Architect Mark Kessler, assistant professor in the Department of Design, has been busy reimagining Shields Library and researching San Francisco's "elegant pit stops."

The former is the subject of a new exhibition at the library itself, where Kessler's students are showcasing possible library redesigns.

The latter refers to a special attraction at the San Francisco History Expo next weekend.

• Elegant Pit Stops: The Historic Garages of San Francisco — These are public garages built between the Great Earthquake of 1906 and the Great Depression. Along with archival images, the exhibition also features contemporary images by the architectural photographer Sharon Risedorph.

Kessler worked as an architect in San Francisco before joining the UC Davis faculty in 2006; he teaches studio classes in interior architecture.

He said he began to take notice of the old garages about 10 years ago, while on weekend walks in San Francisco’s Tenderloin.

“The buildings captured my imagination because they combined composed, symmetrical and ornamented facades with rough industrial interiors,” he said in an e-mail to Dateline UC Davis.

“Later, as an academic, I determined to study the garages and uncover why so much care was lavished on buildings devoted to vehicular storage.

“The short answer is that the facades enhanced the status of car ownership, and the architects were not overly concerned with representing the mundane function of parking or repair.”

The American Institute of Architects published Kessler’s paper “Educate, Preserve, Reuse: The Good (Not Great) Garage Buildings of San Francisco” in 2010, in volume 4 of the AIA Report on University Research. Two years earlier, with an AIA grant, Kessler developed the Design 180A course "Adaptive Reuse of Industrial Buildings in San Francisco," in which students researched and documented assigned buildings (mostly garages), and then developed redesign proposals.

The students presented their work to planners and preservation architects, sitting as a review panel at the San Francisco Planning Department.

Kessler

Kessler's first book, tentatively titled The Historicist Garages of San Francisco, is due out next year from McFarland Press.

Historicist? Kessler said he relies on this definition of "historicism" from the New Oxford American Dictionary: "chiefly derogatory (in artistic and architectural contexts) excessive regard for past styles."

“While I personally don't intend to assume a derogatory posture towards my beloved garages, this definition correctly and implicitly acknowledges the impossibility of viewing the garages any way but retrospectively, i.e., after the critique launched against historical style by the modernists.

“So, while I find the historical overlay attractive, my admiration is tinged with the knowledge that the overlay is ultimately frivolous and elitist.”

Kessler’s research also has led to his activist role in preserving the garages.

“Garages and other utilitarian structures are vulnerable to real estate development because they underutilize their sites in terms of both size and use,” he said. “I advocate for the adaptive reuse of garages, subject to a reuse design that not only preserves the facade, but respects the industrial character of the interior.”

Recently he worked with the Russian Hill Community Association to fight the conversion of a garage to seven condominiums. (“To my amazement, the RHCA discovered my paper for the AIA and sought my assistance.”)

“The developer prevailed before the San Francisco Historic Preservation Commission. We were, however, successful in convincing the commission to mandate design changes reducing the impact of the project on the neighborhood and the building.”

Elegant Pit Stops debuted a year ago in the gallery of the San Francisco EcoCenter, the public face of the Department of the Environment. The department’s interest stemmed from a mandate to promote recycling (in this case, of buildings) and a livable city.

Now the exhibition is back, at the second San Francisco History Expo: 11 a.m.- 4 p.m. Saturday-Sunday, March 3-4, Old Mint, 88 Fifth St. (corner of Fifth and Mission streets), San Francisco. Directions.

• Reimagining Shields, Part 1 — Step into Peter J. Shields Library and you may see the building's future — in this exhibition of architectural drawings suggesting ways to design the library's entrance, lobby, main staircase, and first- and second-floor spaces, to make better use of the public spaces and to have them reflect the 21st century. Part 1 runs through March 19.

The work is from the students of Design 180A, in which Kessler is focusing on the real-world challenges of designing the research library of tomorrow.

The students studied existing plans, researched library design literature, observed the social use of the Shields Library spaces, and interviewed librarians and library users to come up with designs that might accommodate the multiple, and sometimes, competing demands of an academic library.

The library is asking people to "let us know what you think." Send questions or comments to Daniel Goldstein, librarian, Arts and Humanities, University Library. His e-mail address is
dgoldstein@ucdavis.edu.

MORE AT SHIELDS LIBRARY

• The Ground Beneath Our Feet: The Nikola P. Prokopovich Papers on Land Subsidence — Manuscript archivist Liz Phillips prepared this exhibition on the papers of engineering geologist Nikola P. Prokopovich (1918-99), who worked as a geologist with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation's Mid-Pacific Region.

He worked out of the bureau's Sacramento office from 1958 to 1986, investigating the geology and geochemistry of statewide water projects, including the Central Valley Project and the Solano Project. He was an avid field geologist and spent as much time as possible on site, collecting his own data. Prokopovich was particularly interested in the engineering geology of the Central Valley Project's canals and dam sites, and in the effects of state water projects and field irrigation on the surrounding landscape.

The collection includes draft reports, memoranda and published writings, as well as nearly 25,000 slides and photographs documenting his work and the land around his work sites.

• Paper Takes: The Power of Uncivil Words — Materials from the library's Walter Goldwater Radical Pamphlets collection, part of the library's Special Collections. The exhibition debuted last fall as part of the campus's Civility Project, and now Paper Takes is on display in the Shields Library lobby through winter quarter.

Looking beyond the bounds of the campus, the exhibition explores the ways in which intolerant views are communicated and disseminated through pamphlets. Paper Takes explores the particular rhetoric supporting race-based hatred, gender and sexuality bias, and political divisiveness, to better understand the dominant discourses that frame some of our most uncivil exchanges. Displaying a selection from more than 17,000 items in the leading collection of “extreme” pamphlets in the United States, this exhibition provides historical depth to our understanding of the language of hate and intolerance, traces of which remain potent today.

Read more about Paper Takes and the Walter Goldwater Radical Pamphlets collection.

• Words Take Wing — Selected works by Ying Chang Compestine, featured author for this year's Words Take Wing: Celebration of Diversity in Children's Literature.

The Shields Library presents its exhibitions in the lobby. Regular hours: 7:30 a.m.-midnight Monday-Thursday, 7:30 a.m.-6 p.m. Friday, noon-6 p.m. Saturday and noon-midnight Sunday. Holidays and other exceptions.

OTHER ONGOING EXHIBITIONS

• Ruthe Blalock Jones: A Retrospective — The internationally acclaimed Blalock Jones creates in a range of media, including oil, acrylic, watercolor and printmaking — producing works that emerge from personal experiences with a focus on Native American women in dance attire, and depictions of ceremonial and social events. Blalock Jones (Chu-Lun-Dit), Delaware/Shawnee/Peoria, formerly served as professor and art director at Bacone College, Muskogee, Okla. Through March 16, C.N. Gorman Museum, 1316 Hart Hall. Regular hours: noon-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, and 2-5 p.m. Sunday.

• Hollow — Flame-worked sculpture and vessels by Craft Center instructor Andrew Phillips. Through March 16, Craft Center Gallery, South Silo. Regular hours: 10 a.m.-10 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 10 a.m.-7 p.m. Friday and 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Saturday-Sunday.

• Need and Desire, the work of blankblank — Curated by Rob Zinn, founder of blankblank, a Northern California firm that works with a select group of designers and artisans to produce furniture, lighting and limited-edition art — as seen around the world. The title of this show alludes to the ambiguities that Zinn sees between art and design, form and function, business and creativity, and individual and society. Need and Desire charts the past eight years of blankblank through examples from its collection, including documentation of development and personal insight from Zinn as to the time, environment and circumstance in which they were created. Through March 16, Design Museum, Cruess Hall. Regular hours: noon-4 p.m. Monday-Friday, 2-4 p.m. Sunday. Closed holidays and holiday weekends.

• Poking at Beehives: Three Painters — “I believe that this will prove to be the most important painting show that I have organized in my seven years at the Nelson,” said the gallery’s director, Renny Pritikin. “These are three very special artists, and it’s a thrill to bring their work to the attention of this community for the first time.” Each of the artists, Peter Edlund, Leslie Shows and Fred Tomaselli, finds inspiration in nature. A  news release describes them as follows:

Edlund, from Brooklyn via San Francisco, who makes representational monochromatic depictions of natural settings, has carved out a significant career since returning to the Northeast after many years in San Francisco and is a professor at the acclaimed School of the Visual Arts in Manhattan.

Tomaselli, from Brooklyn via Los Angeles, is internationally acclaimed for his collage paintings depicting birds, nature and narratives in thick resin.

Shows, from San Francisco via Alaska, also makes collaged paintings based on man’s impact on nature, and is considered to be one of the handful of most important artists to emerge from San Francisco in the past 10 years.

Through March 18, Nelson Gallery, Nelson Hall. Regular hours: 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Thursday, Saturday-Sunday, and by appointment on Fridays.

OFF-CAMPUS

• Between the Quotes: Work by UC Davis Art Faculty — New work by 12 members of the UC Davis Department of Art: paintings by Timothy Berry, David Hollowell, Hearne Pardee, Bryce Vinokurov and Gina Werfel; photographs by Robin Hill, Matthias Geiger and Youngsuk Suh; video and sculpture by Darrin Martin; sculpture by Tom Bills, Lucy Puls and Annabeth Rosen, alongside a recent drawing. Through Feb. 29, Pence Gallery, 212 D St., Davis. The exhibit and related programs are sponsored by the Department of Art, and the Division of Humanities, Arts and Cultural Studies (Herbert A. Young Society Fund).