Next Three Events:
Download the Fall 2025 calendar as a pdf here.
Wednesday, October 1, 7:30pm
Art & Politics: Eric Drooker’s
Naked City
Public Talk at 518 Valencia
The inimitable Eric Drooker presents his latest graphic novel Naked City in sound and compelling imagery as only he can do it. Political artist and cartoonist Eric Drooker, known for his New Yorker covers and animation for Howl, presents a cartoon concert based on his new graphic novel Naked City. First appearing in our Public Talks series in 2008, and again in 2011, Drooker’s visual and musical presentations are intimate journeys through his iconic graphic arts.
* * * * * *
On the edge of town, three bohemians struggle to answer the question: “Is it possible to survive as an artist in the 21st century?”
A young singer with no family hitchhikes to the city and sings her heart out. Late one night, she encounters a street dancer who inspires her to have faith in her music no matter the cost. Desperate for rent money, she poses for a painter who’s abandoned landscapes for nudes.
“Drooker’s comment on the sacrifices inherent to the pursuit of the arts feels both timeless and of-the-moment, thanks to his spot-on critique of late capitalism. Any creative to ever question their craft or purpose will find themselves reflected here.”
—Publishers Weekly
This is part of a series of solo artists giving a behind the scenes and in depth look at what inspires them in the interrelationship between art and politics.
Saturday, October 4, 12-3 pm
Freeway Plan Routes: Never Built—Panhandle
An Urban Walk & Talk
Join Shaping San Francisco and friends for a spirited hike and rambling conversation(s) as we traverse the Panhandle freeway route, seeing the hundreds of buildings that would have been destroyed, and imagining a world without the Panhandle Park, instead seeing a freeway interchange as it plunged into a tunnel beneath Golden Gate Park. A favorite theme for us to cover, the Freeway Revolt of the 1950s and 1960s, was one of the largest and most successful ongoing citizen protests in San Francisco’s history. The revolt against the California Division of Highways’ plan to extend freeways across the city became the first serious opposition in the nation to the post-WWII consensus on automobiles, freeways, and suburbanization.
RSVP to shaping@foundsf.org
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Saturday, October 18, 12-2pm
Ghost Streets of Golden Gate Park and the Panhandle
Our guest guide Nancy Botkin leads us by bicycle through various spaces in Golden Gate Park and the Panhandle that used to be roadways but have since transformed into open areas prioritized for people, welcoming pedestrians, equestrians, picnickers, and people on bikes. Visit the Rose Garden, 6th Avenue Skate Park, Marx Meadow, Hellman Hollow, and many other spots you may not have considered before. A short segment of the ride will be on gravel roads.
Explore Shaping San Francisco:
Ecology Emerges
Discussions and reflections on the history of Bay Area ecological activism, based on oral histories documenting the past 50 years.
Ecology Emerges is an oral history gathering project to explore the past 50 years of ecological activism in the Bay Area and the role that individual and institutional memories play in the development, policy proposals, and interrelationships that together make up the existing networks of ecological politics. We document the living ecological activist movement, in their own words, but also in a larger context of urban growth and globalization.
Oral Histories
Shaping San Francisco, as part of our ongoing work, sits down with people who have stories to tell and conducts oral history interviews.
Check them out here.
"Editor's Pick Tour" from FoundSF.org
Comprised of over 1,400 pages, and 2,500 historical photos, the wiki-based archive FoundSF.org is the product of hundreds of contributors, regular people who were compelled by the chance to investigate some piece of this City's past.
Shaping San Francisco is fiscally sponsored by Independent Arts & Media, a California non-profit corporation.