November 29, 2012, San Francisco, CA—  SOMArts Cultural Center presents Speak Your Peace, a group exhibition January 4 through 24, 2013 curated by SOMArts’ Curator & Gallery Director Justin Hoover. Opening with a reception on Friday, January 4, 2013, 6–9pm, the exhibition brings together Bay Area-based painters, digital, video and installation artists ranging in age, ethnicity and nationality to explore intercultural communication and social justice and propose new iconographies of peace through visual art.

Included works by more than 20 artists and organizations present cycles of destruction and reconstruction through Japanese-American symbols of identity, draw upon traditional and symbolic Persian and Iranian cultural iconographies, debate the value of the prison-industrial complex in the United States and Cuba, reinterpret historic narratives relating to Salvadorian military histories, expose stories of radical, personal self-expression in the face of persecution through Persian-influenced graffiti installations and discuss the manifold ways popular media informs the way we envision and discuss peace.

“Seeing Peace,” an ongoing project by featured artist, activist and San Francisco native Richard Kamler, inspires the curatorial concept as well as satellite and gallery components for the exhibition. For Speak Your Peace, Hoover builds upon Kamler’s practice of pairing established contemporary artists with highly visible public space in an effort to collectively, publicly and imaginatively define peace.

Hoover commented, "Street level curating, such as for corporate billboards, enables artists to work in new ways, at new scales and at new levels of visibility and allows the work to confront the public instead of being cloistered inside a gallery or museum. To a degree, billboard installations democratize the architecture of public iconographic discourse and penetrate the ubiquity of commercial iconography.”

Five newly commissioned, large-scale, digitally printed banners feature new work by Victor Cartagena, Ala Ebtekar, John Halaka and Taraneh Hemami as well as Evan Bissell, whose image was selected through a public open call issued by SOMArts in October 2012 to artists living in San Francisco, Alameda or Contra Costa counties.

Additionally SOMArts funds the printing of two images for public display in billboard advertising space donated by CBS Corporation. This pair of billboards at the intersection of 4th and Brannan Streets in San Francisco will exhibit “Ascension” by Ala Ebtekar and “Can I Tolerate Intolerance” by Uzi Broshi, December 10, 2012 through January 10, 2013.

In the gallery Kamler’s “Last Supper” and “Waiting Room,” a sculptural table made of lead and gold leaf and a large-scale led and acrylic sculptural installation with projected video, investigate capital punishment in the United States prison-industrial complex and communication failures both personal and societal.  

A highly chromatic graffiti installation by Iranian born artists CK1 and Shaghayegh Cyrous reinterprets peace through the lens of Persian graphic and street art. Additional painters include Berkeley artists Betty Nobue Kano and Evan Bissell. “Seeing Peace” by Kano, is a mixed media painting with origami overlays in which broken promises, remembrance and forgiveness take the form of torn and mended canvas. “Meditations,” a series of four oil paintings by Bissell, depicts hands clutching symbolic prayer beads created from corn, shells, pennies, bottle caps and worn pencils.  

South African-born artist Clinton Fein, whose video screens in the gallery annex, uses actors and staged sets to recreate infamous torture scenes from the detainment camp at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, Cuba, and asserts that violence must not be ignored or forgotten in the pursuit of peace.

Additionally Speak Your Peace includes photography and text-based installations from local arts education organizations including The Institute on Aging’s Center for Elders and Youth in the Arts, led by Jessica McKracken and Silvi Alcivar, as well as The Victorian Manor Poets in collaboration with Creative Arts Charter School, Coronet Center Philosopher Poets and 30th Street Poetas, led by Alcivar.

The opening reception on Friday, January 4, 2013, 6–9pm, free admission, features live nonviolence themed music by Brotha Chaz Walker and the Peaceful Vibes and a poetry performance by Iranian-born visual and literary artist Nathera Mawla depicting sexuality and identity from a Persian female’s Christian perspective. Walker is a youth policy expert, musician, writer, and advocate for re-entry programs for the formerly incarcerated. An interactive poetry workstation by The Poetry Store allows gallery visitors to define peace in their own words and add these written narratives to the exhibition.

Additional accompanying events include Life and Death: A Community Conversation on Capital Punishment on Thursday, January 10, 2013, 6–8pm, free admission. Moderated by Laura Magnani, Assistant Regional Director of American Friends Service Committee, San Francisco, confirmed panelists include Frances Luster, who lost her son in an execution-style homicide in San Francisco in 1990, and a representative from Death Penalty Focus, a nonprofit organization working for alternatives to the death penalty.

The closing reception, Thursday, January 24, 2013, 6–9pm, free admission, includes a gallery walkthrough at 6:30pm led by Hoover, who also moderates a 7pm discussion featuring Tressa Berman, founder of the Institute for Inter-Cultural Practice, and Kamler. The discussion focuses on Kamler’s project “Seeing Peace” and Kamler’s legacy as a Bay Area artist and activist.

Exhibiting artists include:

Richard Kamler
30th Street Poetas
Silvi Alcivar
Tressa Berman and the Institute for Inter-Cultural Practice
Evan Bissell
Uzi Broshi
Victor Cartagena
Coronet Center Philosopher Poets
Nestor Casco
Ck1
Shaghayegh Cyrous
Eldergivers: Art With Elders at Laguna Honda Hospital
Ala Ebtekar
Clinton Fein
Sevetta Gay
John Halaka
Taraneh Hemami
Betty Nobue Kano
Ida Marksman
David Ratliff
The Victorian Manor Poets in collaboration with Creative Arts Charter School

CALENDAR LISTINGS
Exhibition and all accompanying events are free to attend and take place at SOMArts Cultural Center, 934 Brannan St., San Francisco, CA, 94103.

Speak Your Peace Exhibition
January 4–24, 2013. Gallery hours: Tuesday–Friday, 12–7pm, and Saturday 12–5pm.

Opening Reception with Performances
Friday, January 4, 2013, 6–9pm, free admission

Life and Death: A Community Conversation on Capital Punishment
Thursday, January 10, 2013, 6–8pm, free admission

Closing Reception with Curatorial Walkthrough and Panel Discussion
Thursday, January 24, 2013, 6–9pm, free admission


ABOUT SOMARTS CULTURAL CENTER
SOMArts (South of Market Arts, Resources, Technology, and Services) was founded in 1979 and operates the South of Market Cultural Center, one of four city-owned cultural facilities in San Francisco.

SOMArts supports exhibitions, performances, classes and other collaborations that serve its mission: to promote and nurture art on the community level and foster an appreciation of and respect for all cultures.

For more information about upcoming events, space rentals and technical services, visit www.somarts.org or call 415-863-1414. SOMArts programs are supported by the San Francisco Arts Commission’s Community Arts and Education Program, with funding from Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund and The San Francisco Foundation.