The SFAI Legacy

The San Francisco Art Institute is the first fine arts college west of the Mississippi, and for nearly 150 years it has been an incubator for innovative, sometimes subversive, artwork and artists. Dorothea Lange, Sargent Johnson, Joan Brown, and other luminaries all found a place there.

As the school faces an uncertain future, SFMOMA has pulled together a selection of videos and written pieces focused on alumni and former faculty. By no means comprehensive, this rotating collection offers just a peek at the critical role the school continues to play in shaping contemporary arts in the Bay Area and beyond.

Dorothea Lange, American Photographs, cover

Dorothea Lange: The camera teaches people how to see

Sargent Johnson on surviving the Great Depression

Richard Diebenkorn: Seeing the world in abstraction

David Park believed art should be troublesome

Artwork thumbnail, Joan Brown, After the Alcatraz Swim

After the Alcatraz Swim #1

Joan Brown finds success in surprise

5 Artists Reflect on How SFAI Shaped Them

Instagram: SFAI Alumni

Jerome Caja and the Scalability of Camp

zoomed out view of Mark di Suvero sculptures on grassy field

FIELD WORK: Bill Berkson

Interwoven colored stripes against a beige background

Alicia McCarthy

Artwork image, Kehinde Wiley, Alexander the Great

Discussion Questions

Alexander the Great

Ansel Adams visualizing the final print

Larry Sultan, Fixing the Vacuum, 1991. Courtesy The Estate of Larry Sultan and Casemore Kirkeby.

Larry Sultan: Stories we tell ourselves

Artist Alicia McCarthy painting, with one of her giant works of painted woven lines behind her

Alicia McCarthy: Visually listening to bands of colors

Stephanie Syjuco creates knockoffs of works of art

Graffiti is a sport, and Barry McGee a sportsman