Carlos Villa’s sculptural painting from 1995, My Father Walking up Kearny Street for the First Time, includes a Panama hat—a stand-in for the artist’s father. On either side of the cap are two rows of columns covered in black feathers, suggesting a crowded, destabilizing, and unwelcoming San Francisco—the artist’s parents moved to the city from the Philippines during the 1920s. A sign bearing the word ORIENT is placed above the piece, implying an arrogant command and a forced racial categorization.

A retrospective of Villa’s work was on view at the Newark Museum of Art before traveling to San