Throughout the Mission, alleys are hubs of public art, with garage doors and the backs of buildings covered in painted images and statements. Among the standouts is Clarion Alley, home to the eponymous mural project, where hundreds of artists have left their marks over the years.
One of those artists is Doug Rhodes, whose “Tree City” has been a fixture on the alley near the Community Thrift Store on Valencia Street since 2013. A short distance away from his mural is his open studio, the only one in the alley.
Rhodes’s artwork fills walls, racks and shelves inside the repurposed garage. One acrylic painting shows the Transamerica Pyramid submerged in water; in another, plant people strike poses in Victorian bay windows. His sculptures, many of them with large, protruding eyes, seem to stare back.
Together, they map Rhodes’s years as an artist, a body of whimsical work driven by his imagination.
A lot of stuff is AI now, … but I think people can still want what I call ‘real art,’” he added referring to art that “humans make with their blood, sweat and tears and their life experience, that they’re putting their emotions into.”
On my first visit to his studio, Rhodes, a Generation Xer, was perched behind his work station, facing Clarion Alley. Nearby sat a stack of his book, “The Last Garibaldi,” alongside multiple prints for sale. A white laundry basket held inexpensive picture frames he buys at Salvation Army and Community Thrift on Valencia Street.
When I returned a week later, Rhodes was in the same spot, working on a new 3-D piece.
“I’m playing with some ideas,” he said. “It involves motion sensors and motors and stuff, sort of inspired by a cuckoo clock. I always loved how cuckoo clocks had something that happened.”
Other current projects include small collages made from prints of his originals and a globe with a stand, solidly painted black, that he’d come across.
“It’s kind of cool-looking, but I don’t know what I’m going to do with it yet,” he said.
Doug Rhodes’ mural “Tree City,” seen here on the right behind the chain link fence, has been a fixture in Clarion Alley since 2013. His art studio is right around the corner — the white garage door facing the alley. Photo by JL Odom. 
One of Doug Rhodes’ works in progress is a bowling pin from the Mission Bowling Club. So far, he’s created a base for it and added eyes. It will be featured in an exhibition down the road. Photo by JL Odom. 
Many of Doug Rhodes’ paintings blend nature and San Francisco fixtures, such as the Transamerica Pyramid, the Golden Gate Bridge and Victorian houses. The large painting on the back wall, seen here, depicts a sidewalk in the Mission neighborhood bustling with produce and plant people. It’s titled “Reflection on Mission Street.” Photo by JL Odom. 
Doug Rhodes’ work station faces Clarion Alley, located in the Mission. Visitors can find Rhodes in his studio on most afternoons, though he tends to take Tuesdays and Wednesdays off to walk around San Francisco and get inspired. Photo by JL Odom. 
Small collages, made from prints of his original pieces, hang on a wall in Doug Rhodes’ art studio. It’s one of a few projects that currently has his attention, and he says he’s having fun with it. Photo by JL Odom. 
Doug Rhodes stands in the rear of his art studio — a repurposed garage in Clarion Alley. Nearly every inch of it features his unique artwork. Photo by JL Odom.
Another work in progress, a “retired” bowling pin from Mission Bowling Club, was on his desk. So far, he’d added a base and eyes, which, as with the other peepers throughout the studio, seemed ever-watchful.
“I really enjoy making them [look] sincere,” he explained.
During his youth in Southern California, outside of doing bike jumps with friends, he’d busy himself with drawing eyeballs.
He now uses old spotlights and glass domes for the orbs, which bulge from book covers, paintings and other objects. Two atop his work station resemble creatures in 1980s fantasy films, like “Labyrinth.”
Many have sold, including “Furry Face,” white-and-brown-furred from forehead to chin, with eyelashes, a nose and lips. It was featured in a circus freak-themed group exhibition.
“I was like, ‘I’ll do a taxidermy human freak—that would be really trippy,’” he said.
Timing, and luck, got him his studio. He lives in the building next door and had been working out of another garage there for several years. As a tenant, he was on a waitlist for his current spot, which opened up at the beginning of the Covid pandemic in 2020. He now uses the other, smaller garage for storage.
Rhodes moved to the Mission from Santa Cruz in 1999, and he’s been here ever since, save for a few years in Santa Teresa, Costa Rica, a beach town where he ran a gallery with his then-girlfriend, doing monthly exhibitions to which he drew people with free sangria.
He moved back in 2011 and reclaimed his sublet apartment.
Rhodes stays active in and beyond the studio, showing work in spaces like Evolved SF, doing live-painting at events such as The Edwardian Ball and curating artists for the How Weird Street Faire and other festivals.
“People like to say, ‘The art scene’s dead here,’ but I don’t think it’s dead. It’s just not the hangout scene — the ‘work in a cafe and do your art and live in a place and buy records’ scene — that it used to be,” he said.
During the dot-com boom in the late 1990s and early 2000s, he took on animation projects, including interactive CD-ROMs for B.B. King and the progressive metal band Queensrÿche.
“It was a good time to do it, because everybody wasn’t a digital artist,” he said. “It did take me away from painting and other stuff, but in the end, it gave me a lot of tools.”
Working as a digital art freelancer was lucrative, he said, but his interest waned.
“At a certain point, I just realized it’s like chasing the dragon. You always need that newest thing,” he said.
The past couple of decades have been devoted to physical art-making. He’s found a way to make it work financially.
“More lately, I’m just like, ‘Okay, if I budget properly and with the prints that I sell, I’m able to cover the expenses for the most part.’ Every once in a while, I’ll pick up a side gig,” he said.
Among the nods to San Francisco throughout his pieces is a specific ode to the neighborhood he’s called home these many years. “Reflection on Mission Street” includes produce stands and a busy sidewalk scene. It brings to mind walks to the 16th Street BART station.
The original hangs high in his studio, on the same wall as his many small collage outputs—of which he’s aiming for 100.
“I’m actually having so much fun with them that I might just keep doing them forever,” he said.