An out-of-town visitor motivated me to cross the bridge for a SF Gallery field trip. Haven't bumped into too much exciting (to me) work in the past, so have skipped repeat outings. But, Sharon kindly let me join her on a tour of her favorite galleries. As hoped, we saw some great spaces with varied types of representational paintings and drawings.
It's infrequent that I pass north of Market Street into the better-heeled shopping part of town. On the way, I passed a lady in all pink suit with matching pointy toed pink shoes. Arriving early, I had a chance for a small walk. Under the Chinatown arch (a place I arrive upon only by accident) I walked slowly past the couples photographing each other by the ornate entrance. Last year I visited the SF Earthquake Show at the Oakland Museum. In a lapse in judgement, firemen used dynamite to "control" post-earthquake fires, causing much of Chinatown to burn. There were hopes of a land grab by outside developers. Equal to the scale of the devastation by fire, is the tenacity of the folks who held onto this land for Chinese (a few prominent Chinese families and business-people) during the rebuiding stage. Now, its a narrow steep road lined with tourist goods, neatly stacked t-shirts, parasols, and knick knacks. Up above, week's worth of laundry hangs from windowsills and porch railings. My 7 minutes afforded me a couple block walk up and back into the traditional shopping district.
There are lots of gallery and collectible shops at eye level. Today we started upstairs. I passed my first destination 1.5 times before figuring it out. Dolby Chadwick gallery is tucked on the second floor of a nice office building. Each floor has tall ceilings with ornate detail. While it seems strange to seek out commerce on upper floors, once in, the light is beautiful, and you get a nice vista of the window detail on the cross-street building.
Some highlights:
* Ben Aronson - cityscapes
* Nancy Switzer - her metal can still lifes were great
* Ann Gale - portraits
* Marc Trujille - having a show at Hackett Freedman in a few weeks.
* Stephen Simons
* Jim Phalen
* Katina Huston
* Shelley Hoyt - i met her in the monterey market checkout line - views of from the berkeley hills through fog.
And, to aid my memory for future outings. We went to:
* Jenkins Johnson Gallery - :)
* Hespe Gallery
* Dolby Chadwick (my fav... neat retrospective show up now)
* John Pence Gallery (secret boon is room of drawings in the back)
* Hackett Freedman
* Frey Norris
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