“What do we matter?  What do we matter?, temporary mural, Alemany at
Sickles (under Highway 280), San Francisco

Project Title: What Do You Think?
Recipient Organization: Precita Eyes Muralists Association, Inc.
Lead Artist: Seyed Alavi
Genre and Date Awarded: Visual Arts, July 1997
Completed: 24 murals executed in 1999-2000

Collaborating with teenage artists and Precita Eyes Muralists Association, Seyed Alavi created a series of 24 temporary text murals in the form of comic book thought balloons. Participating youth were part of the Precita Eyes Urban Youth Arts Program. Estria, a well-regarded spraycan artist, contributed his distinctive lettering style to the project and assisted youth with executing the murals.

Phrases inside the balloons were selected by the youth, culled from comic books and graphic novels. They included:

• Who do you trust more, me or my name?
• My desire is to dream, my wish is to wake up, and my hope not to be a dream
• It tastes a bit like forever.
• It is still a noble thing to open cages.
• There are countless cities, worlds and realms out there. So much knowledge to catch in the web of time.
• Freedom—could it really be so close?

Many of the murals were strategically placed over phone booths, bus stops, and other locations where they appeared to be the thoughts of people walking or standing below them. The murals were proposed as temporary (3-6 month) pieces, but some building owners liked and chose to keep them. Two years after the project’s completion, the collaborating organization wrote, “Even to this day, Precita Eyes continues to receive positive calls responding to the art work.” Six of the mural images were published as a set of perforated postcards in an edition of 2,000.

While the project’s tone was playful, the collaborating artists intended to engage both the young people and the general public in a process of reflection and contemplation. Each message suggested large questions concerning life, reality, culture, and society. At the project’s outset, Alavi wrote, “I am interested in creating works that are poetic and accessible to the public at large. At one levels the mural are simple and basic, almost vernacular, yet similar to a Koan riddle, they could propel the viewer to an experience of insight.”

The collaborators spent a nine-month period developing the pieces. At weekly meetings the artists and youth discussed both logistics of the project and viewed samples of public artworks using text, agreeing to some general concepts and themes. They read a range of comic books and novels, selecting sentences and phrases that appealed to them. From these they chose the “thought balloon” messages, testing each phrase for its ability to stand on its own and for its relationship to the group’s larger vision. After working with the youth to sketch initial designs, Seyed Alavi consulted with Estria on the lettering styles and layouts. Estria, six guest spray can artists, and 15 students performed the execution of the murals.

While Seyed Alavi took primary responsibility for selecting the desired sites for the murals, Precita Eyes worked to secure permissions for their use from property owners. This proved to be slower and more time-consuming than originally imagined (taking two years rather than six months), with Precita Eyes researching more than 200 sites. The organization’s staff succeeded at gaining access to a range of excellent placements for the murals—from the exterior of the Riteway Market on Precita Avenue to a wall at the San Francisco Art Institute Annex building. Seyed Alavi also secured use of eight freeway underpasses through Cal Trans. Because of the extra labor that went into this logistical aspect of the project, and because some of the finished works were larger than originally planned, the collaborators limited the mural series to 24 pieces (originally 30 had been proposed).

Before undertaking, “What Do You Think?” Seyed Alavi had completed a number of collaborative public art projects working with youth and featuring text. In 1992, with 14 students from three different Oakland high schools, he created “Words by Roads,” monumental text murals painted on highway underpasses in Oakland. This temporary project was meant to be up for only six months, but was so popular that Cal Trans was inspired to keep them. In 1993 he created and presented, “Last Words,” for which he videotaped 700 responses from high school students to the question, “Imagine that you have the opportunity to speak on national television, but are limited to a single word?” In “Selected Words,” he worked with youth to create a text-based work for the San Rafael Public Library in Marin County. More recently, for “In Vision,” (2000), he met with ten high school students over the course of ten weeks to explore: “Imagine that you are making a movie about your self, your life, your likes, dislikes, concerns, interests, ambitions, and goals; a movie about who you are and how you envision yourself, but you are limited to only one frame. How would you portray yourself?” Starting with pin-hole cameras and then using 33mm, the participants engaged in a process of insightful play. Afterwards, they digitally manipulated and constructed their images, layering them with meanings, moods, and emotions. The finished images were presented on the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art garage’s architectural windows.

Precita Eyes Mural Art Center, established in 1977, and currently located in San Francisco’s Mission District, is a multipurpose community based arts organization that has played an integral role in the city’s cultural heritage. One of only three community mural centers in the United States, Precita Eyes sponsors and implements ongoing mural projects throughout the Bay Area and internationally. In addition, it offers weekly art classes for children and youth (18 months to 19 years) along with classes for adults. These classes and community mural projects for teenagers enable children and youth to develop their individuality and confidence through creative activities and to experience unifying, positive, social interaction. More than 20,000 students and tourists have walked from Precita Eyes for a curated tour of more than 80 murals along an eight-block walk.

“It tastes a bit like forever,” temporary mural, Bayshore and Paul (under Highway 101), San Francisco

Seyed Alavi

Installations at Public Sites

• Horace Mann Elementary School, San Jose, California (2003)
• Uncovering, Emeryville City Hall, Emeryville, California (2003)
• A Sense of Unity, Valley Medical Hospital, San Jose, California (2002)
• Who Am I?, Market Street Kiosks, Market Street Art-in-Transit Project, San Francisco Arts Commission, San Francisco, California (2002)
• The color of my dream, Zeum, San Francisco, California (2001)
• Speaking Stones, Richmond Community Center, San Francisco, California (2000)
• InVision, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art Garage, San Francisco, California (2000)
• What Do You Think?, San Francisco, California (1999)
• Where is Fairfield? Fairfield, California (1995)
• Forgotten Language, Palo Alto, California (1994)
• Selected Words, San Rafael, California 1993
• Richmond Community Center, San Francisco, California (1993)
• “Pasadena Metro Project,” Pasadena, California (1993)
• Neptune’s Gate, Manhattan Beach, California (1993)
• A Sense of Place, Richmond, California (1993)
• Words by Roads, Oakland, California (1992)

Installations in Museums/Galleries

• Renunciation: A Requium, University Art Gallery, Sonoma State University, Rohnert Park, California (2003)
• Drawn by Light, University Art Museum, San Bernadino, California (2000)
• Drawn by Light, Art Gallery, San Bernadino Valley College, California (2000)
• Canticles of Ecstasy, deSaisset Museum, Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, California (1998)
• Unconscious Enigma-Youth collaboration, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, California (1998)
• Remembrance, Art Museum of Santa Cruz County, Santa Cruz, California (1996)
• Garden of Secrets, University Art Museum, Long Beach, California (1995)
• There is no place like here, Franklin Furnace, New York, New York (1994)
• Here, Capp Street Project, San Francisco, California (1992)
• Last Words, New Museum of Contemporary Arts, New York, New York (1992)

Group Exhibitions

• Sm.ART Gallery, Munich, Germany (2003)
• Pac Art, Los Angeles, California (2003)
• Oakland Museum of Art, Oakland, California (2002)
• M.Y. Art Prospects Gallery, New York, New York (2001)
• San Francisco Museum of Modern Art Artists’ Gallery, San Francisco, California (2001)
• Kala Institute, Berkeley, California (2000)
• Eric Dean Gallery, Wabash College, Indiana (1998)
• DeSaisset Museum, Santa Clara University (1997)
• DePree Art Center, Hope College, Michigan (1997)
• Pro Arts, Oakland, California (1997)
• ICA, San Jose, California (1996)
• Hearst Art Gallery, St. Mary’s College, Moraga, California (1996)
• Falkirk Cultural Center, San Rafael, California (1995)
• SOMAR, San Francisco, California (1995)
• San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, San Jose, California (1994)
• Euphrat Museum of Art, San Jose, California (1994)
• Richmond Art Center, Richmond, California (1993)
• San Jose Museum of Modern Art, San Jose, California (1992)
• The Museum of Contemporary Religious Art, St. Louis, Missouri (1992)
• Richmond Art Center, Richmond, California (1991)

Awards/Grants

• National Endowment for the Arts, United States/Japan Artists’ Fellowship (2002)
• California Arts Council (2001)
• LEF Foundation Grant (2000)
• Creative Work Fund (1997)
• Howard Foundation Merit Award, Brown University (1995)
• Oakland Business Arts awards (1995)
• Most Unusual Mural Award, Precita Eyes Mural Arts Center (1995)
• Artists Project Grant, LACE/New Langton Arts (1994)
• Creative Artists Fellowship, City of Oakland (1994)
• Western States Arts Federation (1993)
• Art Matters Inc grants (1993, 1990)
• Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant (1990)
• David McMillan Memorial Award (1989)

Residencies

• University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (2003)
• United States/Japan Creative Artists’ Residency (2002)
• University Art Museum, Long Beach, California (1995)
• Capp Street Project, San Francisco, California (1992)
• Blue Mountain Residency, Blue Mountain Lake, New York (1991)
• John Michael Kohler Arts Center Residency, Sheboygan, Wisconsin (1990)
• Djerassi Foundation Residency, Woodside, California (1990)

Teaching Experience

• Visiting Faculty, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, California (2003)
• Visiting artist, Kyoto Seika University, Kyoto, Japan (2002)
• Lecturer, Inter Arts Center, San Francisco State University, San Francisco, California (2001)
• Youth Workshop, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, California (2000)
• Instructor, Youth Ambassador Program, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, California (1998)
• Sculpture Instructor, California College of Arts and Crafts, Oakland, California (1996-97)
• Sculpture Instructor, University of California, Davis (1995)
• Visiting Artist, San Francisco Art Institute (1995)
• Summer Workshop, California College of Arts and Crafts, Oakland, California (1994)
• Visiting Artist, Evergreen College, San Jose, California (1993)

“It is…I just feel something wonderful is about to happen,” temporary mural, Third Street and Harrison (under Highway 80), San Francisco

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