Summer of Art will present dance and theatre performance bimonthly with What’s On Stage? and live musical performances bimonthly courtesy of People in Plazas.

Here’s the line up for May:

May 8: KICK-OFF What’s on Stage?

• A preview of Cutting Ball Theater Company’s play Tenderloin
• Preview of ACT’s MFA program students in Midsummer Night’s Dream
• Previews by Dance Artists of The Garage and CounterPULSE
• Music by EXIT Cafe’s Songwriters Saturdays Artists, Lane Murchison and Ira Marlowe, Curated by Melissa Lyn

May 15: People in Plazas Music Concert

• Harry Best: Reggae/Caribbean: Steel Drums

May 22: What’s on Stage?

• Previews of upcoming dance shows by Scott Wells and Dancers of CounterPULSE and KUNST-STOFF Arts Underground Resident Artists Daiane Lopes da Silva and Jana Meszaros
• Music by Tenderloin Gospel Musician Brother Earl, Curated by Susie McKinnon

May 29: People in Plazas Music Concert

• Meredith Axelrod and Craig Ventresco: American Roots Music

Summer of Art is a collaborative project overseen by advisory board members Brad Erickson of Theatre Bay Area, Dick Daley of American Conservatory Theater, Felice Ana Denia of Denia Dance, Janette Gitler of Alonzo King LINES Ballet, Lynn Valente of People in Plazas and Tracy Everwine of Urban Solutions. The project is a member of Intersection Incubator, a program of Intersection for the Arts providing fiscal sponsorship, incubation, and consulting to artists. Media sponsorship provided by the Bay Guardian. Funding provided by the Rainin Foundation and sponsorship provided by North of Market-Tenderloin Community Benefit District.

ArtIsMobilUs is bringing art to people everywhere.

ArtIsMobilUs is non-rofit mobile public art gallery and roving arts incubator bringing pubic art to the people while providing a platform for dialogue, collaboration, and creative expression. It is estimated that every month somewhere between 30,000 to 40,000 people view the murals on the outside galleries as it drives though the neighborhoods, arts districts, and business areas of Oakland, Emeryville, Berkeley, and San Francisco.

In conjunction with SF Camerawork’s Eric William Carroll solo exhibit opening and Hospitality House Community Arts Program’s CAPTOONS opening, ArtIsMobilUs will be parked in Central Market outside of the San Francisco Foundation at 1035 Market Street.

For more information about ArtIsMobilUs, visit artismobilus.com.

Artwork by Bochay Drum. Courtesy of the luggage store.

Over 100 Bay Area artists will appear in the luggage store’s anticipated Streetopia SF, a large-scale group exhibition to
 take place in venues throughout downtown San Francisco this coming May 18 through June 23. Curated by writer, Erick Lyle, and artists, Chris Johanson and Kal Spelletich, Streetopia will bring neighborhood residents together with at least 132 artists, performers, writers, filmmakers, activists, thinkers, and public policy makers in venues in the heart of
the city, to address the show’s themes of Utopian aspiration for the city.

Don’t miss Opening Night on Friday, May 18 from 7 to 11 p.m. at the luggage store and on Market Street. The night will feature dance performance in the streets by Brontez Purnell and Amara Tabor Smith; live performance by LOVEWARZ; THE SOMETHING, a performance by Shaun O’Dell on Market Street; music by Strawberry Smog, Moira Scar; and more!

What: Streetopia Opening Night
When: Friday, May 18, 7-11 p.m.
Where: the luggage store, 1007 Market Street and other Central Market venues

For a complete listing of all the events part of Streetopia click here or visit the website at streetopiasf.com.

According to the designers, “The San Francisco Arts Commission creates essential connections between the arts and our community. These connections-between artists and the public, between organizations and resources, and even between different agency programs-remind us of the crucial role that the arts play in our community. We wanted to explore these links in the identity, and develop a mark that embodies openness and creativity, and serves as the foundation for a branding system that unifies all of the Commission’s efforts into a single, cohesive whole.”

Click on the images to view at a larger scale.

The new brand identity, which was developed by studio1500 pro bono, will be rolled out over the next couple of months starting on Tuesday, April 17 with six new Decaux Kiosk posters on Market Street. The posters celebrate the people and the organizations affiliated with The ARTery Project, the Arts Commission initiative that supports the transformation of the Central Market corridor into a lively and sustainable cultural district with art at its core. The new logo is also featured on the agency’s website, sfartscommission.org.

“This new identity represents a fresh start for the Arts Commission,” said Director of Cultural Affairs Tom DeCaigny. “While handsome, our old logo felt very institutional. Our new logo makes a strong statement while being both contemporary and friendly. Studio1500 has helped us take the first step towards re-envisioning the Agency and the role that it plays in supporting a strong arts and culture ecosystem. We look forward to building on their incredible work through a comprehensive strategic planning process later this year.”

Media Contact:
Candace Cui
Website: www.midmarketartproject.org
Email: midmarketartproject@gmail.com

Mid-Market Art Project (MMAP) presents Storied Sites:
Architecture, Politics & People

(San Francisco, CA – April 6, 2012) FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: The Mid-Market Art Project presents Storied Sites: Architecture, Politics & People, a series of artistic interventions along Market Street, San Francisco, that will take place from late April to early May 2012. Storied Sites also includes an exhibition at SFAI’s historic Diego Rivera Gallery, a project publication, web site and blog.

MMAP is a project of the San Francisco Art Institute’s MA Collaborative Thesis students, which investigates the role of the arts in urban revitalization through careful research into avenues of urban redevelopment, social activism, and cultural development, with a particular focus on the history of Mid-Market. Storied Sites examines how the arts might critically assess municipal “progress” by offering a new perspective to dialogues around the Mid-Market community of San Francisco—further defining how community can change over time though external and internal forces. With these goals, MMAP has commissioned three bay area artists to create temporary installations along Market Street between 5^th and 8^th Streets that address cultural development and idle or unused urban spaces.

Exhibition & Project Celebration
Opening Night Event: Tuesday, April 17, 5:30 p.m.
Exhibition dates and times: April 16– 21, 9 a.m. – 5 p.m.
Diego Rivera Gallery
San Francisco Art Institute
800 Chestnut Street, San Francisco

Artists’ Projects on Market Street
NODE (Network of Daily Experience)
Mid-Market Memory Shop
Sunday, April 8, 9:30 a.m. – 3 p.m.
939 Market Street
NODE invites the public to exchange memories and artifacts about Mid-Market at their temporary shop.

Linda Trunzo
9 Flights
April-May 2012
A window-based video installation which represents memory, empowerment, and community as seen through recorded interviews with past members of the now defunct Central YMCA.

WarmBaby
Wouldn’t it Be Nice…
April-May 2012
Peer into three peepholes discretely hidden in the plywood facades of defunct businesses and be treated to views of fantastical dioramas based on interviews with residents.

Updates and details on these projects can be found at www.midmarketartproject.org.

For information, directions, or questions please contact us at midmarketartproject@gmail.com

Writer and Director Annie Elias brings a decade of experience in documentary theater to Cutting Ball Theater with the world premiere of Tenderloin, an unforgettable piece about the people and places in Cutting Ball Theater’s neighborhood. Using transcripts of interviews conducted by seven San Francisco actors, Tenderloin takes theater out into the neighborhood and brings the neighborhood into the theater. From these living sketches, a portrait of the Tenderloin itself emerges. A powerful theatrical experience, Tenderloin honors the diversity of the people who live and work in this gritty and fascinating downtown San Francisco district.

Tenderloin stars Tristan Cunningham, Siobhan Doherty, Rebecca Frank, Michael Kelly, Leigh Shaw, David Sinaiko and David Westley Skillman.

Tickets can be purchased at www.cuttingball.com. Limited FREE tickets for local students and “Pay What You Can” Tickets for neighborhood residents are available at the door. Contact boxoffice@cuttingball.com with questions.

When: Wednesday, April 4, 11 a.m. – 3 p.m. and Sunday, April 8, 9:30 a.m. – 3 p.m.
Where: Along the sidewalk near 939 Market Street, San Francisco, California, 94103
Cost: Free

Mid-Market Memory Shop takes the store to the street through a two-day-only interactive inside-out storefront. Network of Daily Experiences (NODE) is inviting community members to meet researchers at the storefront to contribute to a community archive. The project is produced in conjunction with the Mid-Market Art Project (MMAP) — a collaboration that investigates the role of the arts in urban renewal.

Participants are invited to contribute their memories, stories, future dreams, objects, text, images, sound, photography, and video to the archive. Utilizing a vacant retail space near 939 Market Street, shop patrons will exchange ideas of community and memories of the area. A section of the sidewalk will be transformed into an open store and workspace, welcome to anyone who chooses to participate. Each participant is invited to take a reproduced material from the archive home in exchange for a memory, story or future dream of the Mid-Market corridor.

Participant contributions to Mid-Market Memory Shop will be featured in the exhibition Performing Community at SOMArts in July 2012, as part of the project Archive SOMA: Chronicling Community. For the duration of the exhibition the archive will be physically housed within the exhibition with a work area for continued contributions.

For more information visit: www.archive-soma.com

The Oddists artists Richard L. Perri, Stephen Crawford, and Paolo Salazar open their studio for a Central Market Mixer. Central Market neighbors, meet, mingle, and enjoy delicious food catered by local neighborhood merchants. Musical entertainment is provided by Vinyl.

Hosted by Central Market Community Benefit District and The Oddists, this mixer will also feature guest artist Aladin Stadlin.

For more information and to RSVP call 415-957-5985 or email info@central-market.org.

Artwork by Spencer Keeton. Courtesy of the luggage store.

Opening Reception: Saturday, April 7, 7-10 p.m.
Where: the luggage store, 1007 Market Street
Cost: FREE
On view April 2-28, 2012

Me and My ____ is an exhibition of five emerging young Bay Area multimedia artists, exploring the concept of collaborative engagement through an assortment of paintings, video, and sculpture. They will transform the luggage store into the ultimate interactive installation through group efforts, allowing for moments of particularity in the process. These individualized moments stand as representation of the five unique artists’ work and reflection on the greater space and group environment. In this space, ego is pushed aside and gives opportunity for something sporadic, which would not occur any other way.

This exhibit features artists: Rye Purvis, Erlin Geffrard, Henry Gunderson, Spencer Keeton Cunningham, and Chad Hasegawa.

Image courtesy of Satellite66

Opening Reception: Friday, April 13, 7-10 p.m.
Where: Satellite66, 66 6th Street
Cost: FREE
On view April 13 – May 5, 2012

In Erik Parra‘s new body of representational paintings, he points his lens at concepts of success, prosperity, and conveyance, and focuses on where they collide.

Modernist design figures strongly in his work, not as an aesthetic choice, but as a narrative device. It makes appearances in architecture and furniture, and even in the formal application of paint. Parra is referencing Postwar America, a time and place filled with the promise of progress and prosperity, led by science.

Erik Parra’s stance is not one of a hopeless pessimist, but rather that of a faithful critic. His portrayal of America Now asks us to abandon those notions of success and victory that were handed to us by corporations in the 1940s and 1950s. What we choose to replace them with is up to us.