The Only Magazine for Children's Art
Sep 18, 2026
'Giant Arc' is a canopy of 75,000 painted kites.
American artist Jacob Hashimoto, who has a Japanese father but was actually born in Colorado in 1973, began his career by installing an assemblage of 15,000 "kites" in Chicago's Ann Nathan Gallery (he had recently graduated from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago). The piece was soon "discovered" by Museum of Contemporary Art chief curator Richard Francis - who insisted on having it moved so that it could dangle from the ceiling of the museum's popular cafe...where it remained for the next eighteen months.
The Los Angeles Times would go on to describe 'Gas Giant' (the work's official name) as like "being in a 3D painting, gentle as a summer breeze and intimate as a whisper" when it was exhibited at LA's Museum of Contemporary Art Pacific Design Center in 2014. More recently Hashimoto has built similar installations for major cultural centers from Boise, Idaho to Skärhamn, Sweden to Siena, Italy.
But his new and descriptively titled 'Giant Arc' is his most ambitious project to date, an indoor "awning" made up of more than 75,000 of his now signature painted kites - which is draped dramatically from the ceiling of the free-to-enter Roberts Family Gallery. The room's two story windows allow the work to be visible to passersby on Howard Street, making it almost impossible to not be compelled to pop in for a peek at it in person.
What is most fascinating about Hashimoto's nearly three-decades-long artistic narrative is the sense that it is an ever-ongoing continuum, of sorts, often employing elements from previous works in his most current projects. And while that is true once again here, 'Giant Arc' also boasts more than 10,000 new painted kites, inspired specifically by the flora and fauna of Northern California. So viewers can enjoy searching for references to the coastal Sonoran blue butterfly, the enigmatically beautiful checker lily, and especially the storied dahlia, which happens to be San Francisco's official flower.
“This giant arc of kites, color and pattern will be at once chaotic meditative and playful," Hashimoto explains, "a generous artwork that invites viewers to spend time in the gallery. It is an enticing, intriguing overture to the museum itself.”
It is an astute observation, considering SFMOMA's recent and notable commitment to presenting exhibits and events that usher visitors into the more fantastical, whimsical and boldly provocative. To wit, the just-closed career survey 'KAWS: FAMILY'; Yayoi Kusama's 'Aspiring to Pumpkin's Love, Love in My Heart' (2023-25); and the thought-provoking group show 'What Matters: A Proposition in Eight Rooms' (2023-24). Yet 'Giant Arc' represents something particularly powerful and urgent in such bitterly divisive times as these: a communal public experience that projects a sense of hope, and even seems to be offering a kind of refuge/protection. It's a truly unique opportunity for complete strangers to assemble and share a few moments of collective enchantment and even, dare we say, enlightenment.
“The gravity of 'Giant Arc' is in its universality," observes Hashimoto. "This essential nature allows people to find what they might need in the work: mysteries if people want them, stories if people desire them, narratives to spin and twist, experimental maps and aerial geographies to explore."
Naturally, we highly recommend bringing the kids along for the experience, with the museum's own Christopher Bedford enthusing, "[This] enveloping and breathtaking commission promises to welcome visitors of all ages, imbuing all who experience it with a sense of wonder and awe."
A little wonder and awe, of course, can go a very long way.
