The city of San Francisco is considering destroying a Brutalist fountain by Armand Vaillancourt in a redevelopment of Embarcadero Plaza.
In an October 2024 meeting of San Francisco’s Recreation and Park Commission, the commission’s general manager Phil Ginsburg revealed he had previously talked with with representatives from property management company BXP about redeveloping the plaza “eight to ten years” prior to the Commission’s participation in a public-private partnership. (On September 22, Ginsburg resigned from his position after 16 years.)
According to the Art Newspaper, city officials had reportedly discussed redeveloping the plaza roughly a decade before these plans were made public in 2024. The plans did not seem to include the plaza or public art asset, which the city has a legal responsibility to maintain.
Previously undisclosed public documents reportedly indicated 15 different instances in which the San Francisco Recreation and Park Department officials referred to BXP and prior organizations as being responsible for the maintenance of Vaillancourt fountain and Embarcadero Plaza between December 1978 and May 2025. BXP officials reportedly also referred to maintenance obligations in the same documents.
BXP, which owns the Embarcadero Center office, hotel, and retail complex, is reportedly responsible for maintaining Embarcadero Plaza and Vaillancourt Fountain—an agreement made in exchange for the construction of a spiral staircase in the plaza.
The documents indicate that, though commission officials said they wanted to try to preserve the fountain and plaza, they instead had plans in place for more than a decade to redevelop the area. Furthermore, officials now say that the fountain and plaza are too dilapidated to be preserved, but it’s not clear why both continued to deteriorate in condition, even though BXP had been charged with stewarding them. Neither San Francisco’s Recreation and Park Commission nor a representative from BXP could be reached for comment at the time of publication.
With the city proposing a $35 million renovation of the plaza, the San Francisco Arts Commission is preparing to vote on deaccessioning the fountain, which will decide its future in the city. Though the fountain is not beyond repair, it reportedly costs $28,951,519 to fix. The decision has some questioning the greater impact it will have on the display of public art.
The 710-ton concrete fountain sculpture has had a long history in San Francisco since its completion in 1971, including an incident in which Bono spray-painted “Rock ’n’ Roll Stops the Traffic” onto its surface during a free 1987 U2 concert. Originally, the piece was situated in the center of a freeway that was later removed due to damage from the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. Designed as a fountain that could carry 30,000 gallons of water, the piece has not had running water since June 2024. It was fenced off from the public due to safety and security concerns in June.
ARTnews reached out to the mayor of San Francisco, Daniel Lurie, as well as the city’s department of Public Works. Neither immediately responded to a request for comment.
