Community Links

Third Street Youth Center and Clinic/ Victory Gardens 2007+

The Third Street Youth Center and Clinic was started in 2004 to counteract the neighborhood's violence, disparities in education and healthcare through partnership with other community organizations. The space has grown into a multi-use facility aimed to connect youth and families with service providers with professionals in arts, education, and healthcare to support a strong, healthy neighborhood. Various services for the youth are offered such as graffiti and boxing classes and a clinic that provides free HIV and STD testing for those under 18.

Amy Franceschini's Victory Gardens 2007+ calls for a more active role for cities in shaping agricultural and food policy. It is a concept currently in development with the city of San Francisco that will provide a subsidized home gardening program for individuals and neighborhoods. This program offers tools, training & materials for urban dwellers to participate in a citywide transformation of underutilized backyardsÑ turning them into productive growing spaces. The project draws from the historical model of the 1940's American Victory Garden program to provide a basis for developing urban agriculture as a viable form of sustainable food practice in the city.

For The San Francisco World's Fair of 2007, the youth involved with the Third Street Youth Center and Clinic have taken a yearlong oath to care for the newest Victory Garden created for their space. The garden will serve as a gathering place, a shared activity between the youth and local residents, as well as a food source for the community.

The Noonan Building/ Off Third Street

The Noonan Building is the only surviving large wood-framed and clad structure built in 1941 by the government for war production. Standing three stories high it housed field offices for the immediate supervision of workers as well as providing a tool room and cafeteria. It is currently leased to multiple tenants, many of who are artists, designers or small businesses proprietors.

The San Francisco World's Fair of 2007 utilized the Noonan Building as an exhibition venue to host ÒOff Third Street,Ó a commissioned series of photographs by Daniel Cheek. The photographs illuminate the stages of redevelopment happening in the southeast region of San Francisco as well as immortalize historical bastions that have been preserved, such as the Bayview Opera House. Cheek photographs some of the Bay Area's most peripheral regions, specifically Benicia and Martinez, conflating the quotidian with encroaching industries, oil refineries, and chemical plants. These industries remain part of the landscape even after being issued major health and environmental citations.

Dogpatch/ Neighborhood Public Radio and 141 Demands

Dogpatch is a neighborhood in transition, located on the Eastern side of San Francisco, adjacent to the waterfront of the San Francisco Bay and to the southeast of Potrero Hill. Its boundaries are roughly 20th Street to the north, I-280 to the west, 24rd Street to the south, and the Pier 70 complex to the east. Dogpatch contains architecturally and historically significant workers' housing, factories, warehouses, and public buildings constructed between 1860 and 1945. The area survived the 1906 earthquake and is therefore the epicenter of San Francisco's largest and most intact historic industrial complex remaining in the cityÐthe former shipyards and mills on the waterfront at Pier 70.

Previously filled-in marshes permitted development of waterfront-oriented industry, including shipbuilding, drydocks, ship outfitting and repairs, warehouses, and steel mills that flourished until after World War II. Up until the 1990s Dogpatch endured several moments of decline that led to the current state of redevelopment, including "live-work" condominiums for artists along the Third Street corridor. On April 7, 2007, after an absence of over 60 years, the electric light rail transit returned to San Francisco's Third Street corridor. The rail line now connects Dogpatch to San Francisco's downtown via new development zones including Mission Bay and the new UCSF research campus.

For The San Francisco World's Fair of 2007, Neighborhood Public Radio (NPR) produced a daylong broadcast from Sundance Coffee consisting of interviews with artists and community members in the Dogpatch neighborhood. By tuning in to 88.9 FM visitors, residents, and local businesses could hear the commotion. Additionally, William Pope.L presented his project 141Demands (in collaboration with Yerba Buena Center for the Arts). Additionally, Silverman Gallery displayed a mural by Malik Seneferu and the youth at Bayview Safe Haven, a neighborhood community center.

Pier 40 and the Bike Hut/ The Hub and the Aeromad

Pier 40, also known as South Beach Harbor, is nestled between AT&T ballpark and the Bay Bridge. It served as a starting point for The San Francisco World's Fair of 2007. After the fall of the Embarcadero freeway during the 1989 earthquake, Pier 40 became an epicenter for redevelopment of the San Francisco waterfront, catalyzed by the construction of the Giants AT&T ballpark. Also located at Pier 40 is the Bike Hut. Opened in 1996 as an outpost of the Bicycle Community Project, The Bike Hut is a resource for local cyclists and a center for skills training for kids from low-income communities. It offers rentals, repairs and youth training.

The San Francisco World's Fair of 2007 chose this location to be the Hub of the event, as it represents the limit of travel for most San Franciscans. However, it is also the beginning the development process that is encroaching further down Third Street. A large, silver inflatable structure designed by Los Angeles based architect Alexis Rochas called an Aeromad served as the beacon for the information Hub of the Fair. Created to function as a temporary museum, art pavilion, or act as emergency housing, the structure presents the model of nomadic architecture. The Hub also included a trailer, where fair visitors were able to learn about the projects, pick up information, and learn about the various modes of transport to experience the fair. These included Bike rental from the Bike Hut, a bio-diesel fueled school bus, and the Third Street Light Rail.

Warm Water Cove Park/ One Tree(s) and Clear Skies Masks

Warm Water Cove Park is located just a few blocks away from Third Street in the Bayview-Hunters Point neighborhood. On the San Francisco government website, the park barely merits mentionÑas if it is on the verge of extinction. Across the cove sits the MUNI (San Francisco Municipal Railway) graveyard. Lying at the foot of 24th Street, the park has acquired sad nicknames like ÒToxic ParkÓ, ÒToxic Tire BeachÓ (visible at low tide, the park was once used as an illegal tire dump), or merely ÒShit Creek.Ó The water in the cove is warmed by the steam turbines of the nearby Potrero Power Plant, though this plant is currently not operating due to air pollution levels that exceed authorized limits.

Ironically, this toxic dump is also a fragile ecological site filled with various species. Threats to the park's very existence loom with the redevelopment of Third Street. Redevelopment and rising property values have led to uncertainty about the future of the park and the wildlife there. With very few public spaces that exist in the Bayview area, Warm Water Cove Park invites a critical challenge to amplify the positive effects of change in the area without ignoring the many forms of life that already depend on its presence and existence. What is magnificent about Warm Water Cove Park is that by default, urbanity, industrial background, and natural life exist all together. The park functions as an ecological system with minimal intention.

One Tree(s) is a pair of Natalie Jeremijenko's cloned walnut trees, one of several pairs planted around San Francisco. Though identical, these trees will grow differently based on the environments they are planted in. One Tree(s) attempts to help people understand what factors affect human health in local urban and global environments. Jeremijenko is also interested in whether public displays of environmental information prompt people to engage in debates with experts and if San Francisco's own complex changing environment is indicative of global environmental change.

For The San Francisco World's Fair of 2007, Natalie Jeremijenko produced a limited edition of the Clear Skies Masks. Jeremijenko conducted meetings with participants committed to be involved with the long-term project. As participants bike through the city, they will measure air quality and particulate levels.

The Bayview Opera House/ Praise Frisco

In 1888 the South San Francisco Opera House was constructed as an extension of the South San Francisco Masonic Temple. Although operas were never performed there, in its early days it existed as a place to showcase dramas, vaudeville acts, and minstrel shows. As rail travel became the norm, the Southern Pacific Railroad put a line running from the south, which made a stop two blocks from the theatre. This made it inconvenient for the road companies to stop on their way to San Francisco, so the number of performances began to decline. Later a second line was built in two sections giving direct access to San Francisco proper and resulting in the decline of legitimate theater at the Opera House. This situation remained even after the 1906 Earthquake, which destroyed every other theatre in the city leaving the Opera house the only one left standing.

Over the years, the building served many different functions in the community but remained its cornerstone. This was particularly evident during the 1960s which proved to be an incredibly volatile time in Bayview's history - the area having suffered from a sudden and catastrophic lack of jobs caused by the closing of the naval shipyard. During this time poverty, combined with the strategically implemented culture of fear imposed by the police who assumed a war footing in the area, led to a week-long riot in which the Opera House and several of its surrounding buildings were ridded with hundreds of bullets. The building was renamed the Bayview Opera House and Ruth Williams Memorial theater in 1995 after Ruth Williams, an artist, community activist and Bayview resident who was largely responsible for preventing its demolition. The Opera House currently functions as a community center and rental facility.

The San Francisco World's Fair of 2007 commissioned a new work William Scott in collaboration with architect Kyu Che. William Scott is a self-taught artist capable of rendering his imagined public and private worlds with remarkable accuracy and meticulous detail. William draws, paints, and rebuilds his native San Francisco in search of the elusive normal life one of Baptist-sermon ideals and gleaming, safe, artistically franchised city centers. The entirety of his practice as an artist is aimed towards one goal: The end of San Francisco as he understands it from the vantage point of his own violence and drug riddled neighborhood of Bayview, and the emergence of Praise Frisco, a place where Scott's public longing for wholesome, peaceful interactions takes place within redeveloped idealized neighborhood landmarks largely inspired by Hunter's points existing landscape.

The work that was created for the Opera House consisted of a painting and a billboard. The painting depicts a large cityscape of Williams's idealized vision of Praise Frisco, as well three overlaid "divas", in the form of three well-known Gospel singers, onto the city. These are women that he feels exemplify the kind of citizen that will live in his idealized, new world. The billboard is a blown up version of a blue-print that William made under the direction of Kyu Che, is an interdisciplinary architect and environment designer, who was brought on to teach William the basic techniques of drafting and creating elevations. The term ÒBillboardÓ is meant to connote a counter-image, a positive, alternative image of Bayview reflected back onto itself.

Agua Vista Park/ Dwight's Soup

Agua Vista Park is located in Mission Bay, an unnaturally occurring region created with landfill during the early Twentieth century. In 1998 the Board of Supervisors set aside the Mission Bay neighborhood as a redevelopment project, encouraging the construction of luxury condominiums, high-end restaurants and retail, and biotech campus for research and development. Prior to this focus on the city's Western fringe, the area was a heavy industrial site dating back to the 1860s. The 303-acre parcel was primarily rail yards for the Southern Pacific Railroad Company and serviced the Naval shipyards just south of Mission Bay.

Mission Bay features stretching parking lots for ballgame goers, major road and building construction, and seemingly abandoned pier buildings somehow reflect the region's humble beginning as a giant dirt pile. Those who spend some time in and around Mission Bay will find its hidden gems Ð among them, the Boat Club, the Ramp, a long jogging and biking path called the Blue Greenway, and a smattering of unusual parks, such as Agua Vista.

With its blue-sequined fishing dock, colorful picnic tables, and imaginative public art, Agua Vista Park is a favorite spot for lunch breaks and local fishing. Historic shipyards and aging piers punctuate the expansive views from this little park, making it a poignant location to view the latest boat created by Poppa Neutrino for The San Francisco World's Fair of 2007.

William David Pearlman, affectionately named Poppa Neutrino, spent his early childhood in San Francisco and now, after thirty-five years and at age seventy-four, he returns to his hometown to begin a great adventure. For nearly four decades, Neutrino has lived a rent-free life, often in homes and boats made of scrap materials. In 1996 Neutrino became the second man in history to cross the Atlantic Ocean on a raft, and the first to do it on a vessel made of trash. He has traversed the Mississippi River and the Panama Canal and will soon embark on a trip across the Pacific.

For The San Francisco World's Fair of 2007, Neutrino spoke to audiences about his newest boat named for a delicious meal cooked by Neutrino's beloved son-in-law, Dwight's Soup. The 32' flat-bottomed boat is primarily constructed with plywood and Styrofoam. Outfitted with GPS and solar power, two small motors, and eventually two mast sails, Dwight's Soup will depart in late summer of 2007 for a year-long voyage to Beijing.

Third Street Corridor/ Gamespitahz

Malik Seneferu is the director of Bayview Safe Haven, an after-school program that provides tutoring and other services to youth of the Bayview-Hunters Point neighborhood. The writing collective, Gamespitahz, meets weekly at Safe Haven and according to Seneferu the group writes and reads aloud as a means to "prevent themselves from being pushed over the edge by life's pressures." A collaborative exercise that they have coined "potluck poetry" begins with a theme agreed upon by the group and one-by-one each poet enters a line until the facilitator stops the flow. The result is a complex sonnet full of diverse views and poetic styles.

For the San Francisco World's Fair of 2007, Gamespitahz were asked to write about the future of their neighborhood or their own personal futures as they imagine them. Some of the young poets took the opportunity to express their feelings about the current situation in Bayview-Hunters Point in the wake of two murders in early January 2007. The poetry was painted by Ben Smith on the front windows of the following Third Street businesses: Sundance Coffee, La Laguna, Community Produce, Double K CafŽ, and Aguila De Oro Taqueria. The students' poetry create a linear narrative along Third Street and also made visible the myriad of voices of those most affected by the current and future state of the neighborhoods.

The poem presented here was initially painted on the window of Hard Knox CafŽ for the World's Fair but was removed for unspecified reasons. The poem has been recreated at CCA for the graduate exhibition.

The Bread Me Out Family

» thebreadmeoutfamily.musicnation.com
Bread Me Out Family, a young rap group that originated in Bayview Hunters Point neighborhood, composed an anthem for the SFWF, which will be performed at the SFWF Reception on Saturday night at 8:00 at Cyclone Arts Center.

Bayview Safe Haven

» www.hunterspointfamily.org/bayview.html
Youth from Bayview Safe Haven's poetry collective, Gamespitahz, contributed poems to the SFWF catalogue. The poetry will also be on view in select window fronts along Third Street.

BAYCAT

» www.baycat.org
Bayview Hunters Point Center for Arts & Technology

Bayview Healing Arts Center

» www.bvhphealingarts.org
Bayview Healing Arts Center is the site for Amy Franceschini's Third Victory Garden, which will be planted on Sunday, April 22, 3 -7pm.

Decaycast

» www.decaycast.com
An "alternative audio tour", created by Michael Daddona and Jsun McCarty of Decaycast. Information and equipment available at the Hub.

Dogpatch and Potrero Point

» http://www.sfcityguides.org/descriptions.html#Anchor-Designated-11481
"Dogpatch and Potrero Point" is a free walking tour offered by San Francisco City Guides, a program run by the San Francisco Public Library.

Literacy for Environmental Justice (Toxic Tour)

» www.lejyouth.org
Literacy for Environmental Justice (LEJ) is an urban environmental education and youth empowerment organization created specifically to address the unique ecological and social concerns of Bayview Hunters Point, San Francisco, and the surrounding communities of Mission, Potrero Hill, Visitacion Valley, and Excelsior.

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© San Francisco World's Fair of 2007
A CURP (CCA Curatorial Practice) Project