Art About Town: San Francisco "An Injury To One"

"Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone."

~Pablo Picasso

"In memory of Howard Sperry and Nick Bordoise who gave their lives on Bloody Thursday, July 5th, 1934, so that all working people might enjoy a greater measure of dignity and security."
 Inscribed On Memorial Plaque
 Steuart and Mission Streets, San Francisco, Ca

My blog has been filled with more than the usual amount of public art pieces this week, which is wonderful, I just wish I had more time to this kind of photography! I have been doing some research and I plan to visit more communities in the East Bay this spring and summer, so hopefully over the summer I can post more of this kind of photography! Public art is one of my favorite subjects to photograph, because I never stop learning from it. Be it about lighting, or the poignancy of the subject or sometimes, such as with this piece, the history, I always come away a much smarter person!

An Injury To One
By Artists... Miranda Bergman, Tem Drescher, Nicole Emmanuel, Lari Kilolani, James Morgan, Raymond M. Patlan, Eduardo Pineda, James Prigoff, O'Brian Theile and Horace Washington

This piece stands at the corner of Steuart and Mission in San Francisco, and is a memorial to the two men who gave their lives on Thursday, July 5th, 1934 when they were killed by police, who fired shots into a crowd in an effort to breakup a strike by maritime workers and longshoremen. As the day wore on, the violence grew and many strikers and their supporters were injured by police, in an effort to contain the strike on behalf of employers and businesses. The death of Bordois and Sperry only served to empower their fellow strikers, and what had begun as a maritime strike became a general strike (the largest in U.S. history) that included Teamsters and blue collar workers, and resulted in shutting down the Port of San Francisco and Alameda for days!

But there is a lot more to the story! To read more about the events leading up to this tragic day, and the aftermath and it's far reaching consequences and change, see the links at the bottom of the post! There is always something to learn from art, and those who take the time to honor the past and history! If we humans continue to refuse to learn from our pasts, perhaps we can learn from the art it tends to inspire!

Well, there's always hope.

1934 West Coast Waterfront Strike

Longshore Legacy: Dockworkers To Remember 'Bloody Thursday'...
(Los Angeles Times (July 3rd, 1986)

Mood: Reflective

~Me :)