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Issue 317 |
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Your cultural event guide
Here's a snapshot of our favorite things to do in San Francisco this week. |
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San Francisco
May 27-Jun 2, 2008
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This week has us thinking of fin de siècle magician Aleister Crowley's famous quote, "Every man and every woman is a star." His comment could be scanned as a thumbs-up to amateurism — a celebration of the everyman's 15 minutes, as seen in Mike Kelley's surreal re-stagings of yearbook photos. But Crowley, a whole century before rehab became the new Weight Watchers, also presaged the subject of Dodeska Performance Ensemble's theatrical piece: America's obsession with self-improvement. Of course, there are plenty of real stars in Trevor Paglen's photographs (and some just might be gazing back at you).
- Matt Sussman, Managing Editor
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SPECIAL FEATURE
Activate 100th Issue Contest
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News shouldn't be a spectator sport. To celebrate the 100th issue of our sister publication Activate, we're stepping out of the mainstream media to let you showcase the stories that activate your universe. Enter to win some great prizes — including a video camera and subscriptions to the New Yorker — by sharing your photos or video on our Flickr group.
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MORE FLAVOR: Lecture
Craft Kills: New Directions in Craft Practices in the 21st Century
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Tuesday May 27 (7pm)
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Oakland Museum of California (1000 Oak St, 510.238.2200)
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FREE
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As a noun, the word "craft" used to indicate folkloric creations like whittled wood figurines and painted porcelain. These days, the word has become an active verb — there are crafting circles and a crafting media. In this provocative lecture that's free to the public, Jennifer Scanlan, associate curator of the Museum of Arts & Design in New York, highlights the changing nature of the craft world, which is embracing modern innovation while attempting to hold on to tradition.
- Tanya Feldman
[Info Source]
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MUSIC: Rock/Pop
White Rabbits w/ the Subjects and Company Car
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Tuesday May 27 (9pm)
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Bottom of the Hill (1233 17th St, 415.621.4455)
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$12
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Although White Rabbits' debut, Fort Nightly, wriggled onto countless 2007 year-end lists (and with good reason), the sextet's Carribbean-fried Walkmen-isms were born for the stage. The Rabbits are stunning musicians and showmen to match, with aggressively tickled ivories, dueling lead singers, and layer upon layer of percussion. It's a study in instrumental excess, to be sure — does any band really need two drummers? — but the group inhabits a correspondingly decadent made-up world, where Gatsby-era accoutrements (old-timey suits and hats, lyrics about social niceties gone rotten) adorn dark, catchy indie-pop tunes. The Subjects and Company Car open.
- Todd Goldstein
[Info Source]
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MUSIC: Global
Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares
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Wednesday May 28 (7:30pm)
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Grace Cathedral (1100 California St, 415.749.6300)
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$25 - $45
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There's always an element of exoticism in world music when traditional dress is involved, as is the case with ensemble act Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares. But the amazing vocal feats pulled off by the singers in this large group of women render the genre's stigma irrelevant. The group (aka the Bulgarian State Radio and Television Female Vocal Choir) was established in 1952. However, the ladies didn't become "cool" till the 1980s when, following an introduction to the music from Bauhaus frontman Peter Murphy, 4AD founder Ivo Watts-Russell released two anthology albums that managed to reach young ears. The group's seesaw harmonics and polyrhythms should sound especially dazzling in Grace Cathedral, which rightfully boasts sumptuous acoustics.
- Max Goldberg
[Info Source]
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PERFORMING ARTS: Theatre
Ex Machina presents The Andersen Project
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Wednesday May 28 (8pm)
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| where: |
Zellerbach Hall (2100 Bancroft Way, 510.642.9988)
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| price: |
$62
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Theatrical visionary Robert Lepage has garnered international acclaim for his imaginative productions and dynamic storytelling. The Andersen Project concerns a Canadian lyricist who moves to Paris and encounters a series of unusual characters. Inspired by the life and stories of Hans Christian Andersen, Lepage explores confrontations between the past and present, romanticism and modernism, and traditional and underground art forms. Full of Lepage's trademark visual brilliance and satirical humor, The Andersen Project is both magical and moving.
- Annie Lo
[Info Source]
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PERFORMING ARTS: Theatre
The Group
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Thursday May 29
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Climate Theater (285 9th St, 415.263.0830)
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$15
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From Dale Carnegie to Norman Vincent Peale (who coined the phrase "the power of positive thinking") to the current worldwide success of The Secret, America has long been addicted to self improvement. The Group, a world-premiere, audio-enhanced show by the Dodeska Performance Ensemble, takes a caustic look at this American obsession and money-making institution. Entering a supposed self-empowerment workshop, audience members don headphones to be led on a "soul journey" by an increasingly hostile Group Leader. In a sense, the audience becomes the piece's actors — even as its agency is gradually undermined by the Leader's hortatory and isolating monologue.
- Matt Sussman
[Info Source]
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FILM
Day Is Done (2006)
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Thursday May 29 (7pm)
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Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (701 Mission St, 415.978.2787)
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$8
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YBCA presents this reprise screening of Mike Kelley's Day Is Done. Distilling what art critic Jerry Saltz called the "clusterfuck aesthetic" of Kelley's sprawling 2005 mixed-media installation of the same name into an epic pseudo-musical, Day Is Done is a deeply fractured fairy tale in which high-school clichés and suburban monsters populate a looking-glass version of youth culture. The 31 loosely intertwined episodes surreally reconstruct found yearbook photos depicting a variety of performance-centered activities — dress-up days, special assemblies, concerts. The resulting two-hour-plus video recalls the color-saturated occultism of Kenneth Anger's films, but Kelley's rituals seem more in the service of regression therapy (via Waiting for Guffman) than the black arts.
- Matt Sussman
[Info Source]
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MUSIC: Electronic
Richie Hawtin w/ Magda and Heartthrob
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Friday May 30 (9pm)
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103 Harriet St (103 Harriet St, 415.431.8609)
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$25
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Little has been heard lately from M_nus, the minimal-techno label set up by Richie "Plastikman" Hawtin in 1998. But the imprint's ten weeks of silence is just a characteristically idiosyncratic introduction to its ten-year anniversary celebration, which takes the form of ten global parties held over the rest of the year. (We'll ignore those mysterious, unintentionally hilarious promo images of Hawtin and company huddled around a glowing space cube, which have been making the rounds online.) This sole San Francisco event is sure to be one of the biggest clubbing dates this year, as M_nus top brass Hawtin, Magda, and Heartthrob bring a little bit of Berlin to the city by the Bay.
- Joe Rudkin
[Info Source]
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FILM: Documentary
Note by Note: The Making of Steinway L1037
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Friday May 30
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Sundance Kabuki Cinema (1881 Post St, 415.346.3243)
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| price: |
$10.50
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An ode to music and craftsmanship, Ben Niles' documentary Note by Note details the painstaking craftsmanship required to produce one Steinway piano, from its origins in an Alaskan forest to its concert-hall debut. Charming interviews with the individual craftsmen involved in the production process, as well as pianists Lang Lang and Harry Connick Jr., provide a fascinating peek into the piano's essence. Stick around after the screening for a short performance by local pianist Richard Glazier, who tickles the ivories of the film's inanimate "star," the Steinway L1037.
- Annie Lo
[Info Source]
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MUSIC: Jazz/Blues
Miles from India
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Saturday May 31 (8pm)
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Palace of Fine Arts Theatre (3301 Lyon St, 415.421.8497)
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$25 - 56
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Jazz producer Bob Belden spearheaded the series of deluxe reissues of Miles Davis' Columbia albums, which came to a close with last year's six-CD bounty, The Complete on the Corner Sessions. Of course, Davis' genius reached beyond the purview of his official studio releases, so Belden recently organized the Miles from India tribute to acknowledge the trumpeter's interest in cross-cultural musical exchange. Some of the record's key contributors — including star bassist Ron Carter and tabla player Badal Roy — come together for tonight's performance, which melds traditional jazz and Indian instrumentation to Davis tunes like "So What" and "Spanish Key."
- Max Goldberg
[Info Source]
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MUSIC: Electronic
Four Tet w/ Maus Haus and Sensitive Men (with Feelings)
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Saturday May 31 (10pm)
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Mezzanine (444 Jessie St, 415.625.8880)
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$15
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After organizing several music/art hybrid events over the last two years, CreativemindsSF shores up its most impressive bill yet. The art portion of the event features the work of 30 local artists, as well as representative pieces from Canvas of Hope, a project initiated by medical students at Touro University to benefit cancer research with striking blowups of microscope images. For the music portion, post-rock heads better line up early for a live set by England's Four Tet. The press dubiously tagged Kieran Hebden's solo project "folktronica" a few years back, but his recent work is more intriguingly minimalist than the name suggests.
- Max Goldberg
[Info Source]
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ART: Photography
Trevor Paglen: The Other Night Sky
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Sunday June 1 (11am–5pm)
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| where: |
Berkeley Art Museum (2626 Bancroft Way, 510.642.0808)
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| price: |
$8
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Trevor Paglen photographs what we can't see — and what the government doesn't want us to see. Using a battery of technologically sophisticated methods on par with his subjects' covert military technology, Paglen reveals the traces of a shadow world of secret bases, orbiting satellites, air-force training missions, and other operations taking place far from prying eyes. The beauty of Paglen's intensely hued nighttime panoramas is undercut by their hidden machinations: surveillance vessels appear as bright stars, aircraft contrails as meteorites. One leaves with the uneasy knowledge that we are definitely not alone, and are constantly being watched.
- Matt Sussman
[Info Source]
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FILM
Lynn Hershman Leeson Marathon Screening
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Sunday June 1 (noon)
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Pacific Film Archive Theater (2575 Bancroft Way, 510.642.0808)
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| price: |
$9.50
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The Pacific Film Archive hosts San Francisco experimental filmmaker and feminist Lynn Hershman Leeson for an unusual marathon screening, paying tribute both to video's capacity for a never-ending feed and the artist's relentless productivity. Though Hershman has turned to producing feature-length Tilda Swinton vehicles in recent years, the PFA spotlights her first-person video productions, all of which anticipate our YouTube world with caution and wit. Audiences are invited to come and go, but Hershman herself will be holding down the fort for the whole seven hours, interjecting reflections and performative discussions.
- Max Goldberg
[Info Source]
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ART
Alex Lukas and Brian Willmont: Feudal Echo
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Monday June 2 (noon–8pm)
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| where: |
Park Life (220 Clement St, 415.386.7275)
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| price: |
FREE
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Some may feel that the twin horrors of global warming and terrorism are hurtling humans into a fiery end of days, but painters Alex Lukas and Brian Willmont aren't frightened — they're entranced. With canvases that dive deep into post-apocalyptic landscapes, Lukas and Willmont show viewers what a modern-day dark age might look like. Lukas' subjects include apartment buildings exploding in sprays of flaming orange debris, crumbling bridges, and power lines overgrown with vines, while Willmont dreams up psychedelic universes where brightly colored peasants and foot soldiers mingle with curious flying machines on black battlefields.
- Jeanne Storck
[Info Source]
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MUSIC: Rock/Pop
The Long Blondes w/ Social Studies
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Monday June 2 (8pm)
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Great American Music Hall (859 O'Farrell St, 415.885.0750)
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| price: |
$15
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Enveloped by disco beats and new-wave synths, Long Blondes frontwoman Kate Jackson's husky voice seems to float above the crowd, reminiscent of Debbie Harry at her breathy best. Since releasing Couples in March, the five mates from Sheffield, England, have taken on a heavy roster of tour dates, including a raft of festival slots and a headlining jaunt throughout the spring and summer. Opening tonight's show are San Francisco's own Social Studies, who are about to release their second album of delightfully peppy lo-fi indie pop.
- Connie Hwong
[Info Source]
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ART
Adam5100: The Heart vs the Mind in a Fight to the Finish
| when: |
Wednesday May 28 (11am–6pm)
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| where: |
Rowan Morrison (330 40th St, 510.384.5344)
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| price: |
FREE
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The graffiti artist Adam5100 may have started out bombing derelict sections of Albuquerque, New Mexico, but he's brushed up on his painting and printmaking at CCA and now appears in gallery shows around the Bay Area. But even with art-world cred, he hasn't let go of his tagger name or can. Breaking down photos into as many as nine layers by color and tone, he carves each into a stencil, lays down the darkest areas of the canvas first, and builds up to the lightest. The blurred and muted lines of his stencil work create photo-realistic snapshots of abandoned buildings and lightless air shafts — turns out, he still focuses on the sadder part of town.
- Jeanne Storck
[Info Source]
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ART
David M. Stein: Improbable\Unlikely
| when: |
Thursday May 29 (1–5pm)
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Eleanor Harwood Gallery (1295 Alabama St, 415.867.7770)
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| price: |
FREE
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David M. Stein's first solo show of improbable objects should provoke double takes, plus a chuckle or two. In The Unlikely Library, shelves of books line the gallery walls, teasing the viewer with titles like Etymology for the MTV Generation, Utopias That Worked, and May '68 Riots for Dummies. Stein juxtaposes real books with his faux creations, and asks that visitors don white gloves and browse to determine each volume's authenticity. In the center of the gallery lies Semesterville, a miniature city built from architectural models discarded by students of the California College of the Arts. The effect is that of a balsa-wood shantytown of as-yet-unrealized visions.
- Jeanne Storck
[Info Source]
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About Us |
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Cultural Partner
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Editors
MANAGING EDITOR
Matt Sussman
DEPUTY EDITOR
Max Goldberg
PRODUCTION EDITOR
Axel Anderson
SENIOR EDITORS
Anna Balkrishna
Doug Levy
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS
Seiji Carpenter
Connie Hwong
Annie Lo
Nicholas Nauman
Andrew Phillips
Lisa Rosman
IMAGE EDITORS
Adda Birnir
Sarah Steele
PUBLISHERS
Sascha Lewis
Mark Mangan
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Flavorpill San Francisco
All events featured on Flavorpill SF are pure editorial — we never accept paid promotions or advertisements. If you know about an upcoming event that you think should be covered in Flavorpill SF, email us a press release at sf_events at least two weeks prior to the event and we'll consider it.
To learn more about our staff and policies, see the credits and about us pages. If you'd like to respond to our editors about a listing published here, or have a general inquiry, please email sf_feedback.
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