Eight bridges connect the San Francisco Bay, so it is an apt name for a gallery platform that brings the Bay Area art world together.
Our mission is to maintain a vibrant gallery scene, despite restrictions on travel, celebrations and other larger gatherings. We want to support our artists by informing and entertaining curators, collectors and critics with potent online exhibitions of their work.
On the first Thursday of every month, we will launch 8 shows of artists relevant to the Bay Area. They may be working in this place, long considered an epicenter of change, or deeply engaged in the conversations the Bay Area holds dear, whether it’s related to technology, the environment, social justice or sexual identity, to name a few. In addition, each month will highlight the crucial work of a Bay Area non-profit arts organization.
Founding Committee
Claudia Altman-Siegel, Kelly Huang, Sophia Kinell, Micki Meng, Daphne Palmer, Ratio 3, Sarah Wendell Sherrill, Jessica Silverman, and Elizabeth Sullivan
Ambassador Committee
Sayre Batton & Maja Thomas, Joachim & Nancy Bechtle, Matt Bernstein, Sabrina Buell, Wayee Chu & Ethan Beard, Natasha Boas, Douglas Durkin, Carla Emil, Matt & Jessica Farron, Lauren Ford, Ali Gass, Stanlee Gatti, Brook Hartzell & Tad Freese, Pamela & David Hornik, Katie & Matt Paige, Putter Pence, Becca Prowda & Daniel Lurie, Deborah Rappaport, Komal Shah & Gaurav Garg, Laura Sweeney, The Battery, Robin Wright, Sonya Yu & Zack Lara
Sponsors
Lobus, The Space Program
Twenty-four years ago, Lordy Rodriguez started using a visual lexicon of map-based forms as metaphors for defining an individual’s position within a culture or society. For his current exhibition at Hosfelt Gallery, Rodriguez utilizes this cartography-inspired vocabulary to ruminate on issues about democracy and its precarious existence.
Like many of us, Rodriguez is a news junky—fixated on unfolding stories of unequal access to resources, the violent quelling of peaceful demonstrations, and governments that poison political rivals or enact laws to disenfranchise their citizenry. The work in this exhibition focuses on the bravery inherent in demanding a place at the table.
The first series memorializes historic and contemporary efforts at peaceful demonstration. These include the 1930 Salt March, led by Mohandas Gandhi challenging British rule over India; the Langa March of 1960, in which 30,000 to 50,000 demonstrators marched in opposition to apartheid; the 1965 civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery; and recent pro-democracy protests against Mainland China’s oppression in Hong Kong. In Rodriguez’s cartographic lexicon, these routes are “code-switched” in candy-colored references to race and oppression.
The second series represents efforts by those in power to manipulate the boundaries of voting districts in order to favor a political party or racial group. While researching these gerrymandered districts, Rodriguez realized many of them were regions in which members of his Filipino-American family live — states like Texas and Florida with large immigrant populations. The pieces here represent some of the most egregious examples of voter suppression as well as districts in which activists and courts have compelled boundaries to be re-drawn in ways that are more equitable.
Born in the Philippines in 1976, Lordy Rodriguez was raised in Texas and Louisiana. He received a BFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York and an MFA from Stanford University.
Lordy Rodriguez
Texas 33rd, 2020
ink on paper
35 x 60 in
88.9 x 152.4 cm
$16,000
Lordy Rodriguez
Texas 33rd, 2020
ink on paper
35 x 60 in
88.9 x 152.4 cm
$16,000
Lordy Rodriguez
Salt March, 2020
ink on paper
78 x 34 in
198.1 x 86.4 cm
$20,000
Lordy Rodriguez
Salt March, 2020
ink on paper
78 x 34 in
198.1 x 86.4 cm
$20,000
On March 12, 1930, Gandhi set out from his ashram at Sabermanti with several dozen followers on a trek of some 240 miles to the coastal town of Dandi on the Arabian Sea. There, Gandhi and his supporters were to defy British policy by making salt from seawater. All along the way, Gandhi addressed large crowds, and with each passing day an increasing number of people joined the salt satyagraha. By the time they reached Dandi on April 5, Gandhi was at the head of a crowd of tens of thousands.
In this piece, the circle at the top represents the ashram where they began, and the circle at the bottom marking Dandi on the coast is where Gandhi committed the act of civil disobedience by evaporating sea water to make salt. The height between the 2 points is 5 feet, 3 inches, the height of Gandhi himself. In person, it actually seems much taller—Lordy’s way of expressing Gandhi’s larger than life presence and global influence.
The artist used a random number generator to determine what combination of colors to use for each concentric square in the background. Individual colors repeat, but the combination and order of colors are unique to each square. The colors that are common between the squares represent characteristics that might be attributed to more than one person, but the squares are each distinctive — like the people that made up the march. Gandhi had selected 78 people to begin his march with him. Among them were people of every religion, caste and region of India — a statement of unity against colonial rule amongst an incredibly diverse population.
Every other square is drawn without the use of a straight edge. The two types of squares represent the 2 nations that came out of partition — India and Pakistan.
Lordy Rodriguez
Selma to Montgomery, 2020
ink on paper
26 x 52 in
66 x 132.1 cm
$15,000
Lordy Rodriguez
Selma to Montgomery, 2020
ink on paper
26 x 52 in
66 x 132.1 cm
$15,000
Here, Rodriguez reproduces this pivotal 54-mile march from Selma, Alabama to the state capital of Montgomery. Rodriguez uses color and scale to reflect the tension and resistance that marked the critical movement. Scale, as seen in three sections of grids that surround and contract as they move closer to the march route, is used to illustrate the compounding pressure protestors may have felt during the marches. The use of complimentary colors in these same sections (purple/yellow, blue/orange and red/green) act as a metaphor for opposition - a theme that saturated the nation at the time.
The circular mark in the middle left of the work highlights the location of the Edmund Pettus Bridge, ironically named after Edmund Pettus, a known Klu Klux Klan grand master, which was the site of the “Bloody Sunday” attacks against unarmed protesters. The violence against these protesters sparked a national outcry and ultimately contributed to the enactment of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Lordy Rodriguez
Texas 35th, 2020
ink on paper
44 x 26 in
111.8 x 66 cm
$14,000
Lordy Rodriguez
Texas 35th, 2020
ink on paper
44 x 26 in
111.8 x 66 cm
$14,000
Texas's 35th congressional district includes parts of the San Antonio metropolitan area (primarily Black- and Hispanic-majority areas), including portions of Bexar County, thin strips of Comal and Hays, and a portion of Caldwell county, as well as portions of southern and eastern Austin in Travis County.
In March 2017, a panel of federal judges ruled that the 35th district was illegally drawn with discriminatory intent. In August 2017 there was another ruling that the district is unconstitutional. However, the district was allowed to stand in the Supreme Court's 2018 Abbott v. Perez ruling.
In this piece, the shape of the district is emphasized by its lack of color. The grid of the map is defined by the shape of the district, as an indication that everyone is affected by gerrymandering, even those populations in neighboring districts. These polygonal shapes also resemble rural plots of land. Around the border, rather than within the piece itself, Lordy uses the language of freeways, each one randomly assigned a fluorescent color, with one single road connecting the entire border. Inside of the border, Lordy removed all the earth tones and black/white/gray tones from the group of colors subject to randomization. Lordy wanted the border to be completely separate from the interior of the piece, both in terms of color and forms, to further emphasize the idea of polarity.
Lordy Rodriguez
Illinois 4th, 2020
ink on paper
24 x 34 in
61 x 86.4 cm
$12,000
Lordy Rodriguez
Illinois 4th, 2020
ink on paper
24 x 34 in
61 x 86.4 cm
$12,000
This district covers two strips running east–west across the city of Chicago, on the west side continuing into smaller portions of some suburban areas in Cook County, surrounding Illinois's 7th congressional district. The northern portion is largely Puerto Rican, while the southern portion is heavily Mexican-American. The two sections are only connected by a piece of Interstate 294 to the west; the highway is in the district while the surrounding areas are not. It is the smallest congressional district in area outside New York City and California.
In this piece the district boundaries are barely discernible - a metaphor for the hidden machinations of government, when lawmakers draw districts for their own political gain behind closed doors. Lordy thought it was particularly revealing that lawmakers would lump together two distinct Hispanic populations as though they had the same lifestyle, values and culture.
Lordy Rodriguez
Hong Kong Protests, 2020
ink on paper
36 x 64 in
91.4 x 162.6 cm
$17,000
Lordy Rodriguez
Hong Kong Protests, 2020
ink on paper
36 x 64 in
91.4 x 162.6 cm
$17,000
Lordy Rodriguez
Evolution of NC 12th, 2020
ink on paper
18 x 60 in
45.7 x 152.4 cm
$14,000
Lordy Rodriguez
Evolution of NC 12th, 2020
ink on paper
18 x 60 in
45.7 x 152.4 cm
$14,000
It was one of two minority-majority Congressional districts created in the state in the 1990s. Between 2003 and 2013, there was a small plurality of white Americans in the district according to the 2000 United States Census, although African Americans made up a comparable proportion of its voting population. As redrawn for the 2012 elections and under the lines used prior to the 2016 elections, the district had an African-American majority according to the 2010 United States Census. The 12th district is the most Democratic district in North Carolina, and it has never been represented by a Republican.
This piece represents a chronological, but not consecutive, progression of district shapes, starting in the 1990s on the left, and ending prior to 2018. The colors are broken/incomplete on the left side, progressing to wholeness on the right side, as a metaphor for the progress to a more equitable delineation of district boundaries. Lordy's mother lives in this district.
Lordy Rodriguez
Langa March, 2020
ink on paper
34 x 60 in
86.4 x 152.4 cm
$16,000
Lordy Rodriguez
Langa March, 2020
ink on paper
34 x 60 in
86.4 x 152.4 cm
$16,000