1990 Free Speech Monument UC-B by SFAI's Mark Brest Van Kempen

Peter Selz with Mark Brest Van Kempen                            

Column of Earth and Air

While a SFAI graduate student, Mark Brest Van Kempen (MFA, 1991) won a national public art competition for his art installation honoring the 1964 Free Speech Movement at UC Berkeley.  Brest Van Kempen’s piece, placed in UC’s Sproul Plaza, titled, Column of Earth and Air consists of a “six-inch column of land and airspace”--a “circle of soil on campus declared an independent nation,” extending from the center of the earth to 60,000 feet into the atmosphere.  The granite ring surrounding this invisible column is inscribed:  “This soil and the airspace above it shall not be a part of any nation and shall not be subject to any entity’s jurisdiction.” 

With permission, SFAA is re-posting the emails Jeff Gunderson Librarian/Archivist Anne Bremer Memorial Library has been sending out since March 2020. Please enjoy this magnificent archive.

George Kuchar 1970s, ‘80s, ‘90s, ‘00s, ‘10s...

The great underground filmmaker George Kuchar arrived in San Francisco by train from New York City in the early 1970s to teach alongside a stellar group of avant-garde filmmakers. Any day you crossed paths with this charismatic filmmaker, actor, writer, director, painter….was a GOOD DAY. The titles of some of his class films include: Club Vatican; Art Asylum; Queen Conga; Planet of the Vamps; Evangelust; The Smutty Professor; I Married a Heathen; Hush, Hush Sweet Harlot; and Dialogue of the Devil Dolls.  For any of you who would like to have some of the real George Kuchar story, please read his and his twin brother Mike’s auto-biography titled: REFLECTIONS FROM A CINEMATIC CESSPOOL and for a terrific biopic check out Jennifer Kroot’s (studied 94/95) It Came From Kucharhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwZoUX3CxXE

Faune Yerby’s 1989 portrait of George Kuchar with his self-portrait

from Yerby’s artists’ book, Persona

With permission, SFAA is re-posting the emails Jeff Gunderson Librarian/Archivist Anne Bremer Memorial Library has been sending out since March 2020. Please enjoy this magnificent archive.

2019 Patti Smith at SFAI

In January 2019, poet, singer, writer, songwriter, Patti Smith’s fascination with Diego Rivera led to her performance at the School posting that “The historic SFAI is a jewel, a work-centric atmosphere of communal process and artistic evolution.”

With permission, SFAA is re-posting the emails Jeff Gunderson Librarian/Archivist Anne Bremer Memorial Library has been sending out since March 2020. Please enjoy this magnificent archive.