Brian Barneclo's Food Chain Mural

A huge new mural is going up in San Francisco this month...



...on a 200 foot by 25 foot white wall on Shotwell Street between 14th and 15th Streets and Folsom and South Van Ness.



The wall is to the right of a brutal, industrial-style parking lot...



...that fronts a large discount supermarket.



The artist is a young Indiana transplant named Brian Barneclo...



...and he's a wonderful painter.



In addition, he may be one of the fastest and most prolific artists I've ever witnessed.



At an earlier, stunt-like group show at the Tenderloin's Shooting Gallery, a batch of painters were invited to create a painting in one day with onlookers watching their progress, with a party following the art creation later that night.



I stopped by the gallery at about noon, and saw a couple of dozen people working laboriously upon their various canvases, most of them with only sketched-in outlines.



When I asked where Brian was, they pointed out an area with a large, completed, accomplished painting and said, "He went off somewhere for lunch."



Partly because of his speed, Barneclo is an ideal muralist. To check out his other work, particularly the great Bay Guardian mural he completed on Potrero Hill, click here for his website.



Brian and his assistant Justin ("he's the best!")...



...started work on the mural this Monday, so what you're seeing is four days into their labors.



To get to the "Food Chain Mural" website, click here. It has an address where you can donate money to help pay for the thing, since Brian is essentially doing this huge piece for free.



Or even better, just stop by and watch the muralists at work, and slip them some cash directly.



Part of what is so exciting about this mural is that it's not a derivative, watered-down version of the great Mexican muralists (Rivera, Siquieros, Orozco, O'Gorman) like so many other murals in the Mission.



Brian has his own style...



...and it's extraordinary.