Collaboration with Enrique Chagoya, “Do You Think of Me as Often As I Think Of You”, 2021, acrylic on canvas. Image courtesy of Southern Exposure.

Southern Exposure: Active in the Bay Area since 1974, Southern Exposure (SoEx) is an artist-centered nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting visual artists. Through innovative programming, SoEx experiments, collaborates, and educates while providing a public resource center for Bay Area artists, national artists, and youth in the Mission District. SoEx also advocates to new, diverse audiences to build an expansive community of enthusiasts and supporters of the visual arts.

Ongoing to November 16, A leaf a gourd a shell a net a bag a sling a sack a bottle a pot a box a container embodies Southern Exposure’s identity as a container for the many multi-vocal histories and imagined futures that make up their artist-centered community. The exhibition takes its name from Ursula K. Le Guin’s essay “The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction,” in which Le Guin offers new metaphors that enable us to reimagine our histories and futures while telling our most important stories. Artwork features Erina Alejo, Enrique Chagoya & Kara Maria, Futurefarmers & Shaun O’Dell, Marcel Pardo Ariza & Julián Delgado Lopera, Related Tactics, and Pablo Tut. Southern Exposure is located at 3030 20th St in San Francisco.

Image courtesy of Root Division.

Root Division: Founded in 2002, Root Division is a visual arts non-profit that connects creativity and community through arts education, exhibitions, and studios. Root Division acts as a sustainable arts hub that addresses the main challenges facing Bay Area emerging artists: need for low-cost studio space, exhibition opportunities, and arts-related professional experience. Giving back to the community is singular to their model where artists receive subsidized studio space in exchange for training, volunteering their time to teaching art classes to adults and low-income youth, and organizing exhibitions.

Opening November 7 through December 4, HUQ: I see no favor gathers the voices of over 100 artists, writers, and thinkers in a collective response to the abortion ban. Artist and curator Ashima Yadava took inspiration from Chilean poet Cecilia Vicuña’s declaration, “Tu rabia es tu oro,” or “your rage is your gold”. Yadava divided the 213-page Dobbs opinion into 50 sections and assigned each to one of a diverse group of 50 artists, who then created something new from the pages. Rooted in defiance and multicultural solidarity, Huq: I Seek No Favor features selections from the original 50 works, as well as new contributions from subsequent collaborators and the public. Root Division is located at 1131 Mission St in San Francisco.

Moffat Takadiwa, “Object of Influence (5G)”, 2021, gold perfume straws and cable ties. Image courtesy of ICA SF.

ICA SF: The Institute of Contemporary Art San Francisco (ICA SF) is a non-collecting art museum that offers artists from around the world an opportunity to push boundaries, experiment with new ideas, and take risks. ICA SF uses art to explore critical social, political, and cultural questions of our time and are committed to expanding the art historical canon of the future. Building upon the lessons learned in their early start-up years, ICA SF remains continuously “under construction,” embracing a nimbleness rarely found in art institutions. Admission is always free for their audiences.

Ongoing to February 23, The Poetics of Dimensions highlights artists who transform everyday objects—durags, shoelaces, felt, leather, single-use plastic—into powerful artistic expressions. Grounded in exploration and experimentation, these works alchemize “non-art” materials into poetic landscapes. Artists include Anthony Akinbola, Miguel Arzabe, Sonia Gomes, Melissa Joseph, Hugo McCloud, Rodney McMillian, Nengi Omuku, Esteban Ramón Pérez, Shinique Smith, Moffat Takadiwa, and Nari Ward. ICA SF is located at 345 Montgomery St in San Francisco.

Image courtesy of SF Camerawork.

SF Camerawork: For over 50 years, SF Camerawork (SFC) has provided a launching pad for artists’ careers, supplying invaluable financial support, exhibition space, curation, and patronage. SF Camerawork presents important new photography and opportunities that would not otherwise be provided by commercial galleries or museums. Their gallery presents installation-based, genre-hybrid, and materially experimental work, as well as work that addresses sociopolitical issues. SF Camerawork also offers programming beyond artist exhibitions, including critiques, workshops, lectures, panel discussions, and curator-led museum and gallery tours to showcase San Francisco’s local photography network.

Opening November 2 through December 20, The SF Camerawork 2024 Member’s Open is their inaugural celebration of the work of SFC’s membership. As a collective curatorial experiment, the exhibition begins with blank walls. The opening reception will be replaced with a hanging party in which members can bring in one of their own works to show salon style, and the exhibition will continue to grow over its course. SF Camerawork is located at Fort Mason Center, 2 Marina Blvd, Building A in San Francisco.

Alvin Smith, “Outside The Rusting Decay Of Confinement”, 2024, oil on canvas. Image courtesy of Berkeley Art Center.

Berkeley Art Center: Since 1967, Berkeley Art Center (BAC) has been a hub for artistic exploration and community-building that champions Bay Area artists and curators. Located in Live Oak Park in North Berkeley, BAC makes contemporary art approachable at an intimate scale while serving diverse communities through exhibitions, artist-conceived events, workshops, and programs. By virtue of its location in an urban park, BAC emphasizes an approach to art and artists that values their work as a vital part of daily life and the local community.

Ongoing to January 12, Painting Ourselves into Society is a new exhibition of 26 works co-presented by Empowerment Avenue and Berkeley Art Center. Co-curated by Orlando Smith, aka “O. Smith” from inside San Quentin Prison, and Rahsaan “New York” Thomas, who has returned to society after 22 years inside, the exhibition features the works of eight currently and formerly incarcerated artists nationwide exploring what it means for incarcerated people to stay connected to the larger community and to challenge the idea of what healing looks like together. Berkeley Art Center is located at 1275 Walnut St in Berkeley.

Cheryl Derricotte, Untitled, 2024, letterpress print. Image courtesy of Kala Art Institute.

Kala Art Institute: Kala Art Institute helps artists sustain their creative work through its Artist-in-Residence and Fellowship Programs and engages the community through exhibitions, public programs, and education. Since 1974, the heart of Kala’s mission as a California art-making hub is supporting artists and engaging the community. Kala offers professional facilities to those working in and across printmaking and digital media, installation, sound, and performance.

Ongoing to February 14, Roadwork features new works by Cheryl Derricotte and Marcel Pardo Ariza, the 2023-2024 Print Public municipal artist-in-residence fellows. Through exploring seven local businesses along Berkeley’s San Pablo Avenue, Marcel Pardo Ariza emphasizes the critical role these businesses play in the fabric of the community, underscoring the urgent need for city support in a landscape where vacant retail spaces proliferate across the Bay Area. Cheryl Derricotte partnered with the City of Berkeley on three Climate Equity Pilot Projects focusing on coalition-building, e-bike distribution, and housing utility electrification. These three components of the Climate Equity Pilot Projects are highlighted through portraits, interviews, and letterpress prints. Kala Art Institute Gallery is located at 2990 San Pablo Ave in Berkeley.

Livien Yin, “Double Happy”, 2022, oil on canvas. Image courtesy of the artist.

ICA San José: Founded in 1980, the Institute of Contemporary Art San José (ICA San José) is a vital member of the many arts groups that make up the cultural fabric of San José, engaging audiences through innovative visual art exhibitions and public programs. Their exhibitions are designed to build community, providing a space in which artists can access the resources needed to express their creative spirit and the public can experience artistic expression. Annually, they originate up to 12 exhibitions in all media and provide a free place for visitors.

Ongoing to February 23, Allegedly the worst is behind us spotlights 12 contemporary artists who pursue personal and collective acts of rebuilding fractured memories and stolen histories. Artists Razan AlSalah, Demetri Broxton, Arleene Correa Valencia, Paola de la Calle, Mik and May Gaspay, Pantea Karimi, Suchitra Mattai, Tricia Rainwater, Trina Michelle Robinson, Shirin Towfiq, and Livien Yin work to mend and amend the past in reckonings with memories, records, and archives, acting as both revisionists and storytellers. ICA San José is located at 560 S 1st St in San José.

yétúndé olágbajú “A Spiral Fuels and Fills”. Image courtesy of 500 Capp Street Foundation.

500 Capp Street Foundation: Located in San Francisco’s Mission District, 500 Capp Street is a physical location rooted in conceptual art that was David Ireland’s home and artist studio. 500 Capp Street encourages artistic experimentation, supports new modes of living, and builds community with the goal of holding the legacy of artist-driven spaces and Bay Area conceptualism through arts programming. 500 Capp Street’s tours, exhibitions, programs, and educational workshops enable artists, teachers, scholars, and participants to experiment and interpret art practices and ideas. Additionally, their curatorial practice highlights experimentation, artist-driven participation, and is process-oriented.

Opening November 9 through January 9, yétúndé olágbajú’s solo exhibition, a spiral fuels and fills, showcases new bronze and textile works exploring ideas of shaping legacy, activation, and performance. ọlágbajú is a Bay Area + Los Angeles-based artist and educator who often uses video, sculpture, photography, and performance as through-lines for inquiries regarding Black labor, legacy, memory, and processes of healing. For their new exhibition, olágbajú poses the questions: What do we inherit?; What fuels us to act?; What nourishes us?;  and What must we destroy? 500 Capp Street Foundation is located at 500 Capp St in San Francisco.

Image courtesy of Headlands Center for the Arts.

Headlands Center for the Arts: Headlands Center for the Arts provides an unparalleled environment for artists and the public to build understanding for the role of art in society. Through residency programs, fellowships, and awards, Headlands provides artists with the resources, space, time, and recognition to further their practices and careers and support the diverse arts ecosystem in the Bay Area and around the world. The Headlands campus, consisting of artist-rehabilitated military buildings just north of the Golden Gate Bridge in the Marin Headlands, is a part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Headlands hosts regular public events, including open houses, workshops, nature walks, exhibitions, conversations, and community meals, all designed for meaningful engagement with artmaking as it happens. Headlands Center for the Arts is located at 944 Simmonds Rd in Sausalito.