Category Archives: art

2023 De Young Open

Snaps from the 2023 #deYoungOpen artist preview from yesterday, Tuesday, September 26, 2023. Pictured above (top left) is my photograph, designated as number 20 in the exhibit, titled What it Says, a Covid-19 slice of life. Above my photograph is a beautiful quilt depicting the American Sign Language alphabet.

The exhibit is five or six rooms of impressive art forms that will awe you and instill pride in the richness of expression, humanity, and creativity. Just so impressive! I am honored to have my photograph included.

Community open day is this Saturday, September 30, 2023. There will be live music, pop-up food trucks, and film screenings. Mark your calendar! For more information please visit here and https://deyoungopen2023.artcall.org/pages/web-gallery 

CAPTIONS (top, left to right) Participating artists only day! Overall view images of artists enjoying each others work, milling about. A colorful rainbow entry greets all entering The deYoung museum.

Vertical image: Alberto, intake curator gives me a smile and notes that my photograph is officially in his hands and catalogued as part of the 2023 deYoung Museum Open. I smiled right back. My photograph titled What it Says, a Covid19 slice-of-life was taken while walking on Market Street, during a shopping trip for essentials during the shelter-in-place order.

Next series are images viewed through the gallery app. Enter the image number in the search field to obtain the artist name, title, artist statement and description.

Images 052 and 053: The top image, number 52, Untitled: from the series of Racial Portraits by Mark I. Chester and below image number 53 titled: Happy: A Marin Homeless Encampment by David Santschi.

Image 793: Photograph titled Ghosts from the Past, by Yunfei Ren, selected for the 2023 deYoung Museum Open.

What It says Redux

Mark your calendars for a day celebrating community artistic expression at the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park on September 30.  All Bay Area residents enter free. I’m so very happy to have my slice-of-life photograph, titled What it Says, wild art in the time of covid, included in the 2023 de Young Museum Open Call. The photograph taken  downtown on Market Street celebrates 50 years of Hip-Hop music and heralds San Francisco as a birthplace of music and musicians who have long called the city by the bay their home. The exhibition runs from 30 September till 7 January, 2024. Hope to see you there. 

Molecule Man

Molecule Man, is a series of aluminum sculptures, created by American artist Jonathan Borofsky. Installed in time for the summer Olympics, the sculpture is 32-feet high by 20-feet in diameter.

Mr. Borofsky says about the sculpture, “at the time I first conceived of this sculpture, I had been fascinated by the fact that the human body, though appearing quite solid, is mostly made up of water. In fact 97% of our body is made up of a water molecule which is ‘sea’ or salt water based, leading many scientists to hypothesize that the human species originated in the ocean.”

 

I had to smell the rain; six feet apart

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Image copyright Ana Elisa Fuentes and licensed through Stockimo/ Alamy. 

Throwback Thursday

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Who says California doesn’t have culture?

Oh, heart be still. Nostalgia is in the air … It’s a blast from the past.. Is it a surfin’ safari that’s gone awry? No it’s a 1961 Mercury Meteor station wagon an, automobile manufactured in the United Stated and named for the Mercury space race from a mirrored era gone by.

This surfin’ safari machine, on a warm autumn day, parked under still Acacia trees depicts an era, stood still in time, hopefully an era that hasn’t left us?

An era of civility, peace, and goodness among neighbors.

Oh, heart be still.

Art Walk,Wild Art

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Wild Art is a newspaper term that refers to found images that are unplanned, or unscheduled; a branch of street photography you might say. On this occasion I was on a walk with a friend, and noticed our shadows on the sidewalk.. Et Voilà, there you go, here we are!

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A crow nestles in a blooming Century plant. The tall yellow flowers may reach a height of 25-30 feet. The plant native to California is also known as an Agave and Agave Americana.

(Re)dedication

 Today, members of the Coastal and Valley tribe of the Chumash joined together with members of the Santa Barbara community to re-dedicate the Dolphin fountain at the waterfront.

IMG_5400 The fountain which honors the Dolphin relatives of the Chumash people, was enshrined thirty years ago today.

IMG_5402 IMG_5416The Dolphins face the northern direction and its placement in the fountain symbolizes harmony in the three worlds. Since we are in severe drought, plants have replaced the flow of water; the Chumash people sang traditional  and contemporary songs in their language – to honor and welcome the plants, their Dolphin ancestors and the flow of life; which includes the revitalization of the Chumash language.IMG_5390Ho!

Learn more about Chumash life, culture and song here.

Text and photos copyright Ana Elisa Fuentes. Photos captured with Apple iPod

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A nomadic woman walks with her belongings to the river, along the Plateau of Tibet, at elevation of 12,000 feet. Selected for the Voices Exhibition, on the occasion of The First Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, at the United Nations, in New York, New York. Photographed on Kodak color slide film with flash fill. Photo copyright Ana Elisa Fuentes.

Nuns walk with their dri ( a juvenile yak) on the Plateau of Tibet. Image copyright Ana Elisa Fuentes. Photographed on color slide film, donated by Kodak. Selected for the Voice exhibition, on the occasion of The First Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, United Nations.

Nuns walk with their dri ( a juvenile yak) on the Plateau of Tibet. Image copyright Ana Elisa Fuentes. Photographed on color slide film, donated by Kodak. Selected for the Voice exhibition, on the occasion of The First Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, United Nations.

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Two women wait for a bus in Bluefields, Nicaragua. Selected for the Voices Exhibition, on the occasion of The First Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. Photographed on Kodak color film. Photo copyright Ana Elisa Fuentes.

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Women, members of the Dani tribe mourn, the passing of their tribal chief, in the Baliem Valley, of Irian Jaya. A very rare photograph. I was permitted to sit on my haunches at the entrance to the mourning hut to record three frames. Recorded on color film. Photo copyright Ana Elisa Fuentes. Selected for the Voices Exhibition, on the occasion of The First Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.

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A refugee from the war in El Salvador, this young girl studies at a school in San Miguel Desamparados, a village outside the of San José, Costa Rica. Recorded on Kodak black and white film, copyright Ana Elisa Fuentes. Selected for the Voices Exhibition, on the occasion of The First Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. Selected for the exhibition by Her Eminence Mary Robinson.

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Children on a street corner, with a playful scheme in mind, in Havana, Cuba. Recorded on black and white film. Image copyright, Ana Elisa Fuentes. Selected for the Voices Exhibition, on the occasion of The First Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.

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A mother carries cooking embers with her children following behind, on a main street in Port-au-Prince,Haiti. This photograph was recorded after the UN exhibit. However, it illustrates one of the main points in my presentation which I will deliver in Oxford, England, next month. Digital image, photo copyright, Ana Elisa Fuentes

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A Haitian hurricane survivor waits for medical attention, at a refugee camp, in Jimani, Dominican Republic. Digital image copyright, Ana Elisa Fuentes. This photograph was recorded after the UN exhibit. However, it illustrates one of the main points in my presentation which I will deliver in Oxford, England, next month. Photography copyright, Ana Elisa Fuentes

All images copyright Ana Elisa Fuentes.

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World Refugee Day

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World Refugee Day

Nomadic Woman, Plateau of Tibet

Photograph copyright, Ana Elisa Fuentes

Photographed on film donated by Kodak.