New Absolutely-Must-Visit Poster Print Shop And Gallery In San Francisco

If you’re going to San Francisco - or if you’re lucky enough to live there - the Haight Street Art Center (HSAC), a first-of-its-kind poster print shop and gallery that supports a collective of poster artists, is a must visit.

Dennis Larkins' incredible "Eyeconic" flies high above a wall of rock posters.

With 7,000 square feet of gallery exhibition space, HSAC is one of the largest galleries devoted to poster art in the United States. In addition to the print shop, the Center features community engagement facilities, including a classroom for teaching poster art techniques, a special events space, and a large gallery. Permanent and temporary exhibitions will be free of charge to the public, and the Center and its artists will sell silkscreen and offset prints.

Founded on a cooperative operational model, the HSAC features a state-of-the-art print shop to be managed by and for artists. The Center’s business model offers artists low overhead costs to improve the economics for creating and selling poster art. 

Exercising public art’s proven power to attract, inspire and connect, HSAC will serve not only the Lower Haight, but the city at large with educational programming for the San Francisco community: from students to seniors, apprentices to master artists, and the local residents to visitors.

The Art of Consciousness 

Mariusz Knorowski, Chief Curator at Poster Museum at Wilanów, Warsaw, Poland.

The inaugural exhibition, “The Art of Consciousness,” features more than 90 seminal works from 1965 to 1967. On display will be never-before-seen Family Dog original art from the “Big Five” of San Francisco rock poster art – Rick Griffin, Alton Kelley, Victor Moscoso, Stanley Mouse, and Wes Wilson – whose vision inspired thousands of young people in San Francisco and provided the visual vocabulary for the vibrant community that formed in the Haight-Ashbury.

“It covers the evolution of poster art before the Summer of Love, from the Seed and Are We Next in 1965 through the psychedelic Avalon and Fillmore posters of the spring of 1967,” said Moonalice guitarist and poster philanthropist, Roger McNamee. “Check it out!”

The Art of Consciousness” runs through September. Entrance is free. Regular hours are 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Sunday. 215 Haight St., San Francisco: https://haightstreetart.org

About Haight Street Art Center

The Haight Street Art Center (HSAC) is a 501(c)3 non-profit San Francisco arts collective established to promote poster art production and education. The Center’s community outreach relates to poster art history and cultural impact along with a deep commitment to extending San Francisco’s proud heritage of publicly accessible artwork—artwork created to celebrate, advocate, and connect people.

Left to Right: Roger McNamee, Jeremy Fish and Peter McQuaid at the Grand Opening of the HSAC.

Celebration Of Poster Art At The Haight Street Art Center

Situated in the heart of Haight at 215 Haight Street, near the corner of Laguna, the Haight Street Art Center opened its doors to the public on Saturday 1 July with a Grand Opening that included activities for kids, printing demonstrations for adults, gallery tours, and a welcoming address from Mariusz Knorowski, Chief Curator at Poster Museum at Wilanów, the oldest poster museum in the world located in Warsaw, Poland.

Festivities began at 1pm with a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the iconic Bronze Bunny, gatekeeper to San Francisco’s Lower Haight neighborhood. 

A series of galleries displayed 90 posters from the breakthrough years of 1965-67 in the opening exhibit entitled “The Art of Consciousness," while artists demonstrated the silk screen process, enabling visitors to walk out with a freshly inked poster.

Celebration of poster art

The “Big Five” of poster art, who made San Francisco the epicenter of the genre are well represented: Stanley Mouse, Wes Wilson, Alton Kelly, Victor Moscoso and Rick Griffin. 

“The purpose of the art center is to invigorate poster art by providing a print shop and gallery that dramatically lowers the cost of creating and selling poster art,” said Roger McNamee, the Moonalice lead singer and guitarist with a passion for poster art. “It also provides a platform so that the artists can form and manage a collective for mutual benefit."

When Moonalice started in 2007 as a ’60s-style San Francisco psychedelic roots band, one of the founding precepts was a freshly produced poster for every show. “We figured we’d play 30 or 40 shows a year,” said McNamee, adding, “And we’ve played 100 shows a year for 10 years.” There are now close to 1,000 Moonalice posters, many of which paper the walls as well as the stairwell between the floors at the art center.

Moonalice model

In the day of the Big Five, poster artists were paid around $500 for a poster plus a dozen copies. The promoter, or the band, got the copyright, which meant that if a design hit it big in the aftermarket, the income from all those concert posters sold in bookstores and record stores went to someone other than the artist.

This is in stark contrast to the Moonalice business model, which is to pay the artist more up front, plus allow the artist keeps the copyright. There are some 35 artists in the Moonalice stable, and they will be the first to benefit from the art center’s platform.

Living history museum

The building is part of a Spanish Revival complex put up by the Works Progress Administration in 1934 as San Francisco State Teachers College. It sits on a huge lot, most of which has been developed into market-rate housing by Wood Partners.

“This is like a living history museum on top of a museum,” said Peter McQuaid, executive director of the center, who will oversee a staff of four. “We want to return to the craftsmanship where the artists print the work themselves.”

The art center includes the original San Francisco State entrance on the southeast corner of Haight and Buchanan streets, and occupies the down-slope annex, its mid-block entrance marked by the Bronze Bunny sculpture by Jeremy Fish. The entry is on the gallery level, with the print shop above it fully outfitted with scanners, printers and racks of paper.

Opening exhibition

The opening exhibition, “The Art of Consciousness,” runs through September. Entrance is free. Regular hours are 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Sunday. 215 Haight St., S.F. https://haightstreetart.org

Re-Live The Summer That Rocked The World

"The Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion, and Rock & Roll" reception last night at the de Young Museum saw Partner, Enthusiast, Sustaining, Supporting, and Contributor Members celebrating the 50th anniversary of the colorful counter culture that blossomed in San Francisco, as they enjoyed an exclusive first look at the exhibition before it opens to the public on Saturday 8 April. 

The experience immerses you in the sights, sounds, and cultural achievements of a summer that rocked the world. Turn back time as you enjoy music, film screenings, art-making, artist-led tours and more while helping celebrate the 50th anniversary of San Francisco's 1967 Summer of Love. Highlights include screen-printing demonstrations by poster art activists, live music from San Francisco Airship and a community-led Human Be-In(volved).

Photograph by Marc Margolis

Featuring a wide array of iconic rock posters, period photographs, interactive music and light shows, “out-of-this-world” clothing, and avant-garde films, this exhibition celebrates San Francisco’s rebellious and colorful counterculture that blossomed in the years surrounding the 1967 Summer of Love. This immersive experience explores, through a succession of themed galleries, the visual and material cultures of a generation searching for personal fulfillment and social change. Presenting key cultural artifacts of the time, San Francisco’s Summer of Love introduces and explores the events and experiences that today define this dynamic era.

“This show is incredible!!! It tells a wonderful story, including, art, music and clothing. The archives of the Haight Street Art Center and Center for Counterculture Studies are well represented," commented Roger McNamee of Bay Area psychedelic jam band Moonalice. "There are 25 or 26 pieces ... keep your eyes peeled!!!” 

Photograph by Marc Margolis

Check out the full program for opening day, and use the hashtag #SummerofLoveSF to share your thoughts and photos during the day via Twitter and Instagram, and watch out for a special Summer of Love geofilter on Snapchat.

All activities are free and open to the public. Pop-up tours require an exhibition ticket. Seats for ‘REVOLUTION’ and 'Berkeley in the Sixties' are free and offered on a first come, first served basis. Fees apply for admission to the special exhibition, ‘The Summer of Love Experience.’

The Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion, and Rock & Roll runs April 8th through August 20th at the de Young Museum. Tickets can be purchased at deyoungmuseum.org.

Venue: de Young Museum

50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive

San Francisco , CA 94118

Website: http://deyoung.famsf.org/