About
Dorka Keehn, Principal
Dorka is known for some of the most innovative public artworks in the United States and led the fundraising effort for The Bay Lights, the $12 million 25,000 LED light installation by artist Leo Villareal on the San Francisco Bay Bridge. She brings to KEEHN ON ART her experience as an award winning public artist and a San Francisco Arts Commissioner. For over a decade, Dorka chaired the Visual Arts Committee that commissions all artwork pertaining to the City’s Public Art Program, including at the SF International Airport. She was also a member of the Civic Design Review Committee, which has final purview over all construction and renovation of City-owned architecture, streets, and landscape design. Dorka is currently a member of the board of The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, the San Francisco Bay Area Planning and Urban Research Association (SPUR), and The California Arts Council Creative Economy Committee. |
In 2015, Dorka co-founded Sites Unseen, a project where she curates and partners with public and private sectors, community organizations, and local cultural institutions to bring dynamic arts programming to underused alleys in San Francisco’s Yerba Buena neighborhood in the form of permanent and temporary artworks. Sites Unseen activates these neglected areas by fostering social interaction, community pride, and economic opportunities while increasing visitors’ safety and exposure to the arts.
As an artist, Dorka teamed up with Brian Goggin on two permanent site-specific artworks. Caruso’s Dream was commissioned by AvalonBay for its 17-story high-rise, AVA 55 Ninth Street in San Francisco. Their previous collaboration, The Language of the Birds, the first solar powered public sculpture in the United States commissioned by the SF Arts Commission for a new plaza, was voted one of the best public artworks in the U.S. by Americans for the Arts.
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As an artist, Dorka teamed up with Brian Goggin on two permanent site-specific artworks. Caruso’s Dream was commissioned by AvalonBay for its 17-story high-rise, AVA 55 Ninth Street in San Francisco. Their previous collaboration, The Language of the Birds, the first solar powered public sculpture in the United States commissioned by the SF Arts Commission for a new plaza, was voted one of the best public artworks in the U.S. by Americans for the Arts.
[email protected]