Ruth Asawa Lanier, Inc. (RAL, Inc.), a family-run entity dedicated to supporting the career and legacy of artist Ruth Asawa (1926–2013), will open a 1,714-square-foot ground-floor exhibition space at Minnesota Street Project (1275 Minnesota Street) in San Francisco’s Dogpatch neighborhood on May 9, 2026.
RAL, Inc. will host rotating exhibitions of Asawa’s work, including looped- and tied-wire sculptures, paintings, drawings, cast sculptures, prints, sketchbooks, and community-oriented projects, spanning her six-decade career.
Organized by family members, friends, and world-renowned curators, exhibitions will offer the public a rare opportunity to view lesser-known and never-before-seen works, much of which has never been publicly exhibited, alongside work by her friends, including Josef and Anni Albers, Imogen Cunningham, Ray Johnson, and others. RAL, Inc. will also host an annual exhibition for students and faculty from the Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts, continuing Asawa’s legacy as an arts advocate and educator.
“Our family is very grateful to Minnesota Street Project for this opportunity and looks forward to presenting focused exhibitions on an ongoing basis that continue to educate visitors about my grandmother’s life and work. We hope that, by continuing to share Asawa’s story, we will encourage others to pursue their own creative endeavors and inspire the next generation of artists and makers here in San Francisco.”
— Henry Weverka, Asawa’s grandson and president of Ruth Asawa Lanier Inc.
The inaugural exhibition, Ruth Asawa: Untitled, on view May 9–June 20, 2026, will be co-curated by Asawa’s daughters Aiko Cuneo and Addie Lanier, and include rarely exhibited looped- and tied-wire sculptures for which she is best-known, cast artworks, paperfolds, watercolors, and drawings on paper and copper foil. The title reflects a defining aspect of Asawa’s practice: except in a few cases, she never bothered to title her work. She was more interested in the creation of it than in naming it.
“Minnesota Street Project was built to provide sustainable, long-term space for galleries, artists, and arts organizations, and Ruth Asawa spent her career demonstrating that kind of sustained commitment to San Francisco. Welcoming RAL, Inc. into our community feels like a natural extension of that shared mission.”
— Aimee Le Duc, Executive Director of Minnesota Street Project.
“In addition to her incredible success as an individual artist, my grandmother was a tremendous advocate for the arts and arts education in the Bay Area beginning in the mid-1960s,” says Henry Weverka, President of Ruth Asawa Lanier, Inc. “When asked in 2002 why she never pursued a career in a major art market like New York, she replied, ‘It’s better for me to invest in San Francisco.'”
Weverka added: “Our family is very grateful to Minnesota Street Project for this opportunity and looks forward to presenting focused exhibitions on an ongoing basis that continue to educate visitors about my grandmother’s life and work. We hope that, by continuing to share Asawa’s story, we will encourage others to pursue their own creative endeavors and inspire the next generation of artists and makers here in San Francisco.”
“Minnesota Street Project was built to provide sustainable, long-term space for galleries, artists, and arts organizations, and Ruth Asawa spent her career demonstrating that kind of sustained commitment to San Francisco,” says Aimee Le Duc, Executive Director of Minnesota Street Project. “Welcoming RAL, Inc. into our community feels like a natural extension of that shared mission.”
Asawa is internationally renowned, with recent or planned exhibitions at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Menil Drawing Institute, SFMOMA, MoMA New York, Guggenheim Bilbao, and Fondation Beyeler. Her work is held in permanent collections at major museums across the United States and abroad. She received a posthumous National Medal of Arts in 2024 and was inducted into the California Hall of Fame in 2021.
The space will open May 9, 2026 and will be open to the public Tuesday through Saturday, from 11 AM – 4 PM.
About Minnesota Street Project
Minnesota Street Project opened its doors to the public nearly ten years ago. Located in San Francisco’s historic Dogpatch district, Minnesota Street Project offers economically sustainable spaces for art galleries, artists, and related nonprofits. Inhabiting three warehouses, Minnesota Street Project seeks to retain and strengthen San Francisco’s contemporary art community in the short term, while developing an internationally recognized arts destination in the long term. minnesotastreetproject.com About Ruth Asawa Lanier, Inc. Ruth Asawa Lanier, Inc. (RAL, Inc.) is a family-run entity dedicated to supporting the career and legacy of Ruth Asawa (1926–2013).
About Ruth Asawa Lanier, Inc.
Ruth Asawa Lanier, Inc. (RAL, Inc.) is a family-run entity dedicated to supporting the career and legacy of Ruth Asawa (1926–2013).