Community Calendar

It’s the 10th Annual Santa Monica Playhouse BFF Binge Fringe Festival of FREE Theatre, Oct 14 – Nov 16, the only FREE Fringe Festival in the nation, offering over 36 plays, workshops and family-oriented events. What’s happening on BFF THURSDAYS?

Oct 16: STAGE MAMMA: From Child Star to Leading Lady. Award-winning actor Rheagan Wallace shares her extraordinary life with raw honesty, poignant reflection, and unexpected humor. “A virtuosic solo performance!” DoLA. Includes post-show Q&A with the artist. Rated 16+

Oct 23: Wise Ass Women from the Westside, an evening of comedic storytelling featuring Pattie Fitzgerald, Wendy Hammers and Susan Landon. Three wise (ass) women from the westside of LA share their wit and wisdom in comedic monologues, stand up bits, and stories. You’ll laugh a lot, cry maybe a little, and be grateful you are alive. Rated 16+

Oct 30: Zach Ring’s The Advocate is a “Hollywood” dramedy filled with suspense, lucky breaks and unluck consequences. Written, directed and produced by Zach Ring; featuring Rob Nagle, William Duffy Reina Guthrie, Clarissa Park, Hilary Kang Oglesby. 18+

Oct 30: Terri Silverman’s Workshop for Writers, Performers, Storytellers & Anyone Who Has Something to say. Fun writing and story-telling exercises. No experience necessary – just the willingness to have fun and take a little leap.

Nov 6: My Great Turnround: What God and Argentine Tango Taught Me About Life. Amidst a spectacular whirlwind of comedy, truth, multimedia and fabulous Argentine Tango, Ruthie Danziger and Tango Pro Daniel Ledesma answer the burning question, “Will this fiery, passionate dance be enough to reignite Ruthie’s passion and purpose in life, or will she Tango alone? Includes post-show Q&A and refreshments with the cast. Rated 16+

Nov 13: Trans Mom vs Family court: Justice Sees No Gender. A brutal custody fight. No attorney. No safety net. Just truth, love, risk and raw will. With reenactment, live looping, original music, courtroom audio,photographs and video clips, Rejyna Douglass-Whitman tells the story no one else could. Includes post-show Q&A with the artist. Winner of the 2025 Hollywood Fringe Festival Transcendent Craft and Daredevil Awards Rated 14+

Binge on Theatre this Fall – a great alternative to your couch.

Santa Monica Playhouse programs are supported in part by generous grants from the We Are Santa Monica Fund, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors through the Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture, the City of Santa Monica and the Santa Monica Arts Commission, the Ahmanson Foundation and Playhouse PALS.

October 1- 31 - Join us for a month-long celebration of new vegan dishes all over Santa Barbara!

For the second year in a row, businesses across the region will showcase exciting special vegan menu items for an entire month, giving everyone the opportunity to explore creative plant-based dishes crafted by talented local chefs.

How It Works:

1- Visit participating restaurants across Santa Barbara.
2- Try their exclusive vegan offerings.
3- Share your experience—rate and review the dishes you try, comment, post photos of your favorite meals, and tag us at @veganchefchallengeWest.

This event is open to everyone, not just vegans! It’s about bringing our community together to celebrate incredible food and support our region's chefs.

Get Involved: Looking for ways to connect? Volunteer with us! We’re seeking passionate individuals to help with outreach, event promotion, and community building throughout the month. It's a great way to meet like-minded people and make a difference! Volunteer using this link: TinyURL.com/VOLVCC

Join us in making Santa Barbara an even more inclusive, vibrant, and compassionate community.

For details on participating businesses, menus, sponsorship opportunities, and more, visit our website at veganchefchallenge.org/SantaBarbara.

This exhibition showcases historic Broadway posters from collector Richard C. Norton, a comprehensive selection of musical theater posters 1972 to the present ranging from the famous to the obscure, from the celebrated to the damned. These posters offer insight into the evolution of American musical theater, graphic design, marketing, image branding and audience engagement. Far more than advertisements, they reflect the artistic, social and commercial contexts of their time—revealing how productions were first introduced, how stars were celebrated, and how visual trends paralleled theatrical innovation. As ephemeral objects, their preservation provides rare evidence of the material culture surrounding performance. By examining these posters through an academic lens, we can better understand Broadway’s influence on American theater, music and popular culture. The exhibition invites viewers to explore how theater has been represented and remembered, and how visual media contributes to the construction of cultural memory.
The exhibition will be accompanied by a lecture featuring Nicholas van Hoogstraten, author of Broadway Poster Art: 1945–1969 (Schiffer Publishing, 2024).

About the Richard C. Norton Musical Theater History Collection:
The Richard C. Norton Musical Theater History Collection consists of materials documenting musical theater including 25,000 playbills, 800 typescripts, and 1,500 published libretti, as well as sheet music and 78rpm records. Norton is the author of A Chronology of American Musical Theater (Oxford UP, 2002) a landmark work with details on thousands of Broadway productions. The collection was assembled to support the research for his book.

UCSB Library presents an art installation by artist Elena Yu, exploring histories of the Ethnic and Gender Studies Collection (EGSC) and space in celebration of its 30th anniversary.

In Fall 2023, Yu was invited to create artworks in response to the history of the EGSC. The artist was drawn to two untouched back rooms - former staff offices left exactly as they were when vacated in 2022. Inside, decades of belongings sat frozen in time. In February 2024, the Library was preparing to renovate the rooms. Librarians had sorted and removed items to be sent to the University Archives and gave Yu access to use the remaining materials in her artworks. She was inspired by encountering ephemera related to the history of Ethnic Studies at UCSB and the day-to-day occupations of the library staff, including file cabinets full of book dust jackets and printed correspondences, and bulletin boards whose contents speak to the specific interests of former staff, who were charged with the upkeep of the collections and space.

This exhibition is part of a campus-wide arts partnership with the UCSB Arts Equity Commons (AEC) to support opportunities for engagement of faculty, students, and staff through the presence and practices of contemporary artists. AEC was established in 2022 as a consortium of the Department of Art, Department of History of Art and Architecture, and the Art Design & Architecture Museum through a systemwide grant from the UC Office of the President. The artist would like to thank Gary Colmenar, Angel Diaz, Alyce Harris, Sara Kelly, Marisol Ramos, Jonathan Rissmeyer, and Kim Yasuda for their support of this project.

“One of the best in the country!” Daily Variety

A spectacular all-day theatre camp where young people make friends, expand their imagination and have fun as they act, sing, dance, play theatre games, and work with costumes and make-up, lighting and sound, sets and props, to help create an awesome fully staged original play or musical production written just for them.

‘I couldn’t stop smiling cheek to cheek!” Maia A, after her first session (age 5)

The respected Playhouse Diversity-in-Education Conservatory program for youth, now celebrating its 56th year, combines the fun and excitement of working as a team to create and perform a brand-new play with the joy and fulfillment of a stress-free, creative, arts-oriented environment in which working actors share their love of the craft with young people in all stages of development. Participants learn to share feelings and responsibilities with a group of their “play”-mates in an engaging and fun atmosphere and get a great physical workout, too.

“Our daughter learned more about drama in one week with SMP than in all the productions she’s ever done – put together. We're absolutely ecstatic!” educator and workshop mom Jennifer D.

No experience needed, but even the most “advanced” young actor will benefit from this unique hands-on method, structured so that each child can be successful.

Eight one-week classes to choose from, each with its own original show at the end of the week. Classes meet Mon – Fri, 9 to 3. June 16-20; June 23-27; July 14-18; July 21-25; July 28-Aug 1; Aug 4-8.

Special Teen Camp (ages 11 to 16, Aug 4-8) and Early Stages classes (ages 4 to 6, June 16-20 and July 28-Aug 1) also available.

“Thank You for giving our four children a priceless theatre experience at the Playhouse and for imparting top-quality values of caring and commitment which will stay with them always. Shiela T.

Playhouse conservatory alumni include Kate Hudson, Oliver Hudson, Zooey Deschanel, Emily Deschanel, Jason Ritter, Jason Segel, 12-year Playhouse alumna Cami Anderson, one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World, and Maroon 5’s Mickey Madden, who calls the program “Great in so many ways!”

"Through most of our lives and work, Cedric and I have had deep commitments to collaboration, internationalism, and solidarity movements."
–Elizabeth Robinson, 2024

This exhibition documents the life’s work of Cedric J. Robinson and Elizabeth Peters Robinson, placing it in the global context of the Black radical tradition. The Robinsons were renowned for their seminal scholarship and activism that had wide-ranging influence at UC Santa Barbara (UCSB), in academia, and across many public arenas. The exhibition is drawn from the Cedric J. and Elizabeth P. Robinson Archive (“Robinson Archive”) and supplemented by a variety of materials from other collections in UCSB Library’s Special Research Collections, as well as personal contributions from Elizabeth Robinson.

A deeply influential educator, Cedric Robinson (1940-2016) was a well-known scholar of racial capitalism and the Black radical tradition, and an active participant in political movements, both at home and internationally. For more than 30 years, Elizabeth Robinson has been an educator, social worker, former associate director for media at KCSB-FM radio, activist, and community media producer.

This exhibition was curated by Yolanda Blue, the Library’s Curator of American and International History, Politics, and Cultures Collections, in collaboration with New York University and UCSB Library staff.

Through the experience of some who served, this course examines the US Agency for International Development, the greatest tool America ever had for doing great humanitarian good while building diplomatic goodwill. We’ll look at USAID projects as they changed lives around the world and increased America’s strategic influence. We’ll explore how taxpayer dollars spent were an investment in our security and will consider ways we might move forward following the dismantling of the agency.

Christine Sheckler’s 27-year USAID career included posts in Pakistan, Tbilisi/ Georgia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Lithuania, and Belarus. She served in Ebolaravaged Sierra Leone, wartime Iraq, and Egypt during the Arab Spring. Christine also worked in USAID’s Office of Civilian–Military Cooperation. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, she helped launch and oversaw USAID’s Civil Society programs throughout Russia and the former USSR. In earlier years, she followed her Peace Corps tour in Liberia with a four-month solo crossing of the Sahara Desert. She is co-chair of USAID Alumni Outreach and is a board member and immediate past president of World Affairs Council—San Diego.

Bee Bloeser lived in West Africa, the Middle East, and Native American nations supporting her husband’s global health work and in her own work in speech pathology. She is the author of the acclaimed historical memoir Vaccines & Bayonets: Fighting Smallpox in Africa amid Tribalism, Terror and the Cold War. This is her third VISTAS presentation.

Vistas Lifelong Learning provides intellectually stimulating courses to Santa Barbara area residents, covering topics in history, public policy, science, philosophy, and more. The organization is committed to enriching lives and fostering a vibrant community of curious minds.

Bay Area–based artist Julia Goodman creates hand-formed paper sculptures from reused textiles, expanding the possibilities of handmade paper through a focus on sustainability, texture, and history. Drawing on the overlooked tradition of gathering rags for papermaking, she collects cotton bedding and t-shirts from family, friends, and thrift stores. These materials—embedded with traces of everyday life—bring forward the unseen labor of women and caretakers, past and present. Goodman tears and pulps the fabrics, forming and pressing them into shapes and textures that recall the moon, the imprint of her gripped hand, and the folds of bedsheets and t-shirts. Colors emerge directly from the original fabrics or by mixing together differently-colored fabrics—without dyes or pigments. In recent work, washes of watercolor respond to layered shapes and surfaces in her work.

For her exhibition at SLOMA, Goodman offers tactile, alternative ways to experience time. The wrapped sculpture An Unimaginable Unit of Time, begun in March 2020, marks the personal and collective passing of days during the pandemic. Each day, she formed an imprint of her grip in pulp along strips of torn bedsheets, resulting in a continuous line that ultimately stretched 0.95 miles. In Waning and Waxing, Goodman carves moon phases into large textured calendars, recording the eleven months she mourned her father and, years later, the nine and a half months of her pregnancy. Through handmade materials and labor-intensive rituals, Goodman’s work holds space for cycles of love and loss, connecting us to the rhythms of time.

Siji Krishnan’s paintings invite viewers into a world where memory, myth, and daily life intertwine. Working primarily on delicate rice paper, she builds up translucent layers of watercolor and oil to reveal figures, landscapes, and hidden details. Her images often feel dreamlike—ponds shimmering with light, grasses bending in the rain, or figures dissolving into their surroundings—suggesting the ways that identity, home, and belonging are shaped by both what we see and what lies beneath the surface.

The exhibition The Secret Place brings together recent works from Krishnan’s Los Angeles debut, alongside five new large paintings created in her studio in Kerala, India. In these new works, Krishnan replaces her more figurative elements with water, plants, and sky. The natural world of her home—backwaters, monsoon rains, and village ponds—becomes a central motif, a site of both refuge and transformation. Themes of fertility and motherhood, community, and renewal flow through her practice, informed by her experiences of raising a child and the shifting boundaries between self and environment.

Krishnan’s art asks us to look slowly and closely. Small details emerge—an animal, a flower petal, a shadow of a figure—like secrets discovered over time. Both intimate and expansive, her paintings transcend cultural and geographic boundaries, embodying the Upanishadic (ancient Indian sacred philosophical texts) philosophy vasudhaiva kutumbakam: “the world is one family.”

The Art, Design & Architecture Museum joins in the international centennial celebration of the birth of artist Joan Mitchell (1925–1992) with a spotlight exhibition of her work in the permanent collection.

Gifted to the AD&A Museum in 1985, Sunflower (1970) is part of a series dedicated to the sunflower that began in the late 1960s and continued until Mitchell’s passing. Inspired by her childhood experience of seeing Vincent van Gogh’s sunflower paintings in her home city of Chicago, Mitchell returned to the significance of the sunflower in her late life, commenting that sunflowers are, “like people to me.” Abstracted yet palpable, the painting reflects on the unique character of the sunflower and its life cycle–at once filled with a bright vitality that also hints at darkness and decay.

Joan Mitchell is widely recognized as one of the most significant American artists of the post-war era. Her abstract paintings are distinguished by their physicality, daring use of color, and personal interpretation of the natural world.

A native of Chicago, Mitchell studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Upon graduating in 1947, she spent over a year in France before settling in New York in late 1949. There, she became an active participant in the “New York School” of painters and poets, exploring different approaches to composition and gesture as part of the emerging Abstract Expressionist movement.

Over the next four decades, Mitchell dedicated herself to the single-minded pursuit of abstract painting of the highest order, while moving between New York, Paris, and later the French countryside in Vétheuil, where she made her home from 1968 until her death in 1992. Throughout her long and varied career, Mitchell drew on experiences and memories of the world around her—particularly views of cities, fields, rivers, lakes, and trees—as sources for her work. She once said, "I carry my landscapes around with me."

This presentation is organized by the Art, Design & Architecture Museum and is curated by Ana Briz, AD&A Museum Assistant Director and Curator of Exhibitions. Special thanks to the Joan Mitchell Foundation for providing the video Joan Mitchell: An Introduction that is on view. The exhibition is made possible thanks to the generous support of the AD&A Museum Council.