Off The Wall

Sometimes in San Francisco street art is not on the street, but on the sidewalk...

  

 

Langton near Harrison

There you are (I was) standing near the corner of Harrison and 7^th Street… waiting for the #47 line… and it’s a hot day… you’re sweating (I’m sweating) from walking the long blocks in the heat… and MUNI’s running late… (nothing new)…

You decide (I decide) to walk it… seeking the shade, hoping to luck into some new street art; traditional murals, pop-art paintings, legal advertising… even some graffiti.

The first block away from the hot corner is Langton.

You turn right (I turn right) and the clean-cut, red-colored building is your (my) first clue that something on Langton has changed… you (I) walk towards the shade of SOMA trees and you (I) realize that change can be good… it can be beautiful… soothing… when you (I) notice this new mural by Santo. New to your (my) eyes, as the mural’s already 3 or 4 months old. In mural years, that’s old enough to drive.

 

You (I) continue to walk towards your (my) destination… eventually flagging a cab, going home for a quick shower and ordering some Indian food for lunch while checking out these photos on the large monitor.

Such is life of a street art photographer. 

See more photos from SOMA.

Discover Horace Alley

It’s an alley, even though it’s not identified as such on Google Maps and the various paper maps I checked out. It’s also an art gallery, even though nobody’s talking about the murals you’ll see there.

Horace Alley, between 25^th and 26^th Streets (and Folsom and Shotwell) will reward the ambitions street art lover for temporarily stepping away from 24^th Street… 

That’s right, if your journey is limited to the treasures along the known 24^th Street corridor you might miss Horace altogether and not get a chance to stand face to face with the works shown here. And there’s so much more to see at Horace than what I’m able to show you…

The Mission District continues to surprise me with new, fresh, accessible and obscure artworks when I’m not expecting them. Whether it’s the North Mission or the South Mission, this is where the heart and soul of street art lives.

Within a short walk from Horace Alley you’ll find Balmy, Cypress and Lilac. 
“Balmy, Cypress and Lilac, oh my!”

City Park’s “Welders” Mural Vandalized

Continuing the senseless tradition of destroying beautiful things for no good reason, the City Park mural (on Market near South Van Ness) was recently vandalized, perhaps to death. 

This is what the City Park mural looked like BEFORE the tagging.