ARTIST TAKES A POTSHOT FOR GALLERY EXHIBITION

With its pointy, jagged-edge leaves, it could simply be a robust
houseplant. But in this hip downtown gallery, placed under a display
case, it's art.

It's also illegal.

Michele Pred's "Marijuana Project" is part of a new show at San
Francisco's Frey Norris Gallery called "Who's Afraid of San Francisco?"

The 2-foot-high cannabis plant stands in a plain, plastic pot on a
square, white podium. It's covered by a clear, Plexiglas box with air
holes. On the wall nearby is the artist's medical-marijuana card and
grower's permit. California is one of 11 states that allow medical
marijuana, though it remains illegal under federal law.

Also displayed are buds encased in resin and mounted in petri dishes,
which Pred calls "Marijuana Culture." She recently stopped by the
gallery to sign a set of three dishes that sold for $1,200.

"This symbolic five-leaf imagery that you see on T-shirts or caps --
you associate that with a certain kind of person or lifestyle," the
41-year-old Berkeley artist says. "I wanted to demystify it. It's a
plant. It's a weed."

The show was the idea of gallery owners Raman Frey and Wendi Norris.
"We were talking about current events, social issues in San Francisco
that take on a much larger national context," Frey says, rattling off
a list of San Francisco-centric issues such as gay marriage and
anti-war activism.

Despite the gallery's tourist-friendly location, the plant, which the
artist plans to donate to a local pot club, hasn't generated much
controversy. Pred wasn't surprised.

"It being California, and it being San Francisco," she laughs.
"Controversy? Nah."