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"Stories in Cloth: Communicating Through Textiles" is an exhibition presented by the La Jolla Historical Society in partnership with the Visions Museum of Textile Art. The show explores how textiles from around the world and throughout history have been used to communicate stories, identity, and shared experience. Focusing on three key themes—storytelling, activism and resistance, and cultural expression—the exhibition highlights historic and contemporary works, collaborations with local artists, and loans from institutions and artists. Stories in Cloth celebrates textiles as powerful tools for connection, creativity, and cultural expression. Featuring works by Charlotte Bird, Patricia Kelly, President of the San Diego People of Color Quilt Guild, Michelle Montjoy, Christine Lee, Maryam Bayat and Persian Place, Claudia Rodríguez-Biezunski of Sew Loka, and the Barona Cultural Center & Museum, this exhibition explores the stories, identities, and traditions expressed through cloth and textile art. Selections from the Visions Museum of Textile Art permanent collection further enrich the exhibition, creating a dialogue between contemporary makers and enduring textile traditions. La Jolla Historical Society on Facebook / Instagram

California’s wildfires are destroying forests faster than the state can replant them, and federal cuts are making the gap worse. One expert says the crisis is barely known — even though it could reshape half the state’s forests by 2071.

Following Off-Broadway and London runs, the Fringe hit "Hold On To Your Butts" makes its ArtPower debut at The Loft. Created by Recent Cutbacks, a comedy ensemble known for movie parodies, this production reimagines the 1993 blockbuster Jurassic Park using two actors, a Foley artist creating sound effects onstage, and a bit of lo-fi magic. Every dinosaur encounter, narrow escape, and iconic moment comes to life through physical comedy, rapid-fire character changes, and ingenious stagecraft. Whether you’re revisiting a childhood favorite or meeting its dinosaurs for the first time, "Hold On To Your Butts" finds fresh humor and surprise in one of cinema’s most beloved adventures.

Book clubs can start with a book, but they often become about the people those stories bring together. Three San Diego book club organizers share what keeps their groups going, from lasting friendships and shared traditions to unexpected connections that happen when people read together.

Photographer, fashion illustrator, Oscar-winning costume designer, social caricaturist, and writer Cecil Beaton (1904–1980) was an extraordinary force in the twentieth-century British and American creative scenes. This is the first exhibition dedicated to Beaton’s fashion and portrait photography, which he elevated into an art form. This exhibition showcases Beaton at his most triumphant – from shaping the public image of the “Bright Young Things” (a group of exuberant and artistically inclined socialites in 1920s London) to fashion photography for "Vogue" and other magazines, his vital role as photographer in World War II, and his reinvention of royal portraiture for the modern age, to award-winning costume and set designs for "My Fair Lady" on stage and screen. Via London, Paris, New York, and Hollywood, his era-defining photographs captured beauty, glamour, and star power in the interwar and early post-war eras. "Cecil Beaton’s Fashionable World" features portraits of some of the twentieth century’s most iconic and glamorous figures, including Marilyn Monroe, Audrey Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor, and Marlon Brando; Queen Elizabeth II and Princess Margaret; as well as stars of the artistic and literary scenes, Truman Capote, Francis Bacon, and Salvador Dalí. This exhibition is organized by The National Portrait Gallery, London, and presented by The San Diego Museum of Art. The San Diego Museum of Art on Facebook / Instagram

Note: September 30 is the last day to purchase Phase 1 General Admission tickets for the October 17 Brews & Bites Festival for $70.42. Beginning Oct. 1, tickets increase to $81.06. The 21+ event features food and beverage samples, Halloween fun and live music by Jimmy’s Buffet at Town Center Community Park East. The Santee Brews & Bites 21+ Festival Fundraiser on Saturday, Oct. 17, 2026, will be a spooktacular event! Jimmy's Buffet will be headlining this year’s Brews & Bites bringing all of the ghouls from the grave to the rave. Dress in your creepiest, cutest, or kookiest costume as you sip and snack the night away with us at Town Center Community Park East from 5:30 – 9:30 p.m. We’re brewing up an amazing vendor lineup and are still adding to the list, keep checking our website to see the latest list of participating vampires, I mean vendors! Be sure to grab your ticket today before they vanish into thin air! Funds raised will benefit the Santee Teen Center, park improvement projects, and the Recreation Scholarship Program, which provides financial assistance to qualifying Santee children, teens, and seniors to take part in City recreation programs. Don’t forget to dress to impress! Enter our Costume Contest for a chance to win fang-tastic prizes!

The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (MCASD) announces "The Dean Collection Presents: Hometown Heroes," a new exhibition opening April 18, 2026, alongside "Giants: Art from the Dean Collection of Swizz Beatz and Alicia Keys." To celebrate San Diego’s creative community, Swizz Beatz and Alicia Keys approached MCASD with the idea of spotlighting local artists from the Dean Collection to accompany the run of "Giants." MCASD collaborated with the Deans to organize "Hometown Heroes," which will feature photographers MJ Pimentel, Oscar Cruz, and Chata, drawn from the Dean Collection, in dialogue with selected works from the museum’s permanent collection by regional artists Andrea Chung, Esteban Cabeza de Baca, and Fox Maxy. Works by Pimentel, Cruz and Chata capture facets of life in San Diego with images that speak to the encroachment of gentrification, a longstanding history of Chicana/o/e activism, lowrider car culture, and community pride. With an eye towards the natural environment, Chung’s cyanotypes of lionfish shed light on the enduring effects of colonialism, while Cabeza de Baca’s layered painting and Maxy’s sculptural video installation point to the cultural and ecologic forces that have shaped the U.S. /Mexico border region. This exhibition celebrates San Diego’s artists and histories born from a recent acquisition made by The Dean Collection. "Neighborhood Visualz," an exhibition showcasing film photographs by Cruz and Pimentel, was on view at Por Vida, a coffee shop and gallery in Barrio Logan, when Swizz Beatz (Kasseem Dean) paid a visit and decided to purchase the entire show. This is in line with the Deans’ unique approach to collecting that centers on forming personal relationships with artists and amplifying voices that have been historically underrepresented. This MCASD exclusive exhibition centers Black, Brown, and Indigenous experiences at a critical time. As the first "Giants" venue incorporating both English and Spanish labels, MCASD continues to further their commitment to highlighting the work of Latino/a/e artists in the broader San Diego community and beyond. Local traditions will also be incorporated into the run of "Giants," starting with a performance and blessing by Danza Mexi’cayotl—one of the oldest and most respected Chichimeca-Azteca dance groups in San Diego County—to kick off the exhibition’s opening celebration. "Hometown Heroes" is curated by MCASD Associate Curator, Amy Crum, and will be on view April 18 through Nov. 8, 2026.

Space 4 Art Presents THE GIVING TREE Curated by Jill Dawsey Space 4 Art is pleased to present "The Giving Tree," a group exhibition curated by Jill Dawsey, senior curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, and featuring the work of artists from the greater San Diego-Tijuana region. The exhibition opens with a reception on Saturday, August 29, 2026, from 5 to 8 p.m., and remains on view through September 26, 2026, at Art Produce Gallery. The opening will include readings by poet Fiona Martinez and artist-writer Ruth Wallen at 5:30 p.m. "The Giving Tree" gathers 14 artists who celebrate the intelligence and generosity of trees, while exploring themes of reciprocity, regeneration, and environmental vulnerability. Borrowing its title from Shel Silverstein’s enduring 1964 children’s book, the exhibition approaches the story as an anti-tribute, reconsidering its familiar narrative of selfless giving through the lens of humanity’s complicated relationship with the natural world. “When we asked Jill to be part of this year’s gallery residency at Art Produce, we encouraged her to give free reign to her imagination,” said S4A executive director Jennifer de Poyen. “The result is a deeply personal and conceptually rich show from one of our most exciting curators. We can’t wait to share it with the community.” In Silverstein’s story, a tree–whose pronoun is she–gives and gives to a boy, ultimately becoming a stump as he takes all she has to offer. Long interpreted as a parable of maternal selflessness and charity, the story can also be read as a fable about human consumption and our sense of entitlement to the natural world. Dawsey’s exhibition asks what happens when we move beyond this familiar model of extraction and instead consider trees as active participants in complex, interconnected communities. Recent ecological research suggests that trees communicate, share resources, and form cooperative relationships across species. Forests are not simply collections of individual organisms competing for sunlight, water, and nutrients, but interdependent networks shaped by reciprocity and mutual support. Seen in this light, the title The Giving Tree takes on a new resonance. Bringing together drawing, painting, photography, poetry, and sculpture, "The Giving Tree" imagines trees not as scenery or passive subjects, but as participants in the world. Several works explore forests as spaces of continuous renewal, while others emphasize the precarity of trees and the consequences of human consumption. “Together, the works create a kind of forest within the gallery— one that reflects the interconnected lives of trees alongside the collective intelligence of artists,” says Dawsey. “'The Giving Tree' invites all of us to reconsider what it means to live within an ecosystem, and to imagine a relationship with the natural world grounded not in ownership and extraction, but in mutuality and care.” The exhibition features Space 4 Art resident artists Andrew Alcasid and Bridget Rountree, and former S4A resident artists SIEN Collective (Siobhan Arnold, 1970-2023, & Meaghan Shein) and Lorena Mostajo, alongside Jennifer Anne Bennett, Andrea Chung, scott b. davis, Thomas DeMello, Jeanne Dunn, Fiona Martinez, Amy Pachowicz, Griselda Rosas, Melanie Taylor, and Ruth Wallen. Exhibition Details Title: "The Giving Tree" Curated by: Jill Dawsey Presented by: Space 4 Art Venue: Art Produce Gallery, 3139 University Ave., San Diego Opening Reception: August 29 | 5-8 p.m.; readings at 5:30 p.m. Closing Reception and Artist Talk: September 26 | 12-3 p.m. Exhibition Dates: August 29 – September 26 Gallery Hours: Fridays 1-7 p.m.; Saturdays 12-6 p.m.; and by appointment All events are free and open to the public. For more information, please visit Space 4 Art's website (www.sdspace4art.org) or follow @sdspace4art on social media. About the Curator Jill Dawsey, Ph.D., is Senior Curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego and an adjunct instructor in the Department of Visual Arts, UC San Diego. Her work engages feminism, disability justice, and art histories of the San Diego-Tijuana region. About Space 4 Art Space 4 Art is a San Diego-based nonprofit arts organization dedicated to supporting artists and strengthening the region’s cultural ecosystem by providing access to affordable creative spaces, artist opportunities, exhibitions, public programming, and community engagement. "The Giving Tree" is produced by Space 4 Art as part of an ambitious, year-long residency at Art Produce funded by an Arts Ecosystem grant from the Prebys Foundation, supporting exhibitions and opportunities that connect artists, audiences, and communities across the San Diego region. Space 4 Art on Facebook / Instagram

Who ya gonna call? Experience the beloved 1984 classic "Ghostbusters" with Elmer Bernstein’s Academy Award®-winning score performed by a live orchestra alongside the film. Presented on the amphitheater’s outdoor screen, this immersive cinematic concert event invites longtime fans and newcomers alike to celebrate a movie that has entertained audiences for more than four decades. "Ghostbusters in Concert" amplifies the humor, adventure, and iconic music that have made this supernatural comedy a favorite across generations. ArtPower at UC San Diego on Facebook / Instagram

Join us for our Grand Opening and Inaugural Exhibition: "The Chula Vista Japanese American Story!" This exhibit will trace the story of how Chula Vista farmers of Japanese descent were incarcerated following the U.S. response to the attack on December 1941 bombing of the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii by Japan. The exhibit will also document the Chula Vista Japanese American community’s continued success despite this injustice. Event program: Friday, Sept. 18, 2026 from 5-7 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 19, 2026 from 1-3 p.m. This event is free and will include a ribbon ceremony, exhibit tour, refreshments and remarks by community leaders. Chula Vista Museum and History Center on Facebook / Instagram