We have been following on this blog the saga of the San Francisco Art Institute Diego Rivera mural. First it appeared it might be sold. The UC Regents got somehow involved. The mural has become a national issue. From the NY Times:
On Tuesday, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted 11-0 to start the process to designate a beloved Diego Rivera mural as a landmark after the San Francisco Art Institute, which owns the $50 million painting, said that selling it would help pay off $19.7 million of debt.
Designating the mural as a landmark would severely limit how the 150-year-old institution could leverage it, and public officials behind the measure say that selling it is likely to be off the table for now. Removing the mural with landmark status would require approval from the city’s Historic Preservation Commission, which has broad authority.
“There’s a lot of money in this town,” said Aaron Peskin, a board member from the district where the institute resides and a sponsor of the proposal. “There are better ways to get out of their mess than a harebrained scheme of selling the mural.”
During a public hearing on the resolution on Monday, officials of the Art Institute objected to the idea. Pam Rorke Levy, chairwoman of the Art Institute board, said, “Landmarking the mural now, when there is no imminent threat of it being sold, without sufficient consideration of S.F.A.I.’s position would deprive S.F.A.I. of its primary and most valuable asset.”
The 1931 work, titled “The Making of a Fresco Showing the Building of a City,” is a fresco within a fresco. The tableau portrays the creation of both a city and a mural — with architects, engineers, artisans, sculptors and painters hard at work. Rivera himself is seen from the back, holding a palette and brush, with his assistants. It is one of three frescoes in San Francisco by the Mexican muralist, who was an enormous influence on other artists in the city.
Years of costly expansions and declining enrollment have put S.F.A.I. in a difficult financial situation made worse by the pandemic and a default on a loan. Last July, a private bank announced that it would sell the school’s collateral — including its Chestnut Street campus, the Rivera mural and 18 other artworks — before the University of California Board of Regents stepped in to buy the debt in October. Through a new agreement, the institute has six years to repurchase the property; if it doesn’t, the University of California would take possession of the campus...
Full story at: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/12/arts/design/rivera-mural-to-become-landmark.html
1 comment:
Seems you've got the wrong mural. This is talking about the San Francisco Art Institute, has nothing to do with the murals at UCSF, which are by a different artist.
Post a Comment