Artists Go Lightly

Inaugural Project: Artists Go Lightly
A Community Event, Art Exhibition and Fundraiser for the San Francisco Tenants Union

Documentary on Current TV

San Francisco Bay Guardian Critic's Pick

Saturday, July 28, 2007
3917 22nd Street @ Castro
San Francisco

This exhibition and community event took place in the Noe Valley/Castro flat of two artists who have faced significant housing rights issues in the past and left San Francisco for other opportunities. The event occurred during the open-ended, limbo period after the home was emptied, but before the keys were turned in to the landlord.

Participating Artists:
Tim Armstrong, Victor Barbieri, Chris Baird, Sarah Barsness, James Barsness, Timothy Berry, Susannah Bettag, Claire Brandt, Omar Chacon, Elizabeth Chiles, Lisa Chou, Jonathan Collis, Modesto Covarrubias, Amanda Curreri, Terina Danielle, Beth Deters, Dierdre Dunphy, Sarah Edwards, Maggie Lee Foster, Peter Foucault, Carla Fraga, Rani Goel, Andrew Goldfarb, James Gouldthourpe, Theresa Gooby, Dorothy Goode, Jessalyn Haggenjos, David Hamill, Miya Hannan, Keith Hale, Bryan Hewitt, Dee Hibbert-Jones, Elyse Hochstadt, Cynthia Hooper, Misa Inaoka, Colter Jacobsen, Kaoru Kanai, Hiroyo Kanako, Rainen Knecht, Eila Kovanen, Melanie C. Lacy Kusters, Betsy Lam, Mia Liu, Casey Logan, Sam Lopes, Francis McIlveen, Jennifer Merrill, Yvette Molina, Nyeema Morgan, Mark Mulroney, Roger Ngim, Justin O'Neill, Nanda Palmieri, Francesca Pastine, Laura Paulini, Jeannie Pettigrew, Mel Prest, Andrew Rottner, Catherine Saiki, San Francisco Bureau of Urban Secrets, Chika Sato, Slim, Brian Stinemetz, Casey Jex Smith, Regina Sol, Lisa Stoneman, Nomi Talisman, Tawanda, Josefa Vaughan, Andy Venell, Robin Ward, Brian Wasson, Michael Wong, Jeong-Im Yi, Anne Yoch, Nina Zurier

The day-long exhibition functioned in multiple ways:

• As an exhibit in which the walls were completely covered with “light” work by scores of emerging, mid-career, and established Bay Area, and former Bay Area, artists. Artwork was rotated throughout the course of the day.

• As a fundraiser for the San Francisco Tenants Union. As the work was rotated, it was available for purchase, resulting in the largest fundraiser in SFTU history.

• As a communal event for artists, activists, and other members of the San Francisco community. Food was shared, and art materials gifted or exchanged on the hour every hour for the day. TAM is taking a cue from the wildly popular Slideluck Potshow, a Brooklyn based community project for artists.

The San Francisco Tenants Union is a volunteer-based, membership-supported non-profit that has accomplished significant victories for housing rights in a city where the high stakes real estate game has homogenized the city by driving out other varied demographics, including artists. In 2006, among other achievments, the SFTU pushed the passage of Proposition H (relocation benefits to no-fault evictions) and the Passage of Proposition B in June (requiring realtors to disclose to potential buyers whenever tenants have been evicted from units being sold empty).

(Disclosure: in this first project supported by the Temporary Autonomous Museum, one of the two artists whose home it is happen to be the co-founders of the Museum).