Building the Campus
Print Version Public Art Enhances Life at UCSF Mission Bay
Contemporary works of public art are an integral part of UCSF Mission Bay's
development, contributing to the campus community's cultural identity and experience.
Catalysts for conversation around campus, "the uniquely varied works of art
animate the urban landscape and bring a sense of discovery to the interiors
of its buildings," says Mathieu Gregoire, Mission Bay art consultant.
The growing collection of art features large-scale sculptures, furnishings,
paintings, drawings and photographs by various artists.
An ardent advocate of the arts, Chancellor Mike Bishop pledged 1 percent of
all new Mission Bay campus construction costs to establish initial funding for
the public art program, later to be supplemented by gifts. As is the case at
other UCSF sites, Bishop wants to enrich campus life at Mission Bay by integrating
a wide range of art into public spaces that reflects the diversity of the community
and represents various artistic disciplines and points of view.
"Our purpose is to create an environment that will be a credit and benefit
to the entire community, a stimulating and pleasant place to work and visit,
a permanent legacy to the city," said Chancellor Bishop when he appointed the
Mission Bay Art Planning Committee to develop a world-class public art program
at the new campus in March 1999.
Composed of faculty, staff and students, the committee works closely with an
art advisory board, created at the committee's recommendation to guide its efforts.
The board comprises four art experts who together assist in the selection of
artists by making recommendations to the committee. Ultimately, the committee
recommends commissions, acquisitions and loans of works for the campus to the
chancellor.
For Sam Barondes, chair of the art committee and professor of psychiatry, the
investment in major works of public art at Mission Bay is a once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity. "It's been a great treat for the committee to participate in the
enrichment of this glorious new campus by working so closely with such talented
artists and advisers," he says. "We look forward to continuing our efforts to
expand the collection."
Here's a look at the artists who have brought their unique and powerful expression
of artistic vision to UCSF Mission Bay.
Stephan Balkenhol
Born in 1957, Stephan Balkenhol lives and works in Karlsruhe, Germany, and Meisenthal,
France. He studied at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste in Hamburg. His work
in rough-hewn painted wood and cast metal has contributed to a rediscovery of
the figure, especially as it relates to architecture. Balkenhol frequently works
with scale and context in unexpected ways, representing people, animals and
sometimes combinations of the two.
For his commissioned work installed in the light-filled atrium of the campus
community center in October 2005, Balkenhol carved four standing figures out
of the trunk of a single tree. Each quarter section of the tree is carved into
a figure, integral with its base. The figures, elevated and outsized, facing
in different directions, mediate between human scale and the scale of the 80-foot-tall
atrium space. They express its function as a place where different people cross
paths.
Jonathan Borofsky
Born in 1942, Jonathan Borofsky lives and works in Los Angeles. He earned his
BFA degree from Carnegie-Mellon University, a CT degree from Ecole de Fontainebleau
and an MFA degree from Yale School of Art & Architecture. Borofsky uses memories
and especially dreams as the source material for all his work. He numbers everything
he creates sequentially - regardless of whether it is a scrap of paper or a
monumental sculpture.
His 1984 work, titled "Hammering Man at 2,908,440," is on loan to UCSF from
the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Made of painted wood, aluminum, steel
and electric motor, the sculpture was installed in July 2005 in the main entry
to the California Institute for Quantitative Biomedical Research, or QB3. One
of Borofsky's best-known images, "Hammering Man" expresses his respect for work
and repetition. The repetitive motion of this kinetic sculpture and its prominent
identifying number echo the fusion of math and biology being explored at QB3.
Mark Citret
Born in 1949, Mark Citret lives in San Francisco. He earned BA and MA degrees
at San Francisco State University. His photography is known for its formal elegance,
as well as for capturing fleeting and unexpected moments.
His commissioned black-and-white photographs can be seen in numerous locations
at the Mission Bay and Parnassus Heights campuses. These photographs of construction
materials, sites, buildings and processes will archive the physical evolution
of UCSF Mission Bay. The artist makes regular visits and records objects as
he sees them at different times of the day.
Jim Isermann
Born in 1955, Jim Isermann lives and works in Palm Springs. He earned his BFA
degree at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee and an MFA degree at the California
Institute of the Arts. For 25 years, Isermann has developed a vocabulary that
purposefully encompasses the intersection between art and design, unapologetically
appropriating from mid-century design. Combining sculpture, furniture and architecture,
his bold geometries have influenced a generation of artists who are currently
exploring similar territory.
Isermann's commissioned chandelier project, installed in May 2003 in the atrium
of Genentech Hall, complements the carpet and furniture that surround the piece.
The five-pendant chandelier is suspended at the west end of the 100-foot-tall
space, each pendant comprising luminous spheres enclosed in an open lattice
of red pentamerous shapes. Modernist furniture selected by Isermann is placed
throughout the atrium, as well as carpeting designed by the artist. The shape,
scale, design and colors of chandelier, furniture and carpet pattern relate
to one another.
The chandelier is made of powder-coated aluminum, steel and polycarbon. The
carpet was made from wet dye injection-printed nylon. The furniture Isermann
selected includes Bertoia side, diamond and large diamond chairs, Mies van der
Rohe Barcelona tables and Eames dining tables.
Liz Larner
Born in 1960, Liz Larner lives and works in Los Angeles. She earned a BFA degree
from the California Institute of the Arts. Larner's work combines geometric
form with a pervasive sense of movement and change. Over a period of 20 years,
she has used a wide range of materials to create environments that engage the
formal language of Minimalism to question its own precepts and assumptions.
Her work, titled "2001," was acquired with placement determined by the artist
in the lobby of Arthur and Toni Rembe Rock Hall in May 2004. It is made of fiberglass,
paint and steel. "2001" is a 12-foot-diameter object generated using animation
software to represent six equal steps in a progression from a sphere to a cube,
superimposed upon each other. The resulting form, precisely fabricated in epoxy
resin, is complex and asymmetrical, and its appearance changes constantly as
one moves around it because of the unique refractive properties of the paint
surface — at once green and magenta.
Roy McMakin
Born in 1956, Roy McMakin lives and works in Seattle, Washington. He earned
his BA and MFA degrees at UC San Diego. McMakin's work addresses the design
and use of domestic environments, finding in them unexpected and hidden associations.
Subtle and highly crafted, his furniture and his art explore the nature of function,
ornamentation, decoration and celebration in both public and private life.
His untitled collection of furniture was installed in the Koret Quad in July
2004. McMakin's materials include concrete, fiberglass, wood, bronze, enamel,
steel and stone. The commissioned work features double-sided concrete benches,
which are arranged in a regular pattern around the perimeter of Mission Bay's
primary outdoor space. The furniture is sliced, transformed and rearranged in
various ways.
The work includes a wide variety of objects — all functional as seating
- including enamel laboratory refrigerators and banker's boxes, and typical
office and patio chairs cast in bronze. There are also natural boulders, bronze
tree stumps and planks.
Richard Serra
Born in 1939, San Francisco native Richard Serra lives and works in New York
City and Nova Scotia. He earned BFA and MFA degrees from Yale University. One
of the foremost artists of his time, Serra has redefined the idea of sculpture
since the 1960s, making the experience of site, time and movement essential.
For Serra, it's not as much about the objects he introduces as it is about the
individual experience of the viewer in relation to the whole context, measured
and defined by his massive interventions.
Installed in the campus plaza in March 2005, his commissioned work, titled
"Ballast," awaits completion of the surrounding plaza in the summer of 2006.
The work consists of two plates of weatherproof Cor-Ten steel, each measuring
49'2" by 14'9" by 5" and weighing 70 tons each. The steel plates are located
at equal distances from the ends of the space and from each other, dividing
the plaza lengthwise into three equal intervals. Each plate tilts 18" sideways
in the opposite direction from the other. The scale, weight, placement and angle
of the steel plates animate the whole space, and their relationship changes
continuously as one moves around.
Source: Lisa
Cisneros
First posted October 26, 2005
Last updated November 9, 2005
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