The Mission looks very different when youโre walking down 24th Street with S.F. International Arts Festival founder Andrew Wood.
On a recent sun-drenched afternoon, the British-born founder, also the artistic director of the festival, sees opportunities to put on a show everywhere. Heโs not just pointing out theaters and venues. The SFIAF, which runs April 30 through May 11, manifests throughout the Mission in yoga studios, cafes, and art galleries โ even the headquarters of an internet provider.
โWe put out the call, and the response was pretty amazing,โ he says. โWeโve expanded our footprint this year, and weโve learned a lot about how to work with local businesses from last year.โ
Founded in the Mission in 2003, the itinerant festival fully came into its own during a long tenure at Fort Mason, โwhere we had the run of the campus during a bank holiday,โ Wood says. In returning to the neighborhood last year, the S.F. International Arts Festival has embraced a whole new approach to presenting dance, music, drama and performance art, carefully matching each act to an appropriate space.ย ย
The vast majority of shows are gleaned from the Bay Areaโs teaming scene. With nearly 100 performances and events, the festival showcases the global array of arts in our backyard, from the Carnatic jazz of the Prashant Radhakrishnan Trio and the Egyptian maqam grooves of Music In-Takht to dramatic tablao of Melissa Cruz Flamenco and the East-meets-East encounter of Melody of China with the Ali Akbar College of Music Ensemble.
But the โinternationalโ aspect of the S.F. International Arts Festival reflects a curatorial lens that reaches far beyond the Bay Area. In many events, the programming offers a taste of the expansive Edinburgh Festival Fringe, where Wood scouts every summer for acts that would be economically feasible to bring to San Francisco. Thatโs how the S.F. International Arts Festival landed Duane Forrestโs โBob Marley: How Reggae Changed the World,โ a one-man musical that plays May 1-3 at Fingersnaps Media Arts. (Forrest also performs the work-in-progress โTree of Dreams,โ an immersive theatrical piece about overcoming trauma, with Tide & Foam at Noh Space May 8-9.)
Fingersnaps, a DJ academy that moved into its space on 20th Street six years ago, is one of the S.F. International Arts Festival’s first-time venues. The proprietor, DJ Lamont, is too busy running the business to make it out to see many performances, but last year his husband โwent to some shows and thought the festival was great,โ he says. When he heard Wood on KALW talking about the plans for expanding this yearโs festival, he reached out to offer his space, and now Fingersnaps is one of SFIAFโs busiest venues with seven concerts.
โItโs a great way to be part of an event larger than myself, part of a community effort hosted here in the Mission,โ DJ Lamont says. “Itโs an opportunity to meet people who wouldnโt normally be here, to extend a hand and have a hand extended.โ
At first glance, the most unlikely enterprise hosting performances is the local internet provider Monkeybrains. But it turns out that, since moving into their space on Treat Avenue, the company has set aside a room for community events โ they call it Napsugar โ which has already seen numerous performances and community gatherings.
โWeโre not curators,โ says Monkeybrains co-founder Alex Menendez. โItโs more free-for-all. People come to us when they think of a community event. We havenโt turned anyone away yet.โ
Menendez and fellow founder Rudy Rucker met Wood at a Mission Merchants Association meeting, which led to the 80-person capacity Napsugar space, which is outfitted with a professional sound system, taking on a significant role in the SFIAF.
Like Fingersnaps, Monkeybrains is hosting seven performances, including the May 2 world premiere of renegade composer Moe Staianoโs โMusic For Eight Guitars,โ pioneering Asian American jazz saxophonist Francis Wongโs work-in-progress โWong Weiโs Legacyโ on May 4, and Wandering Ensembleโs new dance theater production โLost & Foundโ on May 8.
For Rucker, an author, mathematician and painter, Napsugar continues his long involvement in now shuttered Bay Area arts spaces like the Missionโs CELLspace and Cyclone Warehouse in Dogpatch. โWe love the arts,โ he says. โWe may be a tech company, but we come from a strong background where arts and tech intersect.โ
If the festival has a blockbuster, itโs โIn the Name of the Sonโ by Northern Irelandโs Green Shoot Productions. A one-man play starring Irish actor Shaun Blaney, it essentially picks up the post-prison story of Gerry Conlon, one of the Guildford Four, who were wrongly convicted for an IRA pub bombing that killed four off-duty British soldiers and a civilian.
The notorious case was portrayed in the 1993 true crime film โIn the Name of the Father,โ starring Daniel Day-Lewis, which was nominated for seven Academy Awards. Written by Conlon’s lifelong friend Richard O’Rawe and Green Shoot Productions Artistic Director Martin Lynch, the play explores Conlonโs disorienting return to society after receiving a major financial settlement. In the wake of the film, he mingles with celebrities such as Johnny Depp and Day-Lewis while battling addiction and waves of guilt over his fatherโs death in prison.
โIn the Name of the Sonโ opens the festival Wednesday, April 30 at the Victoria Theatre, and returns to the Vic on May 2 and May 3. Itโs one of more than a dozen events that are quintessentially SFIAF, available to Bay Area audiences courtesy of a shoestring operation. In many ways the festival is a miracle held together by Woodโs perseverance, and the return to the Mission is an ongoing experiment in making the most out of the least.
โWe havenโt got any money,โ Wood says. โHow do we make it work? Weโre the best at getting the most out of a dollar.โ
The San Francisco International Arts Festival runs from April 30 through May 11 at venues throughout the Mission. For tickets and more information, visit www.sfiaf.org.