You pick up the receiver in the phone booth, and you’re greeted by a voice from the past. It’s a ‘Happy Birthday’ voicemail, with that rare, wonderful, and congratulatory tone that one might just save and listen to again, to remember.

But these messages hit different. They are calls from loved ones to their friends and family who were killed by police. Black and Brown voices, honoring the dead, by leaving them a birthday message.

You listen in to something deeply personal and celebratory, while the weight of the reality around you presses on your chest. The Phone booth is decorated as a shrine, like on a city street where mourners place candles, flowers, and portraits of the fallen.

Inside the Guardhouse, next to the phone, is a recreated living room, a miniature home, a birthday cake on the kitchen table, one slice on a plate, fork ready, but uneaten. A tv playing softly in the background, a jacket casually draped on a chair. A lived-in space made with love, now vacant.

I don’t know if the recent news of ICE agents kidnapping black and brown people, terrorising communities, and murdering people in the streets with no accountability magnifies this message, but when we visited the opening of this exhibit at Fort Mason during SF Art Week, it affected all of us. I remember meeting people in the crowd afterward at the art walk, and not remembering a thing they said to me; the voices from that phone booth just kept playing in my head.

The installation is titled 1-800 Happy Birthday, and was created by filmmaker and artist Mohammad Gorjestani, who was born in Iran but grew up here, in the Bay and went to Cupertino High School. It’s a homecoming for 1-800 Happy Birthday after its exhibition in Brooklyn, NY.

The installation is a FOR-SITE project in collaboration with WORTHLESSSTUDIOS, it’s free to see and will be on display until Valentine’s Day.

1-800 Happy Birthday is a multi-format project rooted in love, remembrance, and care. It honors the lives of Black and Brown people lost to police violence by returning to what is most human: the act of celebration. Through voice, image, and shared ritual, the project creates space to speak names, tell stories, and mark birthdays that continue even after loss.

Main Entrance, Fort Mason Center for Arts & Culture
January 19 – February 14, 2026
More info here