By Sister Dana Van Iquity–
The Sister Honey Bear Mural appeared on the Powerhouse wall in the SoMa neighborhood on the day before Easter Sunday. A flock of nuns of the San Francisco Order of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence assembled to bless the huge, glorious, wondrous mural of renowned artist fnnch’s honey bear donned in wimple, veil, and long fake eyelashes to forever bless the leather ‘hood.
The Sister Honey Bear Painting and Print went on sale Easter Sunday during our 42nd Anniversary Virtual Celebration, “Rise Up with the Sisters.” And 50% of sales went to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence to fund our grants cycle. The painting is 11″ x 19″, spray paint on cut maple plywood, signed, and numbered from an edition of 50. The print is 18″ x 24″, archival pigment on archival cotton rag, signed, and numbered from an edition of 150. After the sale went online at fnnch’s website, the Sister Bear’s 50 paintings and 150 prints sold out in 60 seconds raising $24,375!
fnnch believes art is for everyone. He notes that only about 5% of a city’s residents and visitors tour its art museums. He believes street art and murals are art for the other 95%, inspiring and engaging them with the arts. And the honey bear just makes people feel warm inside.
“To me, The Sisters represents super-grass roots, super-cool people allowing people to be themselves, and is the sort of organization I wanted to partner with,” fnnch told me for the San Francisco Bay Times. “I wanted to help support their work.”
fnnch creates street art and murals using multi-layered stencils and spray paint. He calls his work “contemporary pop art,” depicting objects from both nature and everyday life. Over time his work has gained a strong following on social media and has been featured by The New York Times, Washington Post, and The San Francisco Chronicle. When you go to his website, you will note that he has dozens upon dozens of different versions of honey bears with different themes, hats, accoutrements, props, etc.—and mostly all sold out, unfortunately. They are extremely popular. ( https://fnnch.com/ )
His art can be found in San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Chicago, St. Louis, Tel Aviv, and Hong Kong. And lucky for you kinky leather folx and friends and sister fans: now at 1347 Folsom in SF South of Market!
When I confessed my discomfort as a former English professor and current journalist in fnnch not capitalizing a proper noun, especially at the start of a sentence, he held no remorse. But he did explain his nickname. He said in middle school he was very short and very small and was called the little finch. Added to that, his mother’s family was artistic and used birds somewhat thematically—so it all came together for this artist. He also likes to joke that he’s “too poor to buy vowels.”
Referring to The Sisters always helping out at the gates during Leather Fairs, Power House Manager Scott Peterson said, “Working with The Sisters again feels like a return to normalcy.” He added, “We’re not sure what the future holds, but we’re certainly hoping to get back to it … let’s hope the honey bear here changes everything!”
“This is a merger of three San Francisco institutions: The Sisters, the Powerhouse, and fnnch,” said Senator Scott Wiener. “Three great things coming together to make beautiful art.”
The glorious afternoon concluded with a blessing of the honey nun mural by Sister Celine and Sister Lilith (everyone spraying the crowd with “holy” water from honey bears) followed by a sainting of fnnch as “St. phoenxx, Guardian of the Joyous Bears, Provider of the Honey of Hope, Champion of Resiliency.” Amen!
For More Information
Mark Rhodes, PR
https://www.markrhodes.com
fnnch
https://fnnch.com
Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence
https://www.thesisters.org
Published on April 8, 2021
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