92-foot 'Venus,' only slightly shorter than the Statue of Liberty, unveiled in SF

The newly completed sculpture "Venus," depicting goddess of love and beauty wrapped in a flowing robe, stands in Trinity Place in San Francisco. The 92-foot-tall work is by Lawrence Argent. The newly completed sculpture "Venus," depicting goddess of love and beauty wrapped in a flowing robe, stands in Trinity Place in San Francisco. The 92-foot-tall work is by Lawrence Argent. Photo: Mike Moffitt/SFGATE Photo: Mike Moffitt/SFGATE Image 1 of / 77 Caption Close 92-foot 'Venus,' only slightly shorter than the Statue of Liberty, unveiled in SF 1 / 77 Back to Gallery

The scaffolding is off.

The 92-foot-tall Venus sculpture — a shiny steel goddess whose body twists as if she were a genie coming out of a bottle — was unveiled Friday afternoon.

The tallest sculpture in San Francisco, Venus is only slightly shorter than the Statue of Liberty,as measured from crown to heel.

The Angelo Piazza surrounding her base is still under construction, but you can get a look at her if you peer down a skinny corridor on Eighth Street between Market and Mission streets. She's also visible from the upper-levels of nearby buildings.

This graceful lady wrapped in swirling robes will be the centerpiece for a fantastical sculpture-filled art garden surrounded by four residential towers making up the Trinity Place apartment complex. Two towers are complete, and the third, as well as the one-acre public plaza, are slated to be done by March 2017. A timeline for the fourth tower hasn't been finalized.

As reported in a previous SFGATE article, Venus is "the final statement by landlord and housing developer Angelo Sangiacomo, who died in December at age 91."

Under the city's "1 percent for art" program run by the San Francisco Planning Department, Sangiacomo was required to donate 1 percent of Trinity Place's cost to fund public art. That amount came out to $5 million, and funds could have either been "donated to the Public Art Trust Fund, overseen by the San Francisco Arts Commission, or added to a project by its developer, as overseen by the Planning Department," as reported in SFGATE.

Sangiacomo decided to create a public plaza at the center of the development and fill it with a collection of sculptures — known as C'era Una Volta as a whole. He hired the Denver artist Lawrence Argent to create the anchoring art piece. Drawing from Sangiacomo's love for Classical art, Argent decided created the modern interpretation of the "Venus de Milo."

Argent, who is known for fanciful works, has only one other piece in California—the 35-foot, stainless steel, leaping Bunny Foo Foo at Hall Winery in St. Helena.

The art collection at Trinity Place will also include a 9-foot white marble dove, a modern interpretation of the "Three Graces" and a 20-seat Carrara marble table.