Sargent Johnson Sites

These two wood carvings by Sargent Johnson were moved from the school's former site in Berkeley. "Jungle Scenes," hanging over the reception desk, consists of two 8' x 4' lunettes made of mahogany with gold leaf. "Louis Braille" is 4' x 2.5' and hangs in the library.

This organ screen was originally built for the California School for the Blind. It is a wood carving with gold leaf and polychrome. It remains in the same location, but the building has since become part of the UC Berkeley Clark Kerr Campus in the 1980s. "In 1936 was hired by the WPA as a senior sculptor, advancing almost immediately to the position of unit supervisor. Working from his shop at Fifteenth and Shotwell, Johnson began producing large scale public art. His first public art project was a twenty-two foot long organ screen for the California School for the Blind...

This project was originally assigned to Beniamino Bufano, but was awarded to Johnson instead when the WPA fired Bufano. This 1942 frieze entitled "Athletics" covers the back wall of the football field and still stands today. Supposedly, “WPA officials objected to the political content in Bufano’s design and assigned Johnson to take over the project. According to Richard McKinzie, Bufano was fired when WPA officials learned that he had used the Marxist labor leader, Harry Bridges, as a model for the frieze.” The circumstances surrounding this conflict ended a long friendship between the two artists. -Found SF

In 1934, with Public Works of Art Project (PWAP) funding, Sargent Johnson created an organ screen for the California School for the Blind in Berkeley. Today, the organ screen—a 22-foot-long redwood relief of musicians, animals, birds, and plants—is located at the Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens in San Marino, CA. Two years after creating the organ screen, Johnson was hired by the Works Progress Administration Federal Arts Project (WPA-FAP) as a senior sculptor; soon he was promoted to unit supervisor. Under the auspices of the FAP, Johnson completed a companion relief for the School for the Blind to be...

Sargent Johnson created this two part project "Sea Forms" for the WPA "comprised of a 30 feet long, 14 feet high greenish-gray slate facade titled, Sea Forms, that was placed over the main entrance to the Maritime Museum on Polk Street and a 125 feet long, 14 feet high glazed tile of green and white abstract patterns resembling sea forms that covered the stair wells to the promenade deck." The glazed tile mural is located at the north portico.

African American sculptor Sargent Johnson created a 30 x 14 foot frieze of incised green slate on the exterior of the entrance to the visitor's center of the National Maritime Historical Park in San Francisco, California.     The work, "Sea Form Marquee," was completed in 1939 and paid for by the Federal Art Project (FAP).   Johnson also created a 3′ x 5′ ceramic lintel bas relief on the 4th floor, above the door to the "Radio Room."   The building was built as the bathhouse of the San Francisco Aquatic Park, built by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) in 1936-39.

A huge 14' x 125' glazed tile mural, "Sea Forms," was created by African American sculptor Sargent Johnson in 1939-40 for the bathhouse of the former San Francisco Aquatic Park, built by the Works Progress Administration (WPA).  It was funded by the Federal Art Project (FAP). It sits on the bayside balcony/terrace of what is now the visitors center for the National Maritime Historical Park. The mural is partially incomplete because Johnson and other artist's walked off the job in protest against the city's plans to install a private restaurant in a public building.