What’s going on in SF Bay Area art? Sure, there are museums, but don’t forget commercial galleries, art colleges and ICAs (institutes for contemporary art, like CCA’s Wattis and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, are museum-gallery hybrids with rotating exhibtions and no permanent collections. They’re refreshing successors to the Modern museum). The Bay Area features a thriving alternative art scene for diverse, cutting-edge art. Exhibits are usually free at alternative spaces (but your donations are welcome). Check these listings to stay up-to-date!
EMAIL SUBSCRIPTIONS
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Artsync. Weekly events calendar, emailed weekly. Includes notable lectures by national and international artists and curators at the local colleges.
Flavorpill SF. Weekly events calendar across different kinds of entertainment. A great source to hear about edgy, grassroots events.
WEBSITES
Artforum’s Artguide. Lists many museums and commecial galleries in town, but doesn’t always have current exhibition information.
KQED’s Spark. Lots of listings of events, spaces, educator guides, artist’s profiles, art tours and more. Don’t miss their excellent TV program about local arts/dance/theater/music, with a focus on artistic process.
ArtBusiness.com. Alan Bamberger is a no-nonsense art consultant. When he goes to openings, he shoots loads of photos and posts them on his site. Since few galleries post installation views, it’s a great resource for photos of what’s currently up in galleries around town.
ATA Webzine. The webzine of a teeny alternative art institution devoted to film/video/new media.
SF Arts. Not comprehensive, but a good start.
Fecal Face. Though it’s all grown up, Fecal Face’s tastes reflect its skate/lifestyle beginnings. A central hub of a certain kind of accessible, hip visual art, sort of like Giant Robot and Juztapoz. Also features tons of community listings.
COLLEGE LECTURE SERIES & EXHIBITIONS
The area is also rich in great art schools, which host amazing lecture series by artists, curators and critics (and architects, designers, writers, etc). And, the lectures are free and open to the public.
The California College of the Arts’ calendar
CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Art
SF Art Institute’s exhibitions and public programs
PRINTED GUIDES
In the commercial galleries (such as the cluster downtown at 49 and 77 Geary and the surrounding area), you can find free, printed gallery guides, which list exhibitions at commercial spaces for the next few months.
You can also find a copy of a printed map of spaces to see art for free, in a project lead by Intersection for the Arts and the De Young Museum. I think an online version is still in development.
CRITICISM
In addition to daily papers, alt weeklies, glossy mags and industry rags, there are a growing number of review websites.
R+D 