Photos by Weidong Yang

Weidong Yang is a physicist who invented a method to detect movement as fine as a tenth of an atom. With Kinetech, a collective of artists and scientists he assembled earlier this year, Yang works on a human scale, drawing on years of martial arts and dance training and performance, as well as his skills as an engineer, to produce a tactile and visual experience inspired by fluid dynamics, quantum mechanics, entropy, fractal noise, and infinite loops.

Combining technological contributions by Florian Hoenig, Sachin Deshpande, and Marc Fawzi, and choreography by Bay Area favorites Daiane Lopes da Silva and Karla Quintero, Kinetech presents Open Lab--Sensory Awakening May 20-21 at KUNST-STOFF arts with three modes of aesthetic experimentation: Mosaic, Rag Doll, and Flo, each built of codes, projections, and dancers in motion.

More »

Photo by Chelsea Rowe

They say it takes three weeks to break a habit, and the third annual KUNST-STOFF Arts Fest gives you three-and-a-half to take dance classes, participate in workshops on choreography and creative-intuition, and attend performances loosely centered on the theme "Inhabit," May 15-June 7. Curated by KUNST-STOFF artistic director Yannis Adoniou, events feature local and visiting artists working in dance, new media, technology, film, and more.

More »

In a city that serves as a progressive paragon, it's easy to forget that American women didn't get the right to vote until 1920. And that's just one facet of the tumultuous history and continuing struggle for women's rights -- here and abroad.

The International Museum of Women (IMOW) -- an innovative online museum based in San Francisco -- has been championing female-focused issues since 2006, but its history of fierce feminism has roots stretching back to 1985.

First founded as the Women's Heritage Museum, this nascent organization operated as a museum "without walls" for 10 years, producing exhibits, sponsoring an annual book fair, providing fodder for teachers during Women's History Month, and of course, celebrating the lengthy lineage of women throughout the past, long overlooked for their accomplishments.

Elizabeth Colton, original founder of IMOW

In 1997, a Bay Area woman named Elizabeth Colton was hoping to take her daughter to a museum dedicated to women's contributions to society...but she couldn't find anything. She called up Gloria Steinem, a noted feminist activist, who she didn't know, and asked her if such a place existed.

"Gloria told her 'no, but I think you should [start] one!'" says Catherine King, Vice President of Exhibitions and Programs at IMOW. "Elizabeth took that has a call to arms." Elizabeth soon corralled a group of Bay Area teachers equally disappointed by the current feminist offerings and established the International Museum of Museum.

"She thought, 'lets expand the mission, let's get global.'"

More »

Epic battles were waged, blood was spilt, villains vanquished, heroes triumphed and love endured, all on the battlefields conjured in our childhood bedrooms. Action figures from GI Joe to Barbie, just inches high, loomed larger than life in our imagination. But then you grow up. To recapture what he calls "that faded sense of awe," artist Robert Xavier Burden recreates Batman, Spiderman, and Thundercats as he remembers them: bold, bright, magical, and 11 feet high.

More »

There are at least two things we simply cannot resist here at SF Weekly: sweets and a good show. Indulge! provides them both. A benefit for ODC Theater, Indulge! in-vites the community onto the ODC stage for a night of sweets, savories, spirits, and dance performances. The treats come courtesy of Anthony's Cookies, Schulzie's Bread Pudding, and the Three Babes Bakeshop, with drinks provided by Bluxome Street Cellars and Square One Vodka, among others.

More »

Barney Frank is a liberal's liberal. He called Bill O'Reilly "boorish," on live TV, dismissed Michelle Bachmann as "an odd lady," and famously responded to a woman who compared Obama to Hitler with, "Arguing with you is like arguing with a dining room table. I have no desire to do it." During his 30 years in Congress, Frank opposed the war in Iraq, encouraged efforts to legalize marijuana, and always advocated for stricter regulation of Wall Street firms.

More »

Spring is special in San Francisco. In a city where we spend most of the year wrapped up in sweaters and scarves to fend off the harsh ocean winds, the sun peaking out from behind a perpetual fog bank is music to our eyes. Smuin Ballet, one of our homegrown dance companies, understands this. Their Spring Bouquet is an on-stage tribute to everyone's favorite season.

More »

Despite modern burlesque's associations with elegantly taking one's clothes off before a live audience of hooters and hollerers, burlesque is an art form that was originally intended to make us laugh.

More »

Here in the Bay Area, we aren't lacking for opportunities to watch the wildly popular cult musical, The Rocky Horror Picture Show -- there's a screening pretty much every week. That's why drag superstar and longtime fan Joshua Grannell, aka Peaches Christ, wanted to do something different. "Rocky Horror truly saved my life," says Grannell. "Back in the '80s when I first discovered it, as little closeted queen, it was my 'it gets better' video."

More »

When you move to San Francisco and ask about the literary scene, Writers With Drinks is likely the first thing people tell you about. For one thing, most of us can get behind drinking as a social activity, especially when it's being done by the witty and verbose. But the real reason is host Charlie Jane Anders, who is a pioneer and master of free-form and fictitious biography.

More »