Beale Street by Thomas Griscom

Tom Griscom has been collaborating with the San Francisco State University Labor Archives and Research Center to document important sites of labor revolt and unionization in the Bay Area. Beale Street depicts an area bridging the Financial District and Multimedia Gulch whose traces of labor struggle are today largely eradicated. Though many brick warehouse spaces remain, it is hard to imagine this neighborhood of corporate centers and oyster bars was once the site of the violent climax to the months-long West Coast Longshoremen's Strike 75 years ago, popularly known as "Bloody Thursday."

But this stirring historical reflection is only one motivation behind this body of work. Tom says,

By no means is this project a political statement as much as it is about me trying to understand the allure of the West Coast for so many people, myself included. It has always had the promise of a better life, both the quality of and financially. Choosing these structures has been a look at what remains, what has been reappropriated, and what is gone completely. What started as a small collaborative project for [the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts' triennial] Bay Area Now last summer, then turned into a 50 page thesis and show, and now I am expanding it further to parallel the downturn California is facing

With this in mind, these panoramic portraits are especially poignant in that the format is ostensibly suited for the romantic sweep of California's vistas, only to document a restless and sometimes bitter history.

More of Tom's labor sites and other portfolios can be found on his website.