Oakland visual artist Binta Ayofemi’s dream was to activate dormant spaces in Oakland and San Francisco, two cities long tarnished by racist redlining and urban redevelopment, and transform them into vibrant centers of Black culture and art.
The acclaimed artist, who received SFMOMA’s prestigious SECA award for rising artists last year, sought to realize her ambitions largely through renting and renovating vacant commercial spaces in Oakland and San Francisco through her nonprofit organization, Ground Urban.
But at least five commercial property owners in the Bay Area have accused the artist of failing to pay rent on buildings leased to her over the past three years, and say her missed payments have collectively cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Property owners and Ayofemi said in interviews that the artist hoped to open a bookstore, a craft distillery and an arts and events space, among other ambitious proposals.
Some of these projects were underway when, at some point, each of the property owners said the rent payments stopped coming; other projects never began, with spaces left unused, according to interviews with property owners, court records, email exchanges and real estate documents reviewed by The Chronicle.
“She has in her mind this glittering, beautiful, persuasive image of a project … but it’s an empty shell of a dreamscape that she’s not actually doing,” said Oakland attorney Shona Armstrong, who shortly before the pandemic rented an office space to Ayofemi at 1625 Broadway in Oakland and later evicted her, claiming she was owed more than $10,000 in unpaid rent.
Ayofemi said she believes she does not owe Armstrong money. But an Alameda County Superior Court judge ordered Ayofemi to pay the back rent and about $5,000 more in attorney fees and costs.
“There is no substance backing up these visions. There is no follow-through,” said Armstrong, who filed an extensive complaint to state and federal officials detailing Ayofemi’s real estate dealings under her nonprofit.
The complaint alleges that Ground Urban has been renting and defaulting on spaces around Oakland and raising money purportedly to “revitalize” spaces while using the money for other purposes. Ayofemi said she had not seen the IRS complaint, but called the allegations “insane” and “bogus,” denying the claim that donor money was used to pay rent.
State records also show Ground Urban’s business entity status was suspended by the Franchise Tax Board.
Court records show Ayofemi was evicted from at least three other Oakland buildings, at 1460 Seventh St., 1701 Telegraph Ave., and 2124 Broadway. In two of the cases she was ordered to pay tens of thousands of dollars in back rent and fees, court records show. The artist told The Chronicle she intends to resolve all of the disputes.
Ayofemi is also fighting an eviction from 1615 Broadway in Oakland, where she opened Dusk Coffee, a cafe and wine bar that is still in operation. Brian Breyre, who leased the space to Ayofemi, said she owes “well over $100,000” in back rent since she stopped paying in January.
“She was good at selling herself,” Breyre said. “And it’s so sad because I thought she was going to be good for the community, and I really wanted to believe in it.” Ayofemi said she plans to continue operating Dusk Coffee while contesting her eviction in court.
In a lengthy interview, Ayofemi denied having “any record of not paying rent,” despite the allegations in court documents. Any difficulties she encountered, she said, were misunderstandings brought about by predatory, unforgiving landlords conspiring to thwart her revolutionary work at a time where the pandemic had inflicted hardship on many artists.
“I am literally in the midst of doing transformative things,” said Ayofemi, comparing her work to that of Nelson Mandela. “My family knows how dangerous it is for me to do this work … and I was like no, I’m going to do this work. It’s powerful, beautiful work.”
She did not elaborate on what dangers she faced.
Ayofemi said that in some cases she made requests for rent extensions that were denied. In other instances, she said, she believed that murals she painted and other “renovations” to the buildings she rented could be offered in place of rent payments.
Screenshots of emails Ayofemi provided to The Chronicle show her initially working amicably with some of the landlords who later evicted her. In one, Armstrong — the attorney who rented Ayofemi an office space at 1625 Broadway — wrote that she understood the artist’s funding had been stalled and asked how she planned to pay rent into the future. Ayofemi wrote that she could pay for three months, but asked for a rent reduction, and said she understood if it couldn’t be granted.
Later emails provided by Ayofemi show Armstrong losing patience with the artist after a string of allegedly missed rent payments, and warning her about the possibility of an eviction while pleading with her to leave the building voluntarily.
“I get it,” Armstrong wrote. “You’ve bitten off more than you can chew. Maybe you are panicking. Please stop the bleeding and sign the termination agreement.”
Ayofemi could not provide documents to support her claims about the current status of her financial issues with landlords and could not recall the names of attorneys who she said previously represented her in court.
San Francisco gallery owner Aimee Friberg, who works with Ayofemi and recently included her art in an exhibition at Friberg’s gallery, said she was not aware of concerns surrounding Ayofemi’s business dealings, but said Ayofemi was working to realize her vision at the “intersection of urban development, real estate, changing neighborhoods, architecture, nature and community.”
Friberg said Ayofemi’s work in a January exhibition and her solo exhibition as part of her SFMOMA SECA award both resonated with the Bay Area’s art community and created “space to highlight the Black experience and to emphasize the complexity of urban changes in West Oakland.”
“I do not want to discredit anyone’s financial loss, but I do think it’s an interesting time, coming out of the pandemic where so many small businesses and artists, and creatives have lost space, or have left the Bay Area,” said Friberg.
One of Ayofemi’s most robust urban development projects was her purchase of a storied San Francisco restaurant called Sam Jordan’s Bar and Grill in the Bayview neighborhood. City records show that Ayofemi failed to make payments on a roughly $1 million loan to revitalize the building, which she intended to convert into a craft distillery and art space, inventors who financed her loan told The Chronicle.
The pool of lenders eventually foreclosed on the property and resold it in April at a loss in the vicinity of $300,000 to a different owner, said two of the investors, Rex Baldwin and Gardner Kent.
“I’ve never seen something like this, when an individual enters into this many leases and for this much money, all at the same time, and breaches this many of them,” said Hussein Saffouri, an attorney who represented the owners of 1701 Telegraph Ave. and 2124 Broadway in Oakland in their eviction proceedings against Ayofemi.
There is almost no recourse other than eviction when commercial tenants like Ayofemi refuse to pay rent, Saffouri said.
In her interview with The Chronicle, Ayofemi said she relies on investments, sales of her art and grant money to fund her work, but did not offer any details about her investors or grants, saying only that the agreements were delicate and nuanced.
In a recent San Francisco Standard article, Ayofemi announced her plans to revive a vacant lot adjacent to Sam Jordan’s Bar and Grill, the building she lost to foreclosure. In the article, Ayofemi said she planned to open up a beer garden and barbecue restaurant in a space she dubbed “The Yard.”
Earl Shaddix, executive director of Economic Development on Third Street, a nonprofit focused on developing businesses along Third Street in the Bayview and Hunters Point neighborhoods, said he was impressed by Ayofemi’s passion for restoring Black-owned spaces when he first met her.
“But as time went on, I think I joined a lot of other folks in wondering, why isn’t anything happening?” he said. “It’s been two years now. … I’m just confused as to what she owns, what she leases, what she doesn’t own. … I’m absolutely confused.”
Bonnie Bridges, principal architect at Studio BBA, an atelier that contracted with Ayofemi, said she worked with the artist to renovate at least four spaces in Oakland.
But Bridges, who said Ayofemi’s vision was compelling and that the artist was fun to work with, said she has not been paid since at least September of 2021. Ayofemi, she said, strung her firm along for more than two years, indicating she intended to pay. Eventually, Bridges said, Ayofemi asked for the fees to be a “donation” to Ayofemi’s nonprofit.
“I can tell you it’s north of six figures,” said Bridges, referring to the outstanding debt.
Ayofemi denied the claims of unpaid invoices. She said Bridges “double-billed” her and has been paid a “ton of money” for the project.
In conversations with The Chronicle, Ayofemi repeatedly stated her belief that the money purported to be owed was a misunderstanding and would be resolved. The artist told The Chronicle that in the Bay Area, saying that someone who has not paid rent “is very problematic.”
Ayofemi said she still believes, once her legal matters are ironed out, that she can achieve her vision of creating reinvigorated Black spaces and storefronts around the Bay Area and Oakland in particular.
On the phone outside of Dusk Coffee, the cafe she operates and is trying to save from eviction, she said she was only a short walk from the many projects she’d taken on at various commercial buildings in Oakland. It was a sunny day in the city, and she snapped pictures of the facades she’d renovated.
At 1625 Broadway, she said, she could see the shimmer of the paint that “transformed” the building.
“I have so many people who love my work,” she said. “The majority of people love my work.”
Reach Annie Vainshtein: avainshtein@sfchronicle.com
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