Reading the several posts that have
been written about graffiti got me interested in learning how much art
galleries have been impacted by gentrification. While I was reading about different San Francisco galleries, I found an article that talked about the George Krevsky Gallery, the Rena Bransten Gallery, and Patricia Sweetow Gallery, all galleries of 77 Geary St., that are being forced out
by a “cloud computing startup,” MuleSoft. They are just three of many galleries
that are slowly disappearing, but these particulary caught my eye because the
article (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/23/is-san-francisco-losing-its-soul)
connects them with Ferlinghetti. Apparently the Krevsky Gallery has been
showing Ferlinghetti’s artwork for two decades (which was surprising to me
since I hadn’t known he was an artist), but now it is closing because it can’t
afford the rent. Krevsky says, "We live in a tough neighborhood… at the
intersection of tech and greed. It's impacted the world I've been working in
passionately for 30 years." This is a bleak outlook, but it mirrors what
we have been talking about in class and section all quarter—the disappearance
of San Francisco’s countercultural, multicultural, queer culture due to the
influx of techies and general white, middle/upper class.
You can go here to see more of Ferlinghetti’s art if you’re
interested. They seem to be inspired by beat-esque spontaneity and be about anti-war,
anti-censorship, San Francisco (of course), freedom of body and mind, etc.
http://www.georgekrevskygallery.com/dynamic/artist_artwork.asp?ArtistID=15
Really what I think this exemplifies is the growing trend away from traditional styles of art in this contemporary era. Less and less people these days are interested in paint-on-canvas-style art and they are turning towards more technological and interactive styles of art. I think that we see this in the rise of performance art and photography based pieces as accepted art forms. While I think that it is a shame that these San Francisco galleries are being forced out by tech companies, I do not see this shift in artistic taste as a negative thing, but more of a natural progression of what we value in art
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