From Tony Award–winning plays to retrospectives dominated by women artists, the arts and culture on deck for the Bay Area’s fall season is some of the most exciting in the entire country.
The calendar kicks off on September 5th, with the opening of two new shows at the Contemporary Jewish Museum and the debut of Market Street’s live performance activation, Unstaged.
They’ll be followed by a huge variety of exhibits, productions, and festivals over the coming months, including an operatic take on The Handmaid’s Tale at San Francisco Opera; Tamara de Lempicka at the de Young, and celebrated Washington D.C. dance troupe Step Afrika! At Berkeley’s Zellerbach Hall.
Here are our picks for the best of the Bay Area’s upcoming art, theater, music, and dance this season.
What’s on at Bay Area Museums This Fall
A retrospective of celebrated artist Amy Sherald’s work opens at SFMOMA on November 16th.
(Amy Sherald, For Love, and for Country, 2022; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; © Amy Sherald; photo: Joseph Hyde, courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth)
Looted and Firmament
Two new shows open September 5th at the Contemporary Jewish Museum. Firmament, the first solo show by artist Nicki Green, explores identity, transformation, and tradition through the spiritual concept of the firmament, the dome separating earth from the heavens. In Looted, four contemporary artists from around the world recreate master works—by the likes of Raphael and Rubens—that were stolen by the Nazis during the occupation of Poland. Then, in erasing them, the exhibit challenges the meanings of ownership and recovery.
// Firmament is on display through February 2, 2025, Looted is on display through July 27, 2025 at the CJM, 736 Mission St. (SoMa), thecjm.org.
Hallyu! The Korean Wave
The Asian Art Museum’s upcoming Hallyu! The Korean Wave explores South Korean works of art, film, television, fashion, and beauty that have successfully captured the 21st century zeitgeist. With close to 200 artifacts ranging from K-pop to K-drama, this exhibition illustrates the creativity of Asia’s most massive contemporary cultural wave as it continues to transcend traditional global boundaries.
// Hallyu! The Korean Wave is on display September 27 through January 6, 2025 at the Asian Art Museum, 200 Larkin St. (Civic Center), asianart.org.
Consuelo Kanaga: Catch the Spirit + Amy Sherald: American Sublime
Although she was one of the first women photojournalists to be hired by a major newspaper, artist Consuelo Kanaga has rarely gotten the credit she’s due. SFMOMA’s retrospective examines Kanaga’s six decades behind the lens documenting poverty, racism, labor rights, and inequality, beginning with her work at the SF Chronicle in the 1910s. Catch the Spirit is followed iby the arrival of more than 45 paintings by Amy Sherald, the artist best known for her portraits of Michelle Obama and Breonna Taylor, in the most comprehensive presentation of her work to date.
// Consuelo Kanaga: Catch the Spirit runs September 28 through February 9, 2025, and Amy Sherald: American Sublime runs November 16 through March 9, 2025 at SFMOMA, 151 3rd St. (SoMa), sfmoma.org.
Tamara de Lempicka
Polish artist Tamara de Lempicka’s work helped to define the Art Deco movement with paintings that exuded cool elegance and the vitality of post-WWI Paris. The first major U.S. retrospective of her work reveals de Lempicka’s trailblazing style, from her genre-exemplifying 1920s post-Cubist oils to her unique nudes and still lifes.
// Tamara de Lempicka runs October 12 through February 9, 2025 at the de Young, 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Dr. (Golden Gate Park), famsf.org.
Making Their Mark: Works from the Shah Garg Collection
Juxtaposing contemporary practice with groundbreaking historical works, BAMPFA’s upcoming exhibition Making Their Mark amplifies the voices and visions of women artists in the Shah Garg Collection. The show will include more than 70 works spanning eight decades by Mary Corse, Trude Guermonprez, Mary Heilman, and other notables—many with deep ties to the Bay Area. Among them are a wide range of craft techniques, alternative materials, influences, and methodologies that challenge art making conventions and redefine their patriarchally-prescribed definitions.
// Making Their Mark: Works from the Shah Garg Collection runs October 27 through April 20, 2025 at the UC Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive, 2155 Center St. (Berkeley), bampfa.org.
Tony-Winning Theater + Dramatic First Thursdays
Five-time Tony Award-winner, Kimberly Akimbo debuts at Curran Theatre on November 6.
(Courtesy of @broadwaysf)
Unstaged: Live on Mid-Market
SF’s Mid-Market theater district is activating a new block-long arts event celebrating live performance. At Unstaged, a free event taking place over three consecutive first Thursdays, vacant storefronts and sidewalks will light up with more than 20 experimental and immersive acts that, on its inaugural night, include salsa and cumbia classes and a vertical takeover by gravity-defying troupe Bandaloop. Even SFMTA is getting in on the action, transforming the F-train into a mobile jazz venue, The Hotsy Totsy Club.
// September 5, October 3, and November 7 from 4pm to 7pm on Market Street between 5th and 6th Streets, marketstreetarts.org
Noël Coward’s Private Lives
Noël Coward’s wry comedy about marriage and passion debuts on stage at A.C.T.’s Toni Rembe Theater this September. Set in 1930s Argentina, Private Lives tells the story of a divorced couple who finds themselves honeymooning with their new spouses in adjacent rooms at the same hotel through sensual tango dancing and spiky repartee. Director KJ Sanchez calls it a “saucy, brassy, and rude” battle of wills that’s “as much about fighting as it is making love.”
// September 12 through October 6 at The Toni Rembe Theater; 415 Geary St. (Union Square), act-sf.org
The Play That Goes Wrong
This 1920s whodunit combines Monty Python-esque comedy with Sherlock Holmes-style investigation when a troupe of actors debut the opening night of their show, The Murder at Haversham Manor. The nonstop mayhem is so ridiculously entertaining, it’ll have you crying with laughter.
// September 21 through November 9 at San Francisco Playhouse, 450 Post St. (Union Square), sfplayhouse.org
Kimberly Akimbo
Winner of five Tony Awards including Best Musical, Kimberly Akimbo follows the heartbreakingly funny story of 16-year-old Kim, who’s recently moved with her family to suburban New Jersey. Navigating family dysfunction, first love, a rare genetic condition and the threat of felony charges, Kim is determined to find happiness against all odds in this show with lyrics by Shrek’s David Lindsay-Abaire, score by Fun Home’s Jeanine Tesori, and choreography by Dear Evan Hansen’s Danny Mefford.
// November 6 through December 1 at Curran Theatre, 445 Geary St. (Union Square), broadwaysf.com
Jaja’s African Hair Braiding
Jaja’s African Hair Braiding, the vibrant Tony Award–winning play by Ghanaian-American playwright Jocelyn Bioh, takes place at a beauty salon in Harlem. As love ignites and secrets unravel over one scorching hot summer, West African immigrant braiders and their local customers grapple with the challenges of outsiders stepping into a close-knit community.
// November 8 through December 15 at Peet’s Theatre, 2025 Addison St. (Berkeley), berkeleyrep.org
Can’t-Miss Music + Festivals
The Handmaid’s Tale opens at San Francisco Opera on September 14th.
(Courtesy of @sfopera)
The Handmaid’s Tale
Based on the dystopian novel by Margaret Atwood, SF Opera’s The Handmaid’s Tale gives voice to an authoritarian world in which women are forced to bear the children of the upper class. The story of Offred and her attempts to resist the regime and return to her child is evocatively scored by Poul Ruders in this West Coast debut.
// September 14 to October 1; SF Opera,301 Van Ness Ave. (Civic Center), sfopera.com
Verdi’s Requiem
For the first time since 2011, the SF Symphony takes up Verdi’s Requiem, an operatic translation of the medieval Latin mass for the dead. Music director Esa-Pekka Salonen guides the musicians as they bring divine scripture to the streets on a three-night event that opens with choral works by celebrated SF composer, Gordon Getty.
// September 19-21 at 7:30pm at Davies Symphony Hall; 201 Van Ness Ave. (Civic Center), sfsymphony.org
Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival
Brandy Clark, Cat Power, Devendra Banhart, Emmylou Harris, Mavis Staples, and Sleater-Kinney are just a few of the names already confirmed to headline the return of one of SF’s best free music festivals. In addition to a weekend of music at Golden Gate Park, keep an eye out for Hardly Strictly artists showing up outside their natural habitat at a handful of venues around the Bay Area.
// October 4-6; Golden Gate Park, hardlystrictlybluegrass.com
Litquake
SF’s massive literary festival returns for its 25th year with a diverse program of live events celebrating and engaging in a variety of literary pursuits. This year’s lineup features such boldface pen names as Daniel Handler, Alexis Madrigal, Michelle Tea, Andrew Sean Greer, Rachel Kushner, Dave Eggars and many more. Expect writing workshops, readings from upcoming books, conversations with writers, the Mission District’s largest Lit Crawl to date.
// October 10-26; litquake.org
Breakaway Festival
This genre-blending music festival returns to the Bay Area for Halloween weekend. Groove to DJs, musicians, and a silent disco with headliners like Marshmello, RL Grime, Alok, and Anabel Englund over this two-day send up to sound.
// October 25 to 26; Bill Graham Civic Auditorium, 99 Grove St. (Civic Center), billgrahamcivic.com
Thelonious Monk Festival
Four performances in October will celebrate jazz legend Thelonious Monk in honor of his 107th birthday. The festival kicks off with three shows dedicated to Monk’s music, the big band sounds of John Beasley Monk’estra at Miner Auditorium, and back-to-back performances by virtuoso pianist Sullivan Fortner. Fortner returns, followed by artists Diego Gaeta and Marta Sanchez, Friday through Sunday at SFJazz’s Joe Henderson Lab.
// October 10-13, sfjazz.org
Dance, From Alice Coltrane to Step Afrika
Bandaloop dancers performing the company’s multi-year vertical dance theater migration piece “Flock” in Redding California prior to bringing “Somewhere to Land” to Alameda. (Basil Tsimoyianis)
West End Arts District Presents Bandaloop’s Somewhere to Land
As part of the ongoing, year-long artistic series Rising Tides, designed to inspire action around climate change, Bandaloop’s Somewhere to Land (dances for sea and low sky) is a site-specific work at Alameda Point using the metal girders of Hangar 25 as a vertical stage to explore themes of climate adaptation, rewilding, and sustainable development, set to an original live musical score by Bay Area luminaries.
// 7pm pre-show, 7:30 performance Thursday through Saturday, September 26-28 at Hangar 25 (Alameda); more info at westendartsdistrict.org
Two Folds: A Siddhi Creative Double Feature
Two Folds delivers the world premier of two productions that celebrate the richness of shared human experience. In the multidisciplinary work The Maze, the stories of women navigating patriarchal structures ignites a dialogue about bodily autonomy and agency, while Finding Joy celebrates the beauty of the modern world through Bharatanatyam practice and presentation.
// September 20-24 at the B. Way Theater; 3153 17th St. (Mission), odc.dance
Alonzo King Lines Ballet
The Alonzo King Lines Ballet’s mesmerizing Fall 2024 season is inspired by legendary spiritual leader, harpist, and composer Alice Coltrane. The performances, part of a nationwide tribute to the musician’s legacy, will interpret Coltrane’s body of work through King’s imaginative choreography, a talent he first flexed to one of her songs as a child. The show also features King’s recent collaboration with the SF Symphony, a color-rich interpretation of composer Maurice Ravel’s 1912 fairytale suite, Ma mère l’Oye (Mother Goose).
// September 26-29at the Blue Shield of California Theater; YBCA, 700 Howard St. (SoMa), linesballet.org
Step Afrika!
Celebrated Washington D.C. step dance company Step Afrika! presents The Migration: Reflections on Jacob Lawrence at Zellerbach Hall this November. With an uplifting soundtrack and inspiration from Lawrence’s 1940s paintings, this production tells the story of the Great Migration through tap, body percussion, and modern dance.
// Nov 2-3 at Zellerbach Hall; 101 Zellerbach Hall (Berkeley), calperformances.org
Gush 2024: A Festival
The Joe Goode Performance Group’s (JGPG) third bi-annual Gush Festival is a showcase for the perspectives of the troupe’s collaborators beginning with Are You Okay, a short duet from Melecio Estrella. Other selections include an excerpt from JCPG’s celebrated 2023 work As We Go; Edging, a meditation on loneliness and connection; and Ground Pressure, which asks how to rewild the sense of self and find a new path forward.
// October 10-13 at the Joe Goode Annex; 401 Alabama St. (Mission-Potrero), joegoode.org