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Blog Category: legion of honor

Will Work for Art: Steven Correll

Posted by Sarah Bailey Hogarty on May 19, 2011

"Will Work for Art" takes you behind the scenes to meet the people who make the Fine Arts Museums operate. Steven F. Correll is a Registrar who literally makes the "scene" possible by organizing and tracking artwork as it moves through the Museums. Originally from San Diego, CA and Ponca City, OK, Steve has been with the Museums for 4 years.

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RTI Photography of the Red-Figure Pelike

Posted by Sue Grinols on May 18, 2011

In my last post, I introduced you to the cutting edge photography Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI), a technique invented by Tom Malzbender at Hewlett Packard Labs. Here at the Museums, we have been using RTI to gain better understanding of objects in our permanent collection. We have just completed another round of RTI photography of this 5th-century Greek pelike.


Manner of the Kadmos Painter, Greek
Red-figure pelike, late 5th century BC
Greece, Athens. Terracotta
Gift of the Queen of Greece through Alma de Bretteville Spreckels, 1925.365

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Preserving Images of the 1906 Earthquake

Posted by Debbie and Victor... on May 13, 2011

The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco is home to a unique collection of 167 film negatives taken by photographer Arnold Genthe chronicling the aftermath of the 1906 earthquake and fires. The negatives were acquired by the Legion of Honor in 1943.

Genthe 1

Arnold Genthe (photographer), American, 1869–1942
Untitled (Earthslip on San Francisco's Union Street), 1906
Cellulose nitrate negative
Museum purchase, James D. Phelan Bequest Fund. 1943.407.6.1

On the day of the earthquake Genthe, an established photographer best known for his society portraits and views of old Chinatown, took to the streets of San Francisco equipped with a handheld Kodak camera and pockets full of roll film.

The film Genthe used was composed of a gelatin silver emulsion on a thin plastic support of cellulose nitrate. Cellulose nitrate film was introduced commercially at the end of the nineteenth century and remained in use until the mid-twentieth century. Lightweight, transparent and flexible, cellulose nitrate film freed photographers from the inconveniences of its predecessors, paper and glass plate negatives.

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Marvelous Menagerie Unmasked

Posted by Renee D. Dreyfus on May 12, 2011

In 1996 construction workers accidentally uncovered a mosaic while widening a road in the modern Israeli town of Lod, near Tel Aviv. A preliminary excavation immediately conducted by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) revealed that three feet below the modern surface there was a mosaic floor dating to about AD 300. The three most complete and impressive panels from the floor are on view at the Legion of Honor through July 24.

Mosaic floor central panel, Roman, ca. AD 300. Excavated at Lod (Lydda), Israel. Stone tesserae. Israel Antiquities Authority and the Shelby White and Leon Levy Lod Mosaic Center. Image courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority

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Will Work for Art: Rich Rice

Posted by Sarah Bailey Hogarty on May 5, 2011

"Will Work for Art" takes you behind the scenes to meet the people who make the Fine Arts Museums possible. Rich Rice, the AV/IT Coordinator, is about as behind-the-scenes as you can get! Originally from Connecticut, Rich has been with the Museums for 15 years (he thinks).

What do you do here at the Museums?

I manage the technical aspects of theater events and exhibitions. I’m also responsible for Mac desktop support.

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Happy Birthday, Richard Diebenkorn!

Posted by Sarah Bailey Hogarty on April 22, 2011

Today the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco wish a happy birthday to renowned artist Richard Diebenkorn. The Fine Arts Museums have enjoyed a long relationship with the artist since the Legion of Honor hosted Diebenkorn’s first solo exhibition in 1948. From that point on, the Museums were ardent supporters of the artist and his work. Both the American Art Department and the Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts have compiled significant holdings of his work.

Richard Diebenkorn (American, 1922–1993)
Seawall, 1957, Oil on canvas
Gift of Phyllis G. Diebenkorn, 1995.96
© The Estate of Richard Diebenkorn
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