Saturday, August 27, 2011

Systems Mural Project Arises



Commuting on Caltrain back from Silicon Valley last Wednesday, we passed a new loft development next to the downtown San Francisco station at 4th and Townsend.



The back of the development is a windowless, curving brown wall that stretches for 600 feet along the train tracks.



A long-delayed dream of painter and muralist Brian Barneclo started going up Tuesday morning on the wall...



...and judging from the illustrations on the Systems Mural Project website...



...this could easily be his masterpiece...



...following his huge breakthrough on the FoodsCo wall on Shotwell Street in the Mission (click here for a "Civic Center" account of that 2006 mural).

6 comments:

Greg said...

it's nice to see something covering that vast wall of nothing...always wondered what it would be like to live in a building with no back windows...

Civic Center said...

Dear Greg: It's going to be absolutely great. I'm looking forward to photographing it over the next month or so.

Axel Feldheim said...

Nice. I did not know about Brian Barneclo. I like his optimistic 1960s design sense. I only have a rough idea of this location, & I wonder if the best view of the mural ends up being from the train.

Civic Center said...

Dear Axel: The best view is definitely from the train, and on this morning's commute the mural had already doubled in size. I'll be taking some more photos tomorrow.

Unknown said...

There are no windows because of the train noise. Very difficult to mitigate to modern standards.

Information about the building, and he mural, at www.dbarchitect.com/CrescentCove

Civic Center said...

Dear David: The no windows on the back wall makes perfect sense, and thanks for the link, which has lots of great info.