Ben Kinmont’s Our commons are free presents an exhibition portrait of the San Francisco Diggers through their publications. Radical community actors who emerged within the Haight-Ashbury counterculture of the 1960s, the Diggers used mimeographs and offset printing to establish a “free” economy: free food, free medical care, free goods, free housing, and free information. These publications served to build community, share resources, and empower revolutionary living.

Kinmont brings his Street press, on view in the exhibition, to the Friday, July 18, 2025 Fort Mason Night Market to print and give away Eric Noble’s A short history of the San Francisco Diggers, a 38-page illustrated essay written by Noble for Our commons are free; six different San Francisco Digger flyers from 1967; and a more recent street sheet written by original Digger Billy Murcott, Noble, and Kinmont.

Night Market Street Press Details:
On view: Friday, July 18, 2025
Hours: 5:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Fort Mason Center For Arts & Culture
Entry Plaza near Equator Coffees Café
San Francisco, CA
Free Admission

Our commons are free is on view through August 10, 2025 in The Store House (Building D) at Fort Mason Center for Arts & Culture. Admission is free. Exhibition hours are Wednesday to Saturday, 12:00 p.m. (Noon) to 6:00 p.m., Sunday 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 pm. The exhibition is open for the July 18, 2025 Fort Mason Night Market until 9:00 p.m.

After his Street press activation, Fort Mason Art screens Kinmont’s new film Saints paradice on the exterior retaining wall near Equator Coffees Cafe. On view in his Our commons are free exhibition project, Saints paradice draws on the 8mm film archive of artist Jilala Jet von Jalopy, among others, to portray the Angels of Light Free Theater and the new worlds they made possible by sharing a communal life together. Footage covers the years of 1970 to 1978 and shows the Angels on-stage and outdoors, performing in various parks around San Francisco.

Film Screening Details
Ben Kinmont Saints paradice oudoor screening
Friday, July 18, 2025
9:00 p.m.
Fort Mason Center For Arts & Culture
Entry Plaza near Equator Coffees Café
Free Admission

In insisting upon the Digger “free” philosophy in art and entertainment, the Angels split off from the drag performance ensemble The Cockettes, rejecting ticketed shows and any paid fees for both artists and audiences. The film includes never-before-seen footage of day-to-day activities within the Friends of Perfection Commune and the new house that came together around the performing artists, like Hibiscus, who departed the Friends’ first Sutter Street home in San Francisco. We see too the fantastical environments created within these communal spaces, and the elements the Angels would make to create free performance for all. Scrumbly, a former member of both the Cockettes and the Angels of Light, composed and performed original music for the film, continuing his contributions – both as an innovator and a historian – to cabaret, jazz, and performance art histories.

Image Information: #1: Ben Kinmont, Street Press (activation in Paris), 2023; #2: Street press activation (Santa Rosa, CA), 2022; #3: Installation photo of Street press within Our commons are free at Fort Mason Center for Arts & Culture, San Francisco, 2025; #4: Ben Kinmont, Saints paradice (still), 2025