The Mission District in San Francisco has been a relentless spotlight for arts and culture since the 1970s. Initially home to various Latino populations, the neighborhood has featured vibrant murals to express its residents’ social, political, and community concerns.
During the past 20 years, the area has attracted aspiring young people of various ethnicities due to its relatively low cost of living. More recently, the Mission District has grown into a progressive independent arts district. Although the area continues to boast its unyielding street art, it also has become home to an array of creative businesses and alternative art spaces. One of these businesses is Gallery Hijinks.
Formed in August of 2010, Gallery Hijinks chose its location in the Mission District due to its “culture-rich neighborhood and the thriving arts community.” The gallery offers an intimate setting for visitors as well as a welcoming venue for progressive and contemporary artworks, displaying pieces from local and national artists who are often in the emerging stages of their careers.
Although Gallery Hijinks is a “traditional” gallery, the 21 artists that it represents, and the shows that it curates, are by no means within the confines of mainstream contemporary art. The artwork of Gallery Hijinks includes ethereal illustrations, psychedelia-inspired paintings, large-scale installations, and primordial sculpture pieces. The gallery is also home to painter Robert Minervini, who was recently accepted into New American Paintings’ juried exhibition-in-print.
Within just the past few months, Gallery Hijinks has presented the public with diverse, interdisciplinary shows such as Jerkin Off in Bunkbeds, which features a variety of engaging photographic works by artists Taylor Brubaker and Jason Levins, along with the release of a controversial publication of Levins’ photographs.
During the same time period, however, the gallery also provided a temporary home for the modular “Free Life Center” – a life-size house-installation project by Mark Warren Jacques and Seth Neefus. Gallery Hijinks is specifically interested in pieces and exhibitions such as these, which transform the physical gallery space and provide inspiration for its diverse visitors.
In this vein, the gallery is currently exhibiting a light-box installation by Mark Warren Jacques, and it’s excited for its February show that will feature solo work by artist Sebastian Wahl. Gallery co-owner Jillian Mackintosh promises that the show will be “unlike any collage show before…[Wahl’s] work truly creates wonder and enhances mindfulness, concentration, tranquility, and insight.”