(Read Brenda Payton's on the street commentary in the Sunday Insight Section of the SF Chronicle.)
In these recessionary times Farmers' Markets appear to be thriving. This is reassuring. Many of us look forward to their arrival in our neighborhood as a high point in the week. The sights, smells and flavors of the countryside spilling out onto concrete and asphalt. The opportunity to support small, family farmers, to pick up gardening tips. To enjoy the food stands and musicians. It's hard to imagine a time before most of these markets existed. It wasn't so long ago.
My first encounter with an outdoor farmers' market was in Florence, Italy in 1966. In those days this market occupied the piazza behind the Mercato Centrale. The local farmers had large handcarts with colorful awnings that could be unfurled on sunny days. It was a picturesque and animated scene overlooked by the pale yellow palazzi with their green shutters. The Duomo floated in the distance.
While Florentines haggled with the farmers, Gypsy families worked the tourists or stole fruit. The merchants would intermittently chase the Gypsies or hurl rotten fruit after them.
(Remember you can click on all these images to enlarge them.)
When I tasted the fruit I understood why they were stealing it. The peaches, especially, were a revelation and made me wonder what American farmers were doing wrong.
I returned to Berkeley, California in 1970. The counter culture rebellion against industrial agriculture was gaining momentum. Our block joined 'The Food Conspiracy'. Many Saturday mornings I would drive my '54 F-100 truck to the Alemany Farmer's Market in San Francisco to pick up the week's orders for more than a dozen households. Before noon, friends and neighbors would gather in our backyard to collect their food.
In the mid seventies an open air market rolled up a block from my home in North Oakland. It stopped on a parking lot on Telegraph Avenue just south of Alcatraz. I would set my up easel there almost every week. The market consisted of two or three red trucks with white wooden panels. The panels swung up to form a wooden awning revealing shelves filled with colorful fruit and vegetables.
I'd been painting on and off near Ratto's in Old Oakland for a decade. The neighborhood was emerging from skid row, when in 1997 'Urban Village' opened the Old Oakland Farmer's Market.
My mural sized painting of the market in those days hangs permanently in the foyer of Holy Names University's Performing Arts Center. It was composed from dozens of small sketches made at the market over several months.
(Remember you can click on all these images to enlarge them.)
Some of the people in the painting from far left are Richard and Byron Fong son and grandson of the famous Oakland Chinese herbalist Fong Wan. Richard died a few years ago. Byron Fong continues the family trade as an herbalist and acupuncturist with an office on Grand Avenue opposite Children's Fairyland. The next two people are Martin Durante and his daughter Elena owners of Ratto's Delicatessen. Talking to them is Sandro Rossi founder of Caffe 817.
This last painting is an up to the moment rendition of the market. Completed May 1st of this year.
If you are in Oakland on a Friday morning come on down to Ninth and Washington Streets. Enjoy the market. Sip the best cappucino in town at Caffe 817 and enjoy organic, Italian food while you consider what you need to buy at Ratto's Delicatessen next door. For a more complete preview of what you will find watch my five minute video titled "Celebrating Caffe 817".
(Read Brenda Payton's on the street commentary about the creation of this painting in the Sunday Insight Section of the SF Chronicle.)