Here are several Labor Day weekend live shows and events in the Bay Area you should know about.
Chicago in San Francisco
Some 42 years after Judy Chicago stunned the art world with the debut of her game-changing installation “The Dinner Party” in San Francisco (to wildly varying reviews), the artist is once again front and center in the city, with the opening of what’s described as the first career retrospective exhibit of the legendary feminist artist at the de Young Museum in San Francisco.
Chicago’s impact as an artist and feminist go way back in California. She established the first women’s collegiate art program at Cal State Fresno in 1970 and was seen as one of the leaders of the feminist arts movement of that decade.
Her conceptual art and installation works — employing everything from painting and knitting to welding and metal sculptures — focus on themes that seem ripped from today’s headlines: gender norms, sexuality and power, patriarchal malfeasance, environmental ruin. The de Young’s new exhibit, “Judy Chicago: A Retrospective” represents all phases of her career, from recent works touching on global warming to her early 1960s conceptual pieces from her involvement in the Californian Light and Space Movement. And while “The Dinner Party” is permanently housed in Brooklyn, it is represented in a “the making of…” portion of the de Young exhibit. Many of her best-known works, from “The Birth Project” to “PowerPlay” to “The Holocaust Project” are represented, in whole or in part, as well.
There are 125 works in all, plus a variety of objects and films focusing on her art, philosophy and life. The exhibit runs through Jan. 9 at the de Young, which is open 9:30 a.m.-5:15 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays. Admission is $13-$28. Masks are required inside the museum. More information and tickets are at deyoung.famsf.org.
— Bay Area News Foundation
Scottish Games are back
If you think a little thing like a pandemic is going to scare off one of the Bay Area’s favorite Labor Day weekend events, Yer aff yer heid.
Yes, the Scottish Gathering and Games will return to the Alameda County Fairgrounds in Pleasanton Sept. 4 and 5, and while it will be an outdoor-only event, most of the traditional activities will be offered.
That includes: Marching and massed band performances and contests; drum and piping corps; “heavy athletics” events, including caber tossing and stone putting; Scottish bands and dancing; Celtic heritage events, and more. There will also be plenty of Scottish delicacies to eat and drink, and booths with Scottish clan information and a variety of other vendors.
Details: Gates open 8 a.m. each day; enter the fairgrounds via the Yellow and Green gates; $10-$15 admission each day, and tickets must be purchased online; parking is $10; masks are required for anyone not fully vaccinated; more information and tickets at thescottishgames.com.
A Salesforce dance; and flamenco jam
If you want to pick a prominent site for a site-specific dance performance, San Francisco’s Salesforce Transit Center Park, with its fabulous gardens, seems like a good bet.
That’s what San Francisco contemporary dance company RAWdance has done for a new work that will be on view for free this weekend.
“Portal,” being presented by RAWDance and the Transbay Joint Powers Authority, is intended to turn Salesforce Park’s elevated garden into “a multimedia ecosystem animated by evocative movement and physical storytelling,” says a RAWDance release.
The work, created by RAWdance co-artistic director Katerina Wong in collaboration with mixed-media artist Ephraim Colbert, incorporates live performance with multimedia text, lighting and video effects as well as an immersive sound score, as it explores the intersection of competing forces — urban development and conservation, migration and stagnation, belonging and isolation — in play in the Bay Area. The six-person dance will lead audience members on a tour across the Salesforce Tower’s public park.
Details: 7:30 p.m. Friday, Saturday, Sunday; Salesforce Transit Center Park, 425 Mission St., use escalators at 1st Street entrance, between Mission and Howard streets, to access the park; free; rawdance.org, salesforcetransitcenter.com/salesforce-park.
Meanwhile, for a more traditional sort of dance, a “Flamenco Juerga” (jam session) will be offered Saturday at San Jose’s Hoover Theatre, led by acclaimed teacher and performer Koko de la Isla and her company. The event will feature live dancing and music.
Details: 7 p.m. Saturday, 1635 Park Ave., San Jose; $20-$25; www.brownpapertickets.com (search for “Flamenco Juerga”).
— Randy McMullen, Staff
SSV, OSJ join for free San Jose concerts
It’s nice to know that two of San Jose’s more beloved arts groups are not bitter enemies or anything. There are no Twitter feuds or Saturday night rumbles at Plaza de Cesar Chavez. In fact, they kind of seem to like each other.
We’re talking about Symphony Silicon Valley and Opera San Jose, which this weekend are celebrating the emerging fall performance season and a return to live shows by teaming up on a pair of free “Strike Up the Band” outdoor concerts. They’re even bringing in Van Cliburn International Piano Competition winner Jon Nakamatsu as a featured soloist.
The two “light classical” concerts, each lasting between 75 and 90 minutes, will touch on such composers/works as Gershwin (“Rhapsody in Blue,” featuring Nakamatsu) Mozart (“The Magic Flute”), Verdi (“Rigoletto”), Puccini (“Gianni Schicchi,” “La boheme”) and many more.
The concerts will be conducted by Peter Jaffe. Lawn chairs, blankets and picnics are welcome. Attendees should be vaccinated and masks are strongly encouraged.
Details: 7 p.m. Saturday, 5:30 p.m. Sunday; Tower Lawn behind the Martin Luther King Jr. Library at San Jose State University, San Fernando and 4th Streets, San Jose; free; www.symphonysiliconvalley.org, www.operasj.org.
The Bay Area News Foundation contributed to this report.
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