This neglected SF plaza is getting a glow-up, complete with more than 1,200 lights

One of the most maligned public spaces in and around downtown San Francisco is about to get a major glow-up. Illuminate, the nonprofit known for large-scale art projects like JFK Drive’s car-free Golden Mile, Market Street’s rainbow laser cannons, and the once and future Bay Lights, is set to transform Civic Center’s Fulton Plaza by stringing more than 1,000 lights — 1,271, to be exact — from the roofs of the San Francisco Public Library’s main branch and the Asian Art Museum.

It’s called “Spectra,” and it’s a collaboration with Oakland artist Joshua Hubert, who will debut the 1.6-acre work at this weekend’s “Night of Ideas,” a series of performances and panel discussions produced by the public library.

Renderings of the project reveal a geometric canopy of light over the plaza’s stenciled koi fish. Because each bulb can be controlled individually, the overall effect will be a waveform pattern, according to Illuminate’s Ben Davis. “It will look different from one direction, or below, or above,” he added.

The San Francisco Recreation and Parks Department — which oversees Fulton Plaza — confirmed that “Spectra” will go live Saturday at 8:10 p.m.

Why that specific timeframe? Because the debut will double as a musical performance. Hubert said he’s putting together a 15-minute DJ set spanning multiple genres, from orchestral dubstep to neuro-funk. “Spectra,” he added, will respond to the music. “I’ll have a couple of iPads set up so people can draw on them and make their own visuals,” Hubert said. “Anyone can play with it, for free.”

Davis calls Fulton Plaza — the pedestrianized block of Fulton between Larkin and Hyde streets — a disjointed space and a pressure point for the city. Rather than a grand gateway to City Hall, it’s an often windswept slab better known for fecal matter and drug use. “People don’t get how crucial this is to the future of the city,” he said. “It could be a nexus of the civic commons.”

While a long-running flea market left Fulton Plaza last year, the twice-weekly Heart of the City Farmers Market is still going strong. Those vendors, though, have to set up in the pre-dawn darkness. “We can leave a little light on in the evening and give those people some light to work by,” Davis said. “It’ll be a little more social and a little more safe.”

“Spectra” has been approved for a two-year run. But, as with the Bay Lights, which are set to return later this year, the bulbs might become too popular to dismantle. “If people like them, and we say we’re going to take them down, there’s usually an outcry,” Hubert said. “They were built to be extended.”