2005
In 2005, in celebration of the opening of the redesigned de Young Museum in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, Ruth Asawa donated 15 sculptures to the museum for a permanent installation. This grouping was personally selected by Asawa to exemplify the range of her sculptural forms. In keeping with the artist's belief that art should be readily accessible to all, these works are housed in the Education Tower, where there is no charge for visitors.
Asawa was actively involved with the community in San Francisco. Upon moving there in 1949, the artist devoted herself to expanding access to art-focused educational programs. She co-founded the Alvarado Arts Workshop in 1968 and was instrumental in the opening of the first public arts high school in San Francisco in 1982, which was renamed the Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts in her honor in 2010. Asawa believed that "Art will make people better, more highly skilled in thinking and improving whatever business one goes into, or whatever occupation. It makes a person broader."