challenging. And pleasing to the eye.
Jill Manton, director of public art for the Arts Commission, learned of Ové’s work while searching for public art to display on Treasure Island. But she thought Civic Center Plaza, and its
spot sandwiched between City Hall and the Pioneer Monument, was an ideal place to install the work.
“I thought, ‘Here’s an opportunity to bring 40 strong, peaceful, elegant, solemn sculptures of black men to Civic Center Plaza.’ I like the idea of them occupying public space,” Manton said. “If the Pioneer Monument has a negative connotation for many people, I thought this would have a positive connotation.”
In other words, since we’re stuck with the Pioneer Monument for at least several more months, there might as well be a counterpoint to it in the meantime. Ové’s sculptures will be on display through early November, and the artist is in discussions with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to display the piece next.
I got to chat with Ové the other day before his flight back to England, where he lives in northern London. He’d never been to San Francisco before the installation of his work, which was originally created to speak to the issues of those of African descent living in other countries around the world.
Because his soldiers are holding their hands in a “don’t shoot” pose, many Americans have taken the art to be a statement on the Black Lives Matter movement. Ové, in turn, said he hopes San Franciscans see a link between the sculptures and the city’s shocking, in-your-face homeless problem, a problem that isn’t so obvious in London or many other cities.
“I wonder in the United States how many moments away any African-American male is from that point of invisibility, like so many on the blocks of this city I see every single day who live in isolation,” he said. “Though they’re here amid thousands of people, they’re completely ignored, cut off from conversation, from a social life.
“It’s quite a scary thing to witness coming to the United States from abroad and to see this,” he continued. “I hope this is a salutation, in some ways, to their struggle and to that isolation.”
He paused when I asked him about the Pioneer Monument, saying ultimately that he does think it should be removed, but that it’s more important that more public art made by and depicting women and people of color be installed.
More than a year ago, I told you that San Francisco had 87 public statues and that just two represent real women: the bust of U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein in City Hall and Florence Nightingale outside the main entrance of Laguna Honda Hospital.
Then-Supervisor Mark Farrell proposed increasing that percentage to 30 percent and said he wanted to start with a statue of the late writer and activist Maya Angelou outside the Main Library.
Since then we’ve actually gone backward. There’s now an additional male statue — a bust of former Mayor Gavin Newsom, with each gelled hair cast in bronze, in City Hall — but still no Angelou.
Farrell became interim mayor in that time and has secured $390,000 in city funds for the statue in addition to $10,000 raised privately. That’s enough for the Angelou statue, but the legislation approving it, which Farrell handed off to his successor on the board, Supervisor Catherine Stefani, still hasn’t moved. It hasn’t even yet been heard in committee. That means the Arts Commission hasn’t even begun to look for an artist.
Farrell didn’t return several calls and texts asking for comment on the holdup. Stefani said she plans to push the legislation in September, when the board returns from its summer break, and is hopeful the Angelou statue will be installed by Dec. 31, 2020.
Yes, in the blazing speed of City Hall, it takes 3½ years to create one statue. No wonder we can’t build affordable housing.
Manton said she thinks “it would be wonderful to recognize Angelou” but that she’s not surprised by the slowness.
“Just in terms of city process, I’ve found there’s often a long pause between the idea and the reality,” she said. “I myself have been on the waiting end for trying to raise funds or get an approval for an idea so it doesn’t surprise me.”
Note to Manton: Civic Center Plaza will lose its 40 dignified men in November, so how about going on a hunt for art depicting women next?