Axis Mundi, a 20-Foot Steel Sculpture by HYBYCOZO, Is Now in Alamo Square for a Year

A 20-foot sculpture made of stacked steel polyhedrons now stands in the center of Alamo Square Park. Axis Mundi, by the Los Angeles studio HYBYCOZO, was installed in October 2026 as part of the Big Art Loop public art program. The San Francisco Arts Commission approved it as a temporary installation for one year from the date it went in, which puts its expected run through about October 2027.

What It Is

According to the minutes of the Arts Commission’s Visual Arts Committee meeting of May 20, 2026, the piece measures about 20 feet tall, 10 feet wide and 10 feet deep, and is made of powder-coated steel with LED lights. The committee approved it unanimously, placed it at the center of the park, and noted that it will not become part of the city’s Civic Art Collection.

Big Art Loop’s page for the work describes the form as a set of truncated octahedrons, a shape built from repeating hexagons and squares, based on the crystal geometry of the mineral fluorite. The framework is open, so sunlight passes through it and casts patterned shadows that change through the day. The title means “axis of the world.”

HYBYCOZO is the artists Serge Beaulieu and Yelena Filipchuk. Filipchuk, originally from Lviv, Ukraine, has a background in environmental science, ecological arts and studio art. Beaulieu, originally from Revelstoke, Canada, studied industrial design. Their large outdoor sculptures use geometry drawn from mathematics, physics and biology.

About the Big Art Loop

The Big Art Loop places temporary large-scale sculptures in parks and public spaces around San Francisco. It is funded by the Sijbrandij Foundation, set up by GitLab co-founder Sid Sijbrandij, and run by the art agency Building 180, with San Francisco Recreation and Parks as the partner on park sites. When the program was announced in 2025, KQED reported a goal of up to 100 works over three years, using existing pieces more than 10 feet tall or wide rather than new commissions. Marco Cochrane’s 45-foot R-Evolution at Embarcadero Plaza was one of its earlier pieces; it left the plaza this month.

On the program’s map, Axis Mundi is one of three works in the North City segment, which runs from Hayes Valley to the Marina. The other two, Daniel Pérez’s Archeology of The Future and George Mubanga’s Renaissance Woman, are listed as coming soon.

Seeing It

Alamo Square Park is bounded by Hayes, Steiner, Fulton and Scott streets, with the row of Victorian houses known as the Painted Ladies on the Steiner Street side. The park is free and open to the public. The sculpture sits at the center of the park, on the hilltop. Muni’s 21 Hayes runs along Hayes Street on the park’s south side, and the 5 Fulton and 5R Fulton Rapid run along Fulton Street on the north side.

For more on the area, see our guides to the Painted Ladies and Alamo Square, and to nearby Hayes Valley.

Sources: San Francisco Arts Commission, Visual Arts Committee minutes, May 20, 2026; Big Art Loop, Axis Mundi; SFist, October 19, 2026; KQED.

Image: rendering of Axis Mundi in Alamo Square Park by Building 180, via Big Art Loop.