''Mohandas K. Gandhi'' is a 1988

bronze sculpture Bronze is the most popular metal for Casting (metalworking), cast metal sculptures; a cast bronze sculpture is often called simply "a bronze". It can be used for statues, singly or in groups, reliefs, and small statuettes and figurines, as w ...

Mahatma Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (; ; 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948), popularly known as Mahatma Gandhi, was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist Quote: "... marks Gandhi as a hybrid cosmopolitan figure who transformed ... anti- ...

sculpted by Zlatko Paunov and Steven Lowe. It is located in the plaza to the southeast of the

San Francisco Ferry Building The San Francisco Ferry Building is a terminal for ferries that travel across the San Francisco Bay, a food hall and an office building. It is located on The Embarcadero in San Francisco, California and is served by Golden Gate Ferry and San ...

along the Embarcadero in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

, California, United States. The tall sculpture is mounted on a block which bears a plaque, raised on two steps. It was a gift from the

Gandhi Memorial International Foundation Gandhi Memorial International Foundation, also known as the Mahatma Gandhi International Foundation, was a controversial non-profit organization run by Yogesh K. Gandhi, born Yogesh Kathari,"Investigation of Illegal or Improper Activities in Connec ...

Reception

The statue was dedicated by

Art Agnos Arthur Christ Agnos (born Arthouros Agnos; [] September 1, 1938) is an American politician. He served as the 39th Mayor of San Francisco, mayor of San Francisco, California from 1988 to 1992 and as the Regional Head of the United States Department ...

, the

Mayor of San Francisco The mayor of the City and County of San Francisco is the head of the executive branch of the San Francisco city and county government. The officeholder has the duty to enforce city laws, and the power to either approve or veto bills passed by t ...

, on October 3, 1988. A similar statue by the same sculptors, Paunov and Lowe, was unveiled under a

banyan tree A banyan, also spelled "banian", is a fig that develops accessory trunks from adventitious prop roots, allowing the tree to spread outwards indefinitely. This distinguishes banyans from other trees with a strangler habit that begin life as a ...

Kapiolani Park Queen Kapiolani Regional Park is the largest and second-oldest public park in Hawaii, located in Honolulu on the east end of Waikiki just beyond Kuhio Beach Park and the Waikiki residential neighborhood. The park, named after Queen Kapiolani, ...

Honolulu Honolulu (; ) is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Hawaii, which is in the Pacific Ocean. It is an unincorporated county seat of the consolidated City and County of Honolulu, situated along the southeast coast of the island ...

in 1990.

msnbc.com MSNBC (originally the Microsoft National Broadcasting Company) is an American news-based pay television cable channel. It is owned by NBCUniversala subsidiary of Comcast. Headquartered in New York City, it provides news coverage and political ...

contributor Chris Rodell wrote that the sculpture of Gandhi, a "renowned vegetarian", was appropriate for the plaza, being the site of a weekly

farmers' market A farmers' market (or farmers market according to the AP stylebook, also farmer's market in the Cambridge Dictionary) is a physical retail marketplace intended to sell foods directly by farmers to consumers. Farmers' markets may be indoors or o ...

. In 2010, a group called the Organization for Minorities of India, which formed to protest the oppression of Indian minorities, demanded the removal of the sculpture, claiming Gandhi was a racist "who harbored violent urges". The sculpture is a known target for vandalism; the eyeglasses are the most-stolen item, and the staff has been broken on several occasions. File:Mohandas K. Gandhi statue, San Francisco (2013) - 2.JPG, Plaque File:200705gandhiWaikiki.jpg, Statue of Gandhi by Paunov and Lowe in Hawaii

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mahatma Gandhi (San Francisco) 1988 establishments in California 1988 sculptures Bronze sculptures in California Monuments and memorials in California Outdoor sculptures in San Francisco Sculptures of men in California South of Market, San Francisco Statues in San Francisco

Vandalized works of art in California

Reception

See also

References