The Bay Area's Fall Arts + Culture Calendar 2025

Museums + Art Galleries

Black Art Week and Unbound

After getting a dual master’s degree from Yale and working at the museum there, Key Jo Lee went to the Cleveland Museum of Art. Now the chief of curatorial affairs and public programs at San Francisco’s Museum of the African Diaspora (a job created for her), Lee has curated the group show Unbound: Art, Blackness, and the Universe, part of the second annual Black Art Week that marks the museum’s 20th anniversary. The exhibit will include 17 artists organized in three categories: creation and the mythological; ecology and nature; and exploring technology with new media works. Lee calls it a “celebration of the vast conceptual capacity of Blackness [that] treats Black existence with the same imaginative and intellectual openness we apply to thinking through metaphysics and the cosmos.” // October 1-August 16, 2026; Museum of the African Diaspora, 685 Mission St. (Downtown), moadsf.org

My America

Julio Cesar Morales says he’s a musician who uses visual art as his instrument. Morales grew up in Tijuana and San Diego before going to the San Francisco Art Institute. After 12 years as the curator of the Arizona State University Art Museum, he recently returned to making art full time in an SF studio. My America is his sixth show with Gallery Wendi Norris, and it includes some of his Gemelos (Twins) series—watercolors of people squeezing into tight spaces to cross the border. Morales has also created a sound installation, My America Is Not Your America, with the Mexican Institute of Sound, looking at ways people reinvent music. Morales’ first museum survey, Ojo, with about 50 works, runs concurrently at UC Davis’ Manetti Shrem Museum. // September 19–November 1; Gallery Wendi Norris, 436 Jackson St. (Jackson Square), gallerywendinorris.com

Rave into the Future: Art in Motion

This contemporary group show at the Asian Art Museum features 10 women and queer artists from West Asia. The exhibition celebrates the way the dance floor brings people together and gives them a place for creative expression. Naz Cuguoglu received a grant from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts to curate the show, which includes local artists like Oakland’s Sahar Khoury, who’s presenting a sculpture of a radio tower and another with a working DJ deck, and Maryan Yousif, born in Baghdad and living in San Francisco, whose sculpture of a large cassette tape is meant to honor Assyrian artist Juliana Jendo. // October 24-January 12, 2026; Asian Art Museum, 200 Larkin St. (Civic Center), asianart.org

Lexicon

Artist Rose B. Simpson, who lives in the Santa Clara Pueblo in New Mexico near lowrider capital Española, is creating a new visual lexicon by pairing classic cars with Pueblo designs. Ten years ago, she refurbished a 1985 Chevy El Camino, using black-on-black, a style Pueblo potter Maria Martinez was known for. That car, Maria, will be on display in the de Young’s Wilsey Court along with a 1964 Buick Riviera also painted with pottery motifs. Wrapping around the court is Simpson’s site-specific mural, inspired by the Southwest. // August 30–August 2, 2026; de Young Museum, 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Dr. (Golden Gate Park), famsf.org

Squirrel Show

You may not expect to find the humble squirrel in fine art, but in Francisco Moreno’s work it serves as a link between the Mexican Baroque and the American suburbs: common, yet mysterious. Moreno’s paintings of squirrels relaxing in an inflatable pool, doing yoga, and doomscrolling will be at Col Gallery in Ghirardelli Square. The exhibition marks Col’s second anniversary with Moreno’s work, which founders Callie Jones and Julia Lithe say showcases the sort of cross-cultural dialogue, humor, and innovation that made them want to open a gallery. // September 18–October 31; 887 Beach St. (Fisherman’s Wharf), colgallery.com

What Is Love

Suzanne Jackson is a painter creating work inspired by the natural world. She’s also a dancer, poet, teacher, and set and costume designer. Born in 1944 in St. Louis, she spent her childhood in San Francisco, living there until the age of eight when her family moved to Alaska, when it was still a territory. Jackson eventually came back here, studying painting and theater at SF State, and this exhibition pays homage to that time. The first museum retrospective of her work (co-organized with the Walker Art Center), covers her work from the ‘60s to the present, with more than 80 works, including early figurative paintings, abstractions, and the recent installation, ¿What Feeds Us?, which includes scraps of African fabrics and Indian saris, as well as moss and bark. // September 27 - March 1; SFMOMA, 151 3rd St. (Downtown), sfmoma.org

Collective Behavior

Shahzia Sikander’s art combines mythology, history, and feminism. Collective Behavior, coming to Stanford’s Cantor Arts Center in September, brings together her past three decades of work, including drawings, prints, paintings, digital animations, sculpture, and mosaics. Rather than being organized chronologically, the exhibition follows the primary ideas in her work and looks at her role “as an American artist, a Pakistani artist, a Muslim artist, and a feminist artist.” // September 17–January 25, 2025; Cantor Arts Center, 328 Lomita Drive at Museum Way (Stanford), museum.stanford.edu

Music

Dead Man Walking

This opera by the beloved Jake Heggie premiered at the San Francisco Opera 25 years ago. It’s based on the story by Sister Helen Prejean, who wrote the book of the same name (also made into a movie with Sean Penn and Susan Sarandon) about serving as a spiritual advisor to a man on death row who brutally killed a young couple on a date. The most performed modern opera, Dead Man Walking has been staged 80 times in 13 countries. Sister Helen told Heggie she wanted to make sure it centered on redemption and that there was no atonal music. She got what she wanted with an opera with soaring and lyrical music critics have labeled a masterpiece. // September 14-28; War Memorial Opera House, 301 Van Ness Ave. (Civic Center), sfopera.com

Ron Carter Quartet

The wildly prolific bassist Ron Carter has 2,300 albums spanning six decades to his credit. Probably best known for his work with Miles Davis in the ‘60s, the 1998 NEA Jazz Master will be at SFJAZZ this fall with his Foursight quartet, which includes pianist Renee Rosnes, a founding member of the SFJAZZ Collective. // September 18-20; Miner Auditorium, 201 Franklin St. (Civic Center), sfjazz.org

Gimeno Conducts Tchaikovsky 5

Timothy Higgins wanted to play the flute in middle school, after seeing a flutist play Star Wars in a demonstration. He ended up instead with the trombone, the only instrument left. It worked out pretty well. He’s now a composer and the principal trombone for the San Francisco Symphony. They’ll play his new work, Market Street, 1920s, in a program led by Spanish conductor Gustavo Gimeno. In what’s described as a “real dopamine hit of a program,” the symphony will pair the piece with Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony, which moves from sadness to celebration, on a satisfying new sonic adventure. // October 3-5; Davies Symphony Hall, 201 Van Ness Ave. (Civic Center), sfsymphony.org

Gershwin, Tchaikovsky, Mahler, and More

In addition to the Gimeno-conducted shows in early October (see above), San Francisco Symphony’s fall season is stacked with performances. Experience epic works like Gershwin’s famed An American in Paris, Mahler’s shimmering First Symphony, Tchaikovsky’s showpiece Violin Concerto with Sergey Khachatryan, and more at these upcoming events at Davies Symphony Hall: Gaffigan Conducts Gershwin & Ellington, Sep. 18–20; Runnicles Conducts Mahler 1, Sep. 26–28; Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé, Oct. 16–18; Afkham Conducts Tchaikovsky & Shostakovich, Oct. 24–26; and Canellakis Conducts Prokofiev & Sibelius, Nov. 6–8. // Davies Symphony Hall, 201 Van Ness Ave. (Civic Center), sfsymphony.org

Thank you to our partners at San Francisco Symphony.

Theater + Literature

Sunset Baby

This play has been called a “tonal love poem” to Nina Simone. The story of the estranged Black Panther father of a drug-dealing daughter who shows up back in her life is by Dominique Morisseau, the “Bard of Detroit” known best for her three-play cycle, The Detroit Project. (She also wrote the book for the Tony-winning Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations, which premiered at Berkeley Repertory Theatre in 2017.) The Lorraine Hansberry Theater is producing her Sunset Baby with artistic director Margo Hall, a professor at UC Berkeley whose work stands out in whatever she does, be it acting or directing. // September 11- September 28; Magic Theatre, 2 Marina Blvd., Bldg. D, 2nd Fl. (Marina), lhtsf.org

Kim’s Convenience

Ins Choi wrote this play about a family from Korea running a corner convenience store in Toronto. He calls it a love letter to his parents as well as all of Canada’s first-generation immigrants. It premiered at Toronto’s Fringe Festival in 2011, then went on to tour theaters in North America—including a run off-Broadway—before being made into a popular Netflix show starring, among others, Simu Liu, now of Marvel movies and Barbie fame. At A.C.T., Choi, who originally portrayed son Jung, will play the title role of the father. // September 18- October 19; A.C.T.’s Toni Rembe Theater, 415 Geary St. (Union Square), act-sf.org

limp wrist on the lever

Litquake

SF’s massive literary festival returns in October with a diverse lineup of programming inspiring community and critical engagement. Though this year’s calendar has not yet been announced, we expect Litquake’s live events to circumnavigate the world of literary interests, from writing workshops to readings from upcoming books to conversations with writers. One thing we know for sure: U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón will headline an intimate event at the Swedish American Hall on October 11th. // October 9-25; venues around SF, litquake.org

The Hills of California

This will be the West Coast premiere of Tony-winning playwright Jez Butterworth’s story about four sisters returning to a seaside guest house where they grew up with a mother who wanted them to have a career as a singing group. It’s directed by the fabulous Loretta Greco who was the artistic director of the Magic Theatre for 12 years. // October 31– December 7; Berkeley Repertory Theatre, 2025 Addison St. (Berkeley), berkeleyrep.org

Dance

Deep River

Alonzo King is considered one of the most innovative and influential choreographers in contemporary American dance. His Lines Ballet has been around for more than 40 years, performing all over the world, including at the Venice Biennale, the Edinburgh International Festival, and the Kennedy Center. For the company’s 40th anniversary in 2022, King worked with MacArthur Genius Grant-winning composer Jason Moran and Grammy-winning vocalist Lisa Fischer to create Deep River, a work invoking the name of a legendary spiritual and King’s idea that we have a river flowing inside us. He told Moran he needed it to be soulful and to touch people’s hearts. Based on the reviews and audience reaction, that seems to be what happened, with the New York Times saying the piece brimmed with hope and love. // September 18–21; Blue Shield Theater at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 700 Howard St. (Downtown), linesballet.org

San Francisco International Hip Hop DanceFest

This annual event (now in its 27th year) isn’t kidding about international. Along with local performers from San Francisco and Oakland, there are ones like Ibrah Silas Jackson, a choreographer from the Netherlands; Iranian-Norwegian dancer Navid (Rezvani), a winner of Persia’s Got Talent; and five krumpers from Belgium, Spain, France, and Senegal, dancing blindfolded. Special events include a freestyle dance contest. // November 8-9; Palace of Fine Arts, 3601 Lyon St. (Marina), sfhiphopdancefest.com

Red Carpet

Choreographer Hofesh Shechter created this piece for the Paris Opera Ballet to celebrate “the confusion between glamour and art.” Intriguing! Influences for the piece include his early years folk dancing in Jerusalem, rave dance parties, and the Fame television series. In Red Carpet, 13 dancers from the esteemed company wear costumes designed by Chanel on a set with huge chandeliers and moving catwalks. The live score blends techno, the music of the Mediterranean, and free jazz. There will only be three performances, so move fast. // October 2-4; 101 Zellerbach Hall (Berkeley), calperformances.org