Connie Wirtz's Obituary
Constance Korematsu Wirtz
passed away on July 16, 2019, at home in Oakland, just shy of her 73rd birthday. Born in San Francisco and raised in the Bay Area, Connie attended San Leandro High School and went on to study at Pomona College, the University of Pennsylvania and then the University of California, Berkeley, where she earned her bachelor of arts. Connie’s passion for art was fueled at Berkeley by her studies with such seminal Bay Area artists and art historians as Harold Paris, Peter Voulkos, Robert Hudson, Peter Selz, Alfred Frankenstein and Walter Horn. A strong belief in equality led to her co-managing with Barbara Lee Alameda County’s Shirley Chisholm campaign for president in 1972. Connie went on to work with other groups, including the Black Panthers, on campaigns and political causes. At Berkeley Connie met Steve Wirtz and they wed in 1967. Nine years later, Connie and Steve opened the Stephen Wirtz Gallery in San Francisco. From its early focus on 20th century American and European design, the gallery evolved into an important venue for contemporary photography, painting, and sculpture. Over the next three decades the gallery would present national and international artists, both historical and contemporary. A hallmark of the gallery was Connie’s strong commitment to Bay Area artists, particularly women artists whose talent and vision she supported. Connie’s integrity and support of Bay Area artists made her a much-loved figure in the arts community. When the gallery closed in 2014, another casualty of San Francisco’s over heated real estate market, that love was in full evidence. The loss to the community was deeply felt. After some three hundred curated exhibitions at the Stephen Wirtz Gallery, Connie created WirtzArt and continued to collaborate with artists she believed in. A major achievement under the auspices of WirtzArt, and one of things she was most proud of, was finding a permanent home for the records and documents of the Stephen Wirtz Gallery in the Smithsonian Institution’s Archives of American Art. Connie saw this as the crowning success of her efforts with Wirtz Art. Steve Wirtz, her husband of 51 years, Nicholas Wirtz, her son, his spouse Rachel Wirtz, and their child Umiko Wirtz survive her. A celebration of Connie’s life and work will be held at a later date; for more information, please contact (Mortuary). Contributions in memory of Connie can be made to Planned Parenthood (plannedparenthood.org).
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