When he was 11 and living in the Dominican Republic, Alejandro Cartagena started taking a bird watching class. The students went on field trips, took photos and learned how to develop the film. Cartagena enjoyed it, but after a couple of years, he became more interested in skateboarding and hanging out with his friends. In […]
Category: Arts & Culture
Posted inArts & Culture, Community, Housing
Art Brings Filipinos’ Fight for Affordable Housing to New Audiences
An organization that Filipinos started 25 years ago to advocate for affordable housing in San Francisco is using art to share its message across wider circles.
Posted inArts & Culture, Politics
Broke-Ass Stuart, Pioneer Offline-Online Influencer, Looks Back at 20 Years of Love, Death and Dive Bars
Stuart Schuffman, aka Broke-Ass Stuart, started with a homemade zine, listing cheap eats, drinks and events. He became a TV travel host, publisher and mayoral candidate. His new book is “The Worst of Broke-Ass Stuart: 20 Years of Love, Death and Dive Bars.”
Posted inArts & Culture
Looming Threat Informs Taiwanese Artist’s ‘Everyday War’ at Asian Art Museum
In Taiwan, the threat of invasion by China is ever present — maybe it will happen tomorrow, maybe next year, maybe never. Video artist Yuan Goang-Ming captures in his work this feeling of dread that pervades even the mundaneness of routine activities.
In “Everyday War,” an exhibit at San Francisco’s Asian Art Museum through Aug. 4, Yuan, explores the unsettled and anxious nature of daily life in which violence feels close and security out of reach in more and more parts of the world.
Posted inArts & Culture, Economy & Business, Labor, Series, Technology
California Creatives Rally Behind State AI Rules to Save Their Artwork
Many creative professionals — including visual artists, writers, actors, singers and musicians — are concerned that companies are feeding existing creative work into data troves and applying generative AI to produce content based on their original work without giving credit or compensation. Creative professionals say their work is being used and monetized without their permission.
Posted inArts & Culture
Pacifica Artist Ties Indigenous Themes to Lives of Immigrants and Farmworkers
Oscar Lopez has a reputation for building community and using his art to tie contemporary experiences to Indigenous history.
Posted inArts & Culture, Community
Asian Americans Have Made Little of Chinatown’s Art. A New Tool Could Change That
When you think about San Francisco’s Chinatown, the first thing that comes to mind might be its art: pagoda-style architecture and dragon-decorated street lamps that showcase the ancient, exotic culture of a civilization half the globe away.
It might surprise you to learn that Asian artists created little of that art, and the works have seldom told the stories of the local community that has lived there for over a century. Local groups are trying to change that with the Chinatown Artist Registry.
Posted inArts & Culture, Immigration
Artist’s Show Weaves Together Memories and Immigration Stories
In her exhibition at San Francisco’s Institute of Contemporary Art museum, artist Suchitra Mattai explores her immigration story and that of her ancestors, as well as the malleability of memory.
The works are entirely fabric, from two-dimensional pieces that resemble paintings to a nearly life-sized house, an ode to where Mattai was born.
Posted inArts & Culture, Community, History, Neighborhoods
New Parade Dragon Carries on Local Legacy Dating Back Nearly 175 Years
There will be a brand new dragon in this year’s Chinese New Year Parade finale, celebrating the Year of the Dragon.
The Chinese New Year Parade, the festival’s pinnacle event, is scheduled this Saturday. Until then, the new dragon is on display at Three Embarcadero Center.
The parade’s organizer, the San Francisco Chinese Chamber of Commerce, has announced the roster of floats and entertainers who will participate, including a 289-feet golden dragon that debuted in public on Lunar New Year’s Day, Feb. 10, for a Taoist “awakening” ceremony.