Fall 2014
San Francisco Art Institute
800 Chestnut Street
San Francisco, CA 94133
Join San Francisco Art Institute (SFAI) for a fall season of art and ideas. SFAI provides direct access to artists and practices that advance our culture. Our undergraduate and graduate degree programs, exhibitions and public programs, and public and youth education programs cultivate new ways of looking at and living in the world. We believe that art has intrinsic value.
Lectures and exhibitions are free and open to all.
Javier Téllez
Tuesday, September 9, 7:30pm
Mike Osterhout
Friday, September 12, 4:30pm
Jill Magid
Thursday, September 18, 7:30pm
Chip Lord
Friday, September 19, 4:30pm
Matthew Goulish
Friday, September 26, 4:30pm
Katrín Sigurdardóttir
Monday, September 29, 7:30pm
Wong Kit Yi
Friday, October 3, 4:30pm
Lisa Freiman
Tuesday, October 7, 7:30pm
Blake Stimson
Friday, October 10, 4:30pm
Llyn Foulkes + Tamar Halpern
Monday, October 13, 7:30pm
John Divola
Friday, October 17, 4:30pm
Allison Miller: Richard Diebenkorn Teaching Fellow
Tuesday, October 21, 7:30pm
Linda Mary Montano
Friday, October 31, 4:30pm
Erin Shirreff
Tuesday, November 4, 7:30pm
Ya Ta Hey! Alcatraz + Ai Weiwei: The Fake Case
Screening: Friday, November 7, 4pm
Lucy Lippard on Ai Weiwei
Saturday, November 8, 7pm
Briony Fer
Friday, November 14, 4:30pm
Walter and McBean Galleries fall exhibition:
Javier Téllez: Games Are Forbidden in the Labyrinth
September 9–December 13, 2014
Artist talk: Tuesday, September 9, 7:30pm
Opening: Thursday, September 11, 7–9pm
Screening: Thursday, November 20, 7:30pm
Titicut Follies (1967), directed by Frederick Wiseman
Les maîtres fous (The Mad Masters) (1955), directed by Jean Rouch
Games Are Forbidden in the Labyrinth explores psychiatric confinement, surveillance architecture, and the game of chess as strategically interrelated systems. The exhibition’s two major works, Dürer’s Rhinoceros (2010) and Chess (2014), dislocate perception through reenactments of delirium.
Venezuelan-born artist Javier Téllez staged his film Dürer’s Rhinoceros within the panopticon of Hospital Miguel Bombarda in Lisbon, and collaborated with psychiatric outpatients who form the film’s cast. In Chess, Téllez deposes traditional chess pieces with psychiatric implements—intricate anatomical assemblages resting on sample miniature beds—to form an uncertain playing field of expectant theatricality.
For nearly two decades, mental illness has served as a primary locus of Téllezʼs practice. Often working in collaboration with psychiatric patients, Téllez’s films and installations diminish stereotypes associated with mental illness. Games Are Forbidden in the Labyrinth opens new spaces for play across formerly closed systems, and inverts the power dynamics between surveillance tower and cell.
Games Are Forbidden in the Labyrinth will be accompanied by a catalogue published by Roma Publications.
Games Are Forbidden in the Labyrinth is co-presented with Kadist Art Foundation. Chess was jointly commissioned by REDCAT, Los Angeles, and Kadist Art Foundation, San Francisco.
Get details about all of SFAI’s events: sfai.edu/events
Stay up to date by joining our email community: sfai.edu/eventmail
SFAI’s exhibitions and public programs provide direct access to artists and practices that advance our culture. The Walter and McBean Galleries, established in 1969, present exhibitions at the forefront of contemporary art practice. The gallery serves as a laboratory for innovative and adventurous projects and commissions new work from emerging and established artists.
SFAI’s exhibitions and public programs are made possible by the generosity of donors and sponsors. Major support is provided by Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund.
Program support is provided by the Harker Fund of The San Francisco Foundation, Mental Insight Foundation, Walter and Elise Haas Fund, The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Kadist Art Foundation, Fort Point Beer Company, Gregory Goode Photography, The Lucas Family Foundation, and Thomas J. Fogarty, MD. Ongoing support is provided by the McBean Distinguished Lecture and Residency Fund, The Buck Fund, and the Visiting Artists Fund of the SFAI Endowment.
