The right wall of the exhibition hall features a mural. On the left wall, the words CREATIVE GROWTH are written in graffiti style. The walls are pale purple. The floor is gray. The ceiling is white with a black circle whose center is white.
William Scott Praise Frisco: Peace and Love in the City, installation view, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 2024.
Photo: Don Ross, courtesy of San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

Access Granted: Some Thoughts for the Future

Jessie Myfanwy Stainton
117 – Crip Feature William Scott
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William Scott paints love letters to San Francisco. His largest work to date, Praise Frisco: Peace and Love in the City (2024), is a landmark commission from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). Composed of colourfully montaged illustrations, the wall-length mural enmeshes Scott’s personal history with cultural iconography.

Praise Frisco is nostalgic yet futuristic, with a redesign of city infrastructure set amongst smiling portraits of some of the people who shape Scott’s world.These include Diana Ross, church women praise dancing, and youthful depictions of himself and his mother. In a short video accompanying the work, Scott says he wants people to feel “so happy,”1 1 - See William Scott, “William Scott: Praise Frisco,” SFMOMA video, 3:10, accessible online. a point echoed in white painted letters at the top of the mural: “Praise Frisco at night / Future of San Francisco / Love in the city / Peace of a gospel city / Joy and happiness.” In Praise Frisco, Scott insists on a future marked with joy in a world filled with too much violence.

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