Recent books by p. scaruffi:
Nature of Consciousness
History of Jazz Music

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A Selection of Cultural Events
in the San Francisco Bay area

compiled by Piero Scaruffi
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2008


JANUARY 2008


Music: Hans Tutschku, January 11 (Stanford CCRMA) Works for laptops and cell phones
Music: Cypress String Quartet, january 13 (Villa Montalvo) Beethoven, Opus 132 in A minor
Music: Mirage Ensemble, january 10 (Old First Church) A program of both classical and avantgarde music
Music: Stanford Percussion Ensemble, January 16 (Stanford CCRMA) Avantgarde works for percussion instruments
Music: Mario Mora, January 18 (Stanford CCRMA) Electroacoustic Works for guitar, saxophone, flute, piano, and electronics

FEBRUARY 2008


Art: Art, Technology and Culture colloquium with Greg Lynn , Feb 4 (U.C. Berkeley) Architect, UCLA & Angewandte, Los Angeles/Vienna
Music: Eos Ensemble, feb 15 (Old First Church) From Fandango to Tango
Dance: Ea Sola, February 6-8 (Yerba Buena Center for the Arts) The Vietnamese choreographer presents her piece "Drought and Rain" from 1995 with dancers from Hanoi Opera Ballet, live music composed by Nguyen Xuan Son played on traditional instruments and performed by two opera singers and four musicians
Music: Bang On A Can, February 9 (Yerba Buena Center for the Arts) The musical group performs a six-hour marathon of avantgarde music
Science: Neil DeGrasse Tyson, February 19 (Herbst Theater) The director of the Hyden Planetarium will discuss the origin of the universe
History: Daniel Waugh et al, February 22-23 (Herbst Theater) The Enduring Legacy of Genghis Khan

MARCH 2008


Music: Robert Rich, March 6 (Camerawork Gallery) Electronic composer Robert Rich will improvise some borderline cacophonous harmonic distortion-drone music with three simultaneous projections of films by Paul Clipson.

APRIL 2008


Politics: Jeffrey Sachs, April 9 (Herbst Theater) The director of the Earth Institute advocates combining economic development with environmental sustainability, warning of the imminence of global economic collapse.
Science: Yuri's Night, April 12 (NASA Ames) A celebration of Yuri Gagarin's first space trip
Dance: Inkboat, April 24-26 (Yerba Buena Center for the Arts) Founded by Shinichi Iova-Koga (aka: Momo), inkBoat is a performance company built by and with the collaborative efforts of choreographers, dancers, musicians, visual artists, directors and actors. Working in fractured, filmic, delicate and decayed environments, inkBoat's performance style is a hybrid of traditional and experimental dance and theater forms weaved with Physical Theater and Japanese Butoh Dance. All collaborators are independent visionaries that assemble according to project parameters. Living in San Francisco, Berlin, New York, Tokyo and Seattle, the group has performed in various constellations ranging from 2 to 12 member ensembles in Europe, Japan and North America at dance festivals, street festivals, ocean-sides and theatres since 1998.

MAY 2008


Music: Stanford Pan-Asian Music Festival, may 1-4 (Stanford University) Several Asian musicians
Music: Cypress String Quartet, may 4 (Villa Montalvo) Beethoven, Opus 130 in Bb Major
Music: Stanford Laptop Orchestra, May 15 and 24 (Stanford CCRMA) Ge Wang's Chamber Laptop Orchestra performs works from a variety of composers
Theater: Ilkhom Theater, May 15-17 (Yerba Buena Center for the Arts) The Ilkhom Theatre of Uzbekistan, founded in 1976 as a renegade theater under the Soviet occupation, perform "Ecstasy with the Pomegranate", a dance theater work inspired by the "Bacha Boys" paintings of the 1930s by Alexandr "Mumin" Nikolayev.
History: Josiah Ober et al, May 22-23 (Herbst Theater) Athens In The Time Of Pericles

JUNE 2008


Art: Frida Kahlo, Jun 14 - Sep 28 (Museum of Modern Art) Exhibition commemorating the 100th anniversary of the artist's birth
Art: Dale Chihuly, Jun 14 (De Young Museum) Dale Chihuly is the most famous glass artist living today and the subject of many popular exhibitions. Chihuly's counterculture roots manifest themselves in a school that's more akin to a commune than an institution of higher learning. Other pivotal points of artistic inspiration are Chihuly's personal collections. The exhibition will include drawings and installations from his Macchia, Venetian, Persian, Ikebana, Nijima Float, Chandelier, and Mille Fiori series. The full exhibition is at the de Young Museum from June 14-September 28, 2008, but two site-specific works will be installed outside of both the de Young and the Legion of Honor starting in April. At the de Young, a Saffron Neon Tower will be installed in the Pool of Enchantment on the building's east side. A 15-foot diameter yellow orb called Yellow Sun will be installed at the Legion of Honor in the Court of Honor.
Literature: Salman Rushdie, Jun 18 (Herbst Theater) Will talk about his forthcoming novel, The Enchantress of Florence, about a bewitching Moghul princess and her Florentine exploits with such historical characters as Machiavelli
Science: Paul Ehrlich, Jun 27 (Fort Mason) Stanford entomologist Paul Ehrlich discusses human evolution and the environment, part of Long Now's seminars on "long term thinking". Everything living evolves, but humans evolve culturally as well as biologically. The question that Ehrlich explores is whether cultural evolution shows patterns that would yield predictive theory.

JULY 2008


Art and Science: Leonardo Art Science Evening, Jul 14 (San Francisco State University) Four presentations by artists and scientists, and socializing
Science: Edward Burtynsky , Jul 23 (Fort Mason) "The 10,000-year Gallery"
Music: Festival of Chariots, july 27 (Golden Gate Park) Festival of India

AUGUST 2008


Music: San Francisco Renaissance Voices, Celtic harper Diana Rowan and bansuri master Deepak Ram, aug 2 (Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church) A fusion performance combining Hildegard von Bingen's medieval plainchant with traditional instrumental music and dance of India.
Science: Daniel Suarez , Aug 8 (Fort Mason) "Daemon: Bot-mediated Reality"
Music: San Francisco Renaissance Voices, Celtic harper Diana Rowan and bansuri master Deepak Ram, aug 9 (Old First Church) A fusion performance combining Hildegard von Bingen's medieval plainchant with traditional instrumental music and dance of India.
Cinema: Manoel de Oliveira , Aug 9 - Sep 28 (Pacific Film Archives) A retrospective of Portuguese director Manoel de Oliveira
Music: San Francisco Renaissance Voices, Celtic harper Diana Rowan and bansuri master Deepak Ram, aug 16 (All Saints' Episcopal Church) A fusion performance combining Hildegard von Bingen's medieval plainchant with traditional instrumental music and dance of India.
Music: Arjun Verma and Javad Butah , Aug 16 (Ali Akbar College) Concert for sarod, sitar and tabla
Music: San Francisco Renaissance Voices, Celtic harper Diana Rowan and bansuri master Deepak Ram, aug 17 (St John's Presbyterian Church) A fusion performance combining Hildegard von Bingen's medieval plainchant with traditional instrumental music and dance of India.

SEPTEMBER 2008


Cinema: Manoel de Oliveira , Aug 9 - Sep 28 (Pacific Film Archives) A retrospective of Portuguese director Manoel de Oliveira
Art: Frida Kahlo, Jun 14 - Sep 28 (Museum of Modern Art) Exhibition commemorating the 100th anniversary of the artist's birth
Cinema: Jean-Luc Godard, Sep 5 - Oct 17 (Pacific Film Archives) Eight films by Jean-Luc Godard, one of the leaders of the French "nouvelle vague" of the 1960s.
Art and Science: Leonardo Art Science Evening (LASER), Sep 8 (San Francisco State University) Four presentations by artists and scientists, and socializing
Science: Peter Diamandis , Sep 12 (Fort Mason) "Long-term X-Prizes"
Cinema: Jia Zhangke, Sep 12 - Oct 17 (Pacific Film Archives) A retrospective of Chinese film-maker Jia Zhangke
Music: Monterey Jazz Festival, Sep 19-21 (Monterey Fairgrounds) 51st edition
Music: Mika Pontecorvo, Sep 20 (Expressions Gallery, Berkeley) The Aqua Movement and other works of "visual music"
Dance: Pandit Chitresh Das, Sep 27-28 (Yerba Buena Center for the Arts) Performs a dance solo
Science: Renzo Piano's California Academy of Sciences, Sep 27 (Golden Gate Park) Opening of Renzo Piano's new building in the Golden Gate Park, free on opening day and every third wednesday of the month
Science: Leonardo 500 Years into the future , Sep 27 - Jan 4 (Tech Museum of San Jose) The world premiere of the largest, most comprehensive exhibit of the innovative art, science and engineering works of Leonardo da Vinci and his contemporaries

OCTOBER 2008


Science: Leonardo 500 Years into the future , Sep 27 - Jan 4 (Tech Museum of San Jose) The world premiere of the largest, most comprehensive exhibit of the innovative art, science and engineering works of Leonardo da Vinci and his contemporaries
Cinema: Jean-Luc Godard, Sep 5 - Oct 17 (Pacific Film Archives) Eight films by Jean-Luc Godard, one of the leaders of the French "nouvelle vague" of the 1960s.
Cinema: Jia Zhangke, Sep 12 - Oct 17 (Pacific Film Archives) A retrospective of Chinese film-maker Jia Zhangke
Music: San Francisco Jazz Festival, Oct 3 - Nov 9 (Herbst Theater, Palace of Fine Arts, etc) Cecil Taylor, Archie Shepp, Dave Brubeck, Charlie Haden
Music: Vasundhara, Oct 4 (St John's Presbyterian Church) World premiere of an Ode to Mother Earth
Science: Huey Johnson , Oct 3 (Fort Mason) "Green Long-term Planning"
Cinema: Jean Eustache, Oct 4 - Oct 22 (Pacific Film Archives) A retrospective of French film-maker Jean Eustache
Music: Philip Glass, Oct 9 (Memorial Auditorium, Stanford) Philip Glass' "Book of Longing" is based on the poetry and images of Leonard Cohen
Dance: Dohee Lee, Oct 16-18-26 (Novellus Theater) Korean-born performance artist Dohee Lee, trained in shamanic ritual music and dance and Korean percussion, explores metaphysical questions in a work based on the ancient Chinese text I-Ching and integrating traditional Korean performance with contemporary music, movement and film with help from filmmaker Tatsu Aoki, saxophonist Francis Wong, Jonathan Chen on violin and electronics, Jason Lewis on multiple percussion, dancer/choreographer Sherwood Chen, and visual artist Thomas Wong.
Cinema: Russia's cinema of the 20th century , Oct 10 - Oct 30 (Pacific Film Archives) Classics by masters from Eisenstein to Tarkovsky
Art: Hasan Elahi , Oct 13 ( Berkeley Center for New Media) " Tracking Transience - The Orwell Project "
Music: The Hub, Oct 14 (CCRMA, Stanford) Computer music
Philosophy: Symposium on the future of cinema, games, and online video, Oct 17-18 (Pacific Film Archives, Berkeley) Pioneers at the forefront of change in cinema, video, games, media and technology share ideas, insights, and innovations. Focus on new tools, new distribution channels, and new rules. The format of the gathering will be experimental: rather than a traditional conference, short talks and demos, "fireside chats," and roundtables will spark a dynamic series of overlapping conversations.
Dance: Lines Ballet, Oct 17-26 (Novellus Theater) ALonzo King's ballet with live music by jazz legend Pharoah Sanders
Opera: Modest Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov, Oct 22 (War Memorial Opera House) With Samuel Ramey
Art: Afghanistan's Hidden Treasures from the National Museum of Kabul, Oct 24 - Jan 25 (Asian Art Museum) "In 1978, on windswept plains of northern Afghanistan, archaeologists unearthed tombs of ancient nomads that had been sealed for two thousand years and discovered an extraordinary trove: some 22,000 individual pieces of gold buried with the remains of six Bactrian Central Asian nomads. Within months of this discovery at Tillya Tepe, the country descended into war, and the so-called Bactrian Hoard disappeared into legend once more. Twenty-five years later, in 2003, Afghanistan surprised the world by announcing that the priceless artifacts had been located intact in the presidential palace bank vault in Kabul."
Art: Maya Lin, Oct 25-Jan 18 (De Young Museum) a major exhibition of new sculptures, drawings, and installations by renowned artist Maya Lin. In 1981, Lin's Vietnam Veterans Memorial dramatically changed the language and form of commemorative sculpture by infusing minimalist design with the emotional charge of memory. Her subsequent work, whether monument, sculpture, design object, or building is equally characterized by its harmony of message and material. In recent years, Lin has focused on a reconsideration of landscape in a time of ecological tension and change. This new body of work engages the issue of our fragile connection to the environment in timely and poetic ways.
Music: Laurie Anderson , Oct 25 (Wheeler Hall, Berkeley) "A conversation with Laurie Anderson"
Music: Laurie Anderson , Oct 24-25 ( Zellerbach Hall, Berkeley) "Homeland"
Music: Cypress String Quartet, oct 26 (Villa Montalvo) Beethoven's Quartet #130

NOVEMBER 2008


Art: Maya Lin, Oct 25-Jan 18 (De Young Museum) a major exhibition of new sculptures, drawings, and installations by renowned artist Maya Lin. In 1981, Lin's Vietnam Veterans Memorial dramatically changed the language and form of commemorative sculpture by infusing minimalist design with the emotional charge of memory. Her subsequent work, whether monument, sculpture, design object, or building is equally characterized by its harmony of message and material. In recent years, Lin has focused on a reconsideration of landscape in a time of ecological tension and change. This new body of work engages the issue of our fragile connection to the environment in timely and poetic ways.
Art: Afghanistan's Hidden Treasures from the National Museum of Kabul, Oct 24 - Jan 25 (Asian Art Museum) "In 1978, on windswept plains of northern Afghanistan, archaeologists unearthed tombs of ancient nomads that had been sealed for two thousand years and discovered an extraordinary trove: some 22,000 individual pieces of gold buried with the remains of six Bactrian Central Asian nomads. Within months of this discovery at Tillya Tepe, the country descended into war, and the so-called Bactrian Hoard disappeared into legend once more. Twenty-five years later, in 2003, Afghanistan surprised the world by announcing that the priceless artifacts had been located intact in the presidential palace bank vault in Kabul."
Science: Leonardo 500 Years into the future , Sep 27 - Jan 4 (Tech Museum of San Jose) The world premiere of the largest, most comprehensive exhibit of the innovative art, science and engineering works of Leonardo da Vinci and his contemporaries
Science: Wonderfest, November 1-2 (Stanford Univ) Presentations include: Is Cultural Diversity Like Biological Diversity? Will New Drugs Help or Hurt Patients? Humans vs. Microbes: Who Will Win? The Promise of 21st-Century Science. Have We Passed the Tipping Point on Climate Change? Will the Universe Have a Happy Ending? Are We Wired To Be Kind?
Art: Traditional Paper Arts from Asia, Nov 13 - Feb 22 (Museum of Crafts) The unique art forms of Chinese paper cuts, Japanese origami, Filipino parols, and Korean paper boxes
Art and Science: Leonardo Art Science Evening (LASER), Nov 10 (San Francisco State University) Four presentations by artists and scientists, and socializing
Music: Olivier Messiaen, Nov 13 (Memorial Church) Quatour pour la fin du temps and organ works for the Messiaen centenary
Music: Olivier Messiaen, Nov 15 (Old First Church) Three concerts for the Messiaen centenary
Science: Drew Endy and Jim Thomas , Nov 17 (Fort Mason) "Synthetic Biology Debate"
Art: Anne Pasternak , Nov 24 ( Berkeley Center for New Media) " Public Art and Media - From Spectacle to Political "

DECEMBER 2008


Art: The Art of Participation, through Feb 8 (Museum of Modern Art) Looking back nearly 60 years across a wide spectrum of genres and media, this exhibition examines how artists have engaged members of the public as essential collaborators in the art-making process
Art: Maya Lin, Oct 25-Jan 18 (De Young Museum) a major exhibition of new sculptures, drawings, and installations by renowned artist Maya Lin. In 1981, Lin's Vietnam Veterans Memorial dramatically changed the language and form of commemorative sculpture by infusing minimalist design with the emotional charge of memory. Her subsequent work, whether monument, sculpture, design object, or building is equally characterized by its harmony of message and material. In recent years, Lin has focused on a reconsideration of landscape in a time of ecological tension and change. This new body of work engages the issue of our fragile connection to the environment in timely and poetic ways.
Art: Afghanistan's Hidden Treasures from the National Museum of Kabul, Oct 24 - Jan 25 (Asian Art Museum) "In 1978, on windswept plains of northern Afghanistan, archaeologists unearthed tombs of ancient nomads that had been sealed for two thousand years and discovered an extraordinary trove: some 22,000 individual pieces of gold buried with the remains of six Bactrian Central Asian nomads. Within months of this discovery at Tillya Tepe, the country descended into war, and the so-called Bactrian Hoard disappeared into legend once more. Twenty-five years later, in 2003, Afghanistan surprised the world by announcing that the priceless artifacts had been located intact in the presidential palace bank vault in Kabul."
Art: Traditional Paper Arts from Asia, Nov 13 - Feb 22 (Museum of Crafts) The unique art forms of Chinese paper cuts, Japanese origami, Filipino parols, and Korean paper boxes
Science: Leonardo 500 Years into the future , Sep 27 - Jan 4 (Tech Museum of San Jose) The world premiere of the largest, most comprehensive exhibit of the innovative art, science and engineering works of Leonardo da Vinci and his contemporaries
Music: Choral Society, Dec 6-7 (St Paul Church) Bach's Christmas Oratorio
Music: Afiara String Quartet, Dec 12 (Old First Church) Quartettsatz by Schubert; String Quartet Op. 130 and Grosse Fuge by Beethoven
Science: Rick Prelinger , Dec 19 (Fort Mason) "Lost Landscapes of San Francisco"
Science: Mind , through Dec 31 (Exploratorium) Museum visitors experience their own thoughts

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