“Menagerie: Artists Look at Animals” at SF's Museum of Craft and Folk Art August 22, 2006

The Museum of Craft and Folk Art presents “Menagerie: Artists Look at Animals,” an exhibition that focuses on contemporary representations of animals created by artists from throughout North America, from the far north through Mexico, including more than fifty works drawn primarily from local collections and Bay Area artists

This exhibition presents a wide variety of visions of animals at their most expressive. Each work’s cultural background or meaning for the individual artist is explored. “Menagerie: Artists Look at Animals” presents contemporary animal art by craft and folk artists, and artists influenced by folk art, who work in a variety of materials—wood, clay, glass, fiber, metal, and found objects—using techniques that include stitching, painting, carving, sculpting, and welding.

Artworks from outside the Bay Area include scrap-wood animals by two of the Naugler brothers, folk artists from Nova Scotia; the wood carvings of the Archuleta family of New Mexico; works by Inuit artists of Canada and Alaska, for whom animals form an integral part of their mythology; sheep and other animal figures of the Navajo (Dine); and animal sculptures by folk artists of Mexico.

The Museum of Craft and Folk Art and the Museum’s Gallery Store are located at 51 Yerba Buena Lane, connecting Market and Mission Street between 3rd and 4th Street in San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Gardens arts district. The Museum and Store are open Tuesdays through Fridays, from 11am to 6pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 11am to 5pm. Admission to the Museum’s galleries is $5; $4 for seniors; children under 18 are free. Museum members enjoy free admission. Admission to the Museum’s Gallery Store is always free for all visitors. For more information call (415) 227-4888 or visit www.mocfa.org.

“Menagerie: Artists Look at Animals” will be on view at the Museum of Craft and Folk Art at 51 Yerba Buena Lane in downtown San Francisco from August 3 through October 22, 2006.

Official Website: http://www.mocfa.org