Photographing Public Art # 21: Wangechi Mutu

Self loves the challenge, Photographing Public Art, co-hosted by Marsha Ingrao and Cee Neuner.

The current theme is: WOMEN IN PUBLIC ART.

Last June, there was an exhibit at San Francisco’s Legion of Honor of the work of Wangechi Mutu. Self had never heard of this artist before; the exhibit was a revelation. Here are some of the pieces that were on exhibit:

Wangechi Mutu Exhibit, Legion of Honor, San Francisco, June 2021

Another Wangechi Mutu Piece from last June’s exhibit at the San Francisco Legion of Honor

Symmetry: One Word Sunday Challenge

Thank you to Travel with Intent for hosting the One Word Sunday Challenge. The word this Sunday is SYMMETRY.

Self is so happy she can share these pictures taken from a room in The Penn Club, which shut its door last year. The place was her little piece of London, her home away from home. The back rooms looked over a private garden which belonged to the Duke of Bedford.

Monday Murals #1: Downtown Redwood City

First time for self to join the Monday Murals challenge! Self found it via Debbie Smyth’s Travel with Intent blog.

The murals are on the buildings surrounding one parking lot in Redwood City, California. Granted, everything looks a little seedier post-pandemic. Still, the murals are beautiful, a display of civic-mindedness and pride from the past.

Photographing Public Art Challenge (PPAC) # 20: Walls and Gates

Self is so far behind with this challenge, co-hosted by Cee Neuner and Marsha Ingrao. They’re actually on #38, so you can see how far behind self is.

Nevertheless, self has some pictures to share today, all of places in the San Francisco Bay Area:

• The LOVE sign is at the Apple Store, Union Square, downtown San Francisco.
• 2nd floor, de Young Museum, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco
• Horn Barbecue in Oakland, an eatery that began just before the pandemic and, improbably, survived.

The Weekend Roundup (Letter ‘I’)

Here are the Instructions:

1. Starts with “I.”
2. A Favorite.
3. “I”nsect.
Tom 😀

1. Starts with ‘I’: IMPROBABLE – In a very wee vintage shop in downtown Fort Bragg, DoOrwaRd, self found this magnificent print by “the foremost mushroom forager on the West Coast,” Billy Sprague.

2. A Favorite ‘I’: The opening sentence to self’s story, which appeared in Western Humanities Review last year: “I didn’t like the blind woman.” Apologies for the shameless plug, but she roamed all over her archives and didn’t find Irises or any other favorite thing beginning with an ‘I’ and was impatient.

3. Finally, Insect: Louise Bourgeois’s giant spiders at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, July 2018

Louise Bourgeois giant spiders at the San Francisco MOMA

POETRY SUNDAY: Joel Tan

Self’s own painting of hyacinths

FREE

You were always free
Just thought yourself otherwise
Unthink + just be.
Listen for birdsong + trees.
If you want to reconnect.

• For many years, Joel Tan served as Yerba Buena Center for the Arts’ Director of Educational Outreach. Then he moved to Kapaau, Hawaii and feels so joyful, he’s been posting a poem a day. This one’s from Feb. 26.

SquareOdds #20: “Our Whole, Unruly Selves”

Still playing catch-up with the SquareOdds Challenge!

What a month February has been. Thank you to Becky at Life of B for making it special.

Current exhibit, San Jose Museum of Art:

SquareOdds #15: Pictures from an Exhibition

Becky, host of the Squares Challenge, has a fantastic photo of a fig tree seemingly bursting out of a window!

Self’s SquareOdds today are museum objects.

Can anyone guess what these are?

The first is a bronze from the Crocker Museum in Sacramento.

The second is a relic from Pompeii, seen at the Last Supper in Pompeii exhibit at the Legion of Honor.

Points to anyone who guesses correctly!

Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge (CFFC): Colors of Your Flag

Cee Neuner explains:

• This week the topic is Colors of Your Flag. Your flag can include: Country, State, or Providence colors. If you feel comfortable, please say which flag you are showing,

Self’s flag is red, white, and blue. She is a dual citizen of America and the Philippines.

Joan Mitchell at SFMOMA, October 2021

Below: red and blue parasols, white walls, and yellow napkins — red, white, blue and yellow are the colors of the Philippine flag.

Luna Red, Chorro St., San Luis Obispo

Photographing Public Art Challenge (PPAC) # 16: Frida Kahlo-Themed

Still playing catch-up with the Photographing Public Art Challenge (PPAC) co-hosted by Cee Neuner and Marsha Ingrao.

Such a fun challenge, self is so happy whenever she gets to post.

Happened to be at the local car-wash, and was amused by some Frida Kahlo items:

These Diego and Frida Christmas ornaments were in the SFMOMA Store:

And finally, further proof (if proof were needed) that Frida Kahlo’s influence is worldwide, these socks were on sale at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, UK:

Self’s personal favorite is the Frida Kahlo pillow.

Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.