Events on Saturday, May 17

Homoccult & Other Esoterotica

Film

Homoccult & Other Esoterotica

Saturday 5/17 @ Yerba Buena Center for the Arts

Curatorial enfant terrible Daniel McKernan brings the magickal, sexually transgressive short films he screened at last year's MIX NYC festival to... 

Bassnectar

Music: Electronic

Bassnectar

Saturday 5/17 @ The Fillmore

Bassnectar's music contains a microcosm of Bay Area subcultures: from wax-poetic hip-hop beats and massive bass lines worthy of the playa's... 

Blowfly w/ Antiseen, Flexx Bronco, and Hammerlock

Music: Hip-Hop

Blowfly

Saturday 5/17 @ Bottom of the Hill

It's sex machine night at Bottom of the Hill. Blowfly — a funky, sensual superhero known for performing in nothing but... 

Z-Trip

Music: DJ

Z-Trip

Saturday 5/17 @ Mighty

Mashups are so 2001, right? Now that every Serato-toting DJ has figured out how to drop T-Pain a cappellas on top... 

The Kills w/ the Childballads

Music

The Kills

Saturday 5/17 @ Slim's

The Kills' Alison Mosshart is all about sizzle — though not necessarily sex. Reveling in her throaty, cigarette-stained croak, the heavy... 

Return to Paradise feat. Sister Sledge and Holy Ghost!

Party

Return to Paradise

Saturday 5/17 @ Mezzanine

You've danced to their songs at weddings, bar mitzvahs, and summer-camp socials galore — but now, they're live and onstage. Get... 

Red Dot feat. Metro Area, Travis TK, and Conor

Music: DJ

Metro Area

Saturday 5/17 @ Vessel-no

Having hosted super-eclectic Beats in Space host and DFA jock Tim Sweeney last month, Red Dot continues to spread the NYC... 

Green Velvet

Music: Electronic

Green Velvet

Saturday 5/17 @ Temple-no

Do house music and Christianity have something in common? For Green Velvet (Curtis Jones), they do; this DJ favors both the... 

Ongoing Events

<em>Protest in Paris 1968: Photographs by Serge Hambourg</em>

Art: Photography

Protest in Paris 1968

Saturday 5/17 @ Berkeley Art Museum

Forty years after Paris' famous May 1968 protests, the true meaning of the uprisings is debatable — but that's not for... 

<em>Flight of the Red Balloon </em>

Film

Flight of the Red Balloon

Saturday 5/17 @ Landmark Bridge Theater

Chinese director Hsiao-hsien Hou's glorious response to the 1956 classic The Red Balloon commences with a long, nearly silent scene of... 

Special Event

Dykes on Bikes®

Saturday 5/17 @ GLBT Historical Society

Like chrome-and-leather-swathed valkyries rumbling down Market Street, Dykes on Bikes have long been the kickoff contingent of the San Francisco Pride... 

Ryan McGinley: <em>Spring and by Summer Fall</em>

Art: Photography

Ryan McGinley

Saturday 5/17 @ Ratio 3

Ryan McGinley's metier is youth. The often smiling, and more often nude men and women cavorting in his photos are like... 

Peter Simon and Roger Steffens: <em>The Reggae Scrapbook</em>

Art: Photography

The Reggae Scrapbook

Saturday 5/17 @ Babylon Falling

The Reggae Scrapbook is a love letter from two eternal fanboys to Jamaica's best-known export. Drawing from their memories, publications, and... 

Amanda M. Smith: <em>Candy Garden and Sparkling Sabers</em>

Art

Amanda M. Smith: Candy Garden and Sparkling Sabers

Saturday 5/17 @ Jack Fischer Gallery

Little children run amok in Amanda M. Smith's series of exquisitely rendered ceramic reliefs. Set in a vivid world of flattened,... 

<em>Uncharted: Imaginary Landscapes </em>

Art

Uncharted

Saturday 5/17 @ Hayes Valley Market Gallery

Like intrepid cartographers, the nine artists featured in this exhibit navigate land and space from many angles. Their interpretations range in... 

Veronica Graham: <em>Bonus Map</em>

Art

Veronica Graham

Saturday 5/17 @ CELLspace

Composed of more than 2000 hand-printed cloth swatches, Veronica Graham's sprawling installation Bonus Map takes over CELLspace's wall like cartographic kudzu.... 

<em>Friedlander</em>

Art: Photography

Friedlander

Saturday 5/17 @ SFMOMA

Over the last half-century, photographer Lee Friedlander has made a career of cataloging America's urban — and increasingly suburban — landscape.... 

<em>Within Two Hands: The Eye of the Collector</em>

Art

Within Two Hands: The Eye of the Collector

Saturday 5/17 @ San Francisco Museum of Craft+Design

Peter Voulkos founded the Arts Ceramics departments at both Los Angeles' Otis College of Art and Design and UC-Berkeley in the... 

Paul Sietsema: <em>New Work</em>

Art

Paul Sietsema

Saturday 5/17 @ SFMOMA

Los Angeles artist Paul Sietsema presents an exceptional body of recent drawings and films in SFMOMA's New Work series. Sietsema straddles... 

Weston Teruya and Michele Carlson: <em>How I Learned to...</em>

Art

How I Learned to...

Saturday 5/17 @ Intersection for the Arts

It's a pretty safe bet that elementary schools won't soon be competing with downtown museums and banks for a top architect's... 

Christian Marclay:<em> Stereo</em>

Art

Christian Marclay

Saturday 5/17 @ Fraenkel Gallery

Christian Marclay pioneered the turntable as a musical instrument in the late '70s, scratching out experimental sounds with vinyl found in... 

Gina Borg

Art

Gina Borg

Saturday 5/17 @ Jancar Jones Gallery

Bay Area artist Gina Borg's small works on canvas and paper are a gratifying addition to Jancar Jones' snug new gallery... 

<em>The Question Is Known: (W)here Is Latin American / Latino Art</em>

Art

The Question Is Known

Saturday 5/17 @ Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts

Artist Antony Torres curates this powerful exhibition of 30 artists showing paintings, sculpture, and installations exploring Latino identity. Highlights include the... 

Alex Lukas and Brian Willmont: <em>Feudal Echo</em>

Art

Feudal Echo

Saturday 5/17 @ Park Life

Some may feel that the twin horrors of global warming and terrorism are hurtling humans into a fiery end of days,... 

Annie Leibovitz: <em>A Photographer's Life, 1990-2005</em>

Art: Photography

Annie Leibovitz

Saturday 5/17 @ The Legion of Honor Museum

Working since the late '70s, photographer Annie Leibowitz has created both iconic celebrity portraits and intimate views of everyday people. She's... 

<em>In Collaboration: Early Works from the Media Arts Collection</em>

Art

In Collaboration

Saturday 5/17 @ SFMOMA

San Francisco's Museum of Modern Art was one of the first major museums to establish a department specifically dedicated to media... 

<em>The Beyond</em> (1981)

Film

The Beyond

Saturday 5/17 @ Landmark Clay Theatre

Heavily censored when it was first released in the US, Lucio Fulci's stunning gore-fest The Beyond was restored to its original... 

<em>Quarter Century: </em>Creativity Explored's 25th Anniversary

Art

Quarter Century

Saturday 5/17 @ Creativity Explored

Creativity Explored has long been an outlet for local developmentally challenged adults to express their artistic visions. Now celebrating its 25th... 

Saskia Leek: <em>Thick Air Method</em>

Art

Saskia Leek

Saturday 5/17 @ Jack Hanley Gallery

Embracing the same kind of provocative ambiguity and loose brushwork found in Luc Tuymans' paintings, New Zealand native Saskia Leek structures... 

<em>Art & Artifice: 75 Years of Design at San Francisco Ballet</em>

Special Event

Art & Artifice

Saturday 5/17 @ Museum of Performance & Design

Emerging with a rejuvenated image and collection in March, the Museum of Performance & Design mounts an impressive exhibit chronicling the... 

William T. Wiley: <em>Punball: Only One Earth</em>

Art

William T. Wiley

Saturday 5/17 @ Electric Works

Pinball machines have largely been relegated to the scrap yard of nostalgia, but that hasn't stopped William T. Wiley from resurrecting... 

Lacey Jane Roberts: <em>The Master's Tools (Decay Goes Both Ways)</em>

Art

Lacey Jane Roberts

Saturday 5/17 @ Little Tree Gallery

Little Tree Gallery has now been fortified, thanks to Bay Area artist Lacey Jane Roberts' handwoven barbed-wire fence. Even though every... 

Mission Bazaar: The Shopping Spectacle

Fashion/Style: Shopping

Mission Bazaar

Saturday 5/17 @ The Armory

After more than 30 years of neglect and inactivity, the historic Armory building (now home to porn company Kink.com) is hosting... 

Tim Lee

Art

Tim Lee

Saturday 5/17 @ CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts

Although it's tempting to dismiss Vancouver-based artist Tim Lee's use of comedy-as-conceptual-device as lacking in depth or social concern, to mistake... 

<em>The Rape of the Sabine Women</em>

Art

The Rape of the Sabine Women

Saturday 5/17 @ SFMOMA

Eve Sussman and the Rufus Corporation's epic video-opera, The Rape of the Sabine Women, is a sprawling, beguiling exploration of classical... 

Inkie Whang: <em>American Debut</em>

Art

Inkie Whang

Saturday 5/17 @ Frey Norris Gallery

Korean artist Inkie Whang's large-scale, pixelated landscapes explore the tenuous balance between his traditional heritage and the digital age. In the... 

David M. Stein: <em>Improbable\Unlikely</em>

Art

Improbable\Unlikely

Saturday 5/17 @ Eleanor Harwood Gallery

David M. Stein's first solo show of improbable objects should provoke double takes, plus a chuckle or two. In The Unlikely... 

<em>American Symbols: From Lady Liberty to the Stars and Stripes</em>

Art

American Symbols

Saturday 5/17 @ Museum of Craft and Folk Art

Recognized worldwide as a cultural symbol, the American flag is an object that elicits many personal and political emotions and interpretations.... 

Curatorial Industries presents <em>Self-Storage</em>

Art

Self-Storage

Saturday 5/17 @ Self Storage

Duchamp had his suitcase-sized monographs. Warhol, his yearly time capsules. Taking its inspiration from Buckminster Fuller's Dymaxion Chronofile — an epic... 

<em>Reclaiming Materials: Four Sculptors Recycle</em>

Art

Reclaiming Materials: Four Sculptors Recycle

Saturday 5/17 @ Sculpturesite Gallery

One person's trash is another person's treasure — or sculpture, as is the case at Sculpturesite's current exhibition of art works... 

SF Oysterfest

Food/Wine

SF Oysterfest

Saturday 5/17 @ Fort Mason Festival Pavilion

This year's Oysterfest pairs plenty of the famous aphrodisiac mollusk with bubbly, beer, and a pack of dedicated gluttons stuffing their... 

<em>Birth of the Cool: California Art, Design and Culture at Mid-century</em>

Special Event

Birth of the Cool

Saturday 5/17 @ Oakland Museum of California

Fashion designer Christian Lacroix put it most directly: "...the history of cool in America is the history of African-American culture." That... 

Enrique Chagoya: <em> Borderlandia </em>

Art

Enrique Chagoya

Saturday 5/17 @ Berkeley Art Museum

The first major museum retrospective of Enrique Chagoya's mixed-media work revels in thorny cultural hierarchies and identity politics. Chagoya immigrated to... 

<em>Redbelt</em>

Film

Redbelt

Saturday 5/17 @ Various locations

Redbelt, David Mamet's latest, is an absorbing foray into the world of mixed martial arts. An unconventional fight film, Redbelt centers... 

Duke Ellington's <em>Queenie Pie</em>

Performing Arts: Opera

Queenie Pie

Saturday 5/17 @ Oakland Metro

Queenie Pie, jazz giant Duke Ellington's final large-scale work, receives the royal treatment from the Oakland Opera Theater. Ellington's muse was... 

Gareth Moore

Art

Gareth Moore

Saturday 5/17 @ CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts

Vancouver artist Gareth Moore takes hold of the reins at the Wattis, presenting the ninth solo exhibition in the gallery's ongoing... 

<em>The Way That We Rhyme: Women, Art & Politics</em>

Art

The Way That We Rhyme

Saturday 5/17 @ Yerba Buena Center for the Arts

American culture always seems poised to pronounce feminism down for the count, when it clearly still has plenty of fighting to... 

Sarah Wagner: <em>Nuclear Family</em>

Art

Sarah Wagner

Saturday 5/17 @ Patricia Sweetow Gallery

Sarah Wagner turns out delicate textile sculptures that resemble tangled roots and vines. Her faux-plant shapes sprout from the gallery's cement... 

<em>Portals</em>: Jen Stark, Anna Fidler, and Jana Flynn

Art

Portals

Saturday 5/17 @ Johansson Projects

This trio of artists transforms one-dimensional planes of paper into doorways that lead to strange universes. Armed with an X-Acto knife,... 

<em>2nd Skin: Imaginative Designs in Digital & Analog Clothing</em>

Special Event

2nd Skin

Saturday 5/17 @ Exploratorium

With a futuristic, tongue-in-cheek vision, the artists featured in the 2nd Skin fashion exhibit challenge the standard notions of practical clothing.... 

Art

Recession

Saturday 5/17 @ Queen's Nail Annex

They say money makes the world go round — and although Maximo Gonzalez might agree, he's got his own cynical take... 

Gilbert &amp; George

Art

Gilbert & George

Saturday 5/17 @ de Young Museum

Gilbert & George, the art-world enfants terribles in natty bespoke suits, celebrate 40 years of having made their lives their work...