SAVE THE TOWN SQUARE MURAL

TO DONATE BY MAIL:

Write a check made out to The Arlene Francis Foundation and mail to:

99 6th Street, Santa Rosa, CA  95401.
On the check, please include a memo to indicate your donation is for "Noe".

All donations are flowing through the non-profit Arlene Francis Foundation to make your donation fully tax-deductible.

These funds will also go towards slight repairs on the eastern mural as well as future maintenance and preservation.

https://www.arlenefranciscenter.org/noe-valley-mural-project

Dear Noe Valleyans,

Our beautiful Town Square mural, painted by the great muralist Mona Caron to surround our Farmers Market, needs repair. As you can see, if you take in the mural as it surrounds the Town Square (and on Saturdays, the Farmers Market), the western portion of the mural seeks to capture 24th Street as it is today, focusing on the Noe Valley portion with Martha’s Coffee at the center but also capturing the street as it winds down into and through the Mission District to the east of us. 

Along with (lovingly) depicting some of us actual residents of the neighborhood as we were when the mural was completed in 2008, the mural's western portion also shows the diversity of 24th Street as it winds down toward the Mission, emphasizing the connection between Noe Valley and the Mission and by extension all the City's neighborhoods. It lightly communicates that we are brothers and sisters on one diverse street in one diverse City. On the other side of the Square, the eastern portion of the mural tells the story of Noe Valley's past and future. The vignette on the north side of that portion captures 24th St. perhaps 100 years ago. On the south side, the vignette imagines the utopian future of Noe Valley and all of 24th Street, with an aerial BART (as Bay Area Relaxed Transit), a spectacular grassy animal run, and countless other imaginative details about the world we are trying to bring into being (through the Farmers Market and other forms of community creation in our neighborhood and world). Fruits and vegetables and beautiful plants weave themselves through both portions of the mural. The mural is GREAT in so many ways, capturing the present and evoking a hoped-for future for Noe Valley and even the world as a whole. 

But alas, the mural is falling apart, as you can see if you look at the western portion on the side of Haystack Restaurant. Normal weathering and imperfections in the original surface have led surface areas to crumble and the paint to run. We must act reasonably quickly to repair and save the mural. Luckily, Mona Caron and her team have agreed to devote their talents to this restoration in April, 2022. But the cost of their doing so will be substantial— $35,000 for labor and materials. The great thing is that this restoration will repair and restore the eastern portion and improve the quality of both portions of the mural and enable them to last in improved form for the next 15 years!

We have already raised the first $10,000 with a small grant from the Max and Anna Levinson Foundation and a contribution from the Noe Valley Association. And we intend to apply for a citywide Community Challenge Grant to cover a portion of the remainder. But we will need the community’s help to raise a significant chunk of the final $25,000—and that is why we are here today asking for your help.

We will seek to recognize in some form those who can donate $100 or more to our effort, with special recognition for those who give more than $500 and $1,000. This will make such a difference to the spirit of the Town Square and the Farmers Market—to see our incredible mural by this world-renowned public artist restored to its beautiful and idealistic origins. What's more, it will be secured for the foreseeable future as the aesthetic arbor surrounding our unique local market and the Town Square.

THANK YOU! Leslie Crawford & Peter Gabel

Noe Valley Community Members, Co-Founders Noe Valley Farmers Market