The bustling population of San Francisco’s Civic Center plaza grew by forty bodies last week — all thanks to an unusual new cadre of art.

The temporary population bump came from London-based artist Zak Ové, whose installation of 40, six-and-a-half foot tall graphite figures forms a project he calls Invisible Man and the Masque of Blackness. The installation is scheduled to remain outside City Hall until November.

Ové said he created the piece in reference to a play performed at London’s Somerset House in 1605. The play was called the Masque of Blackness and was performed in blackface. Ové originally installed the piece at Somerset House as a quasi silent protest of that early theatrical gaff.

Joe Rosato Jr./NBC Bay Area

"I was interested in these pieces as a rebuke to that situation,"

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