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Opening Reception of "Tenfold" Exhibition
McLennon Pen Co. Gallery is proud to announce its move to a new, expanded home at 1114 W 5th St in Clarksville. The inaugural exhibition titled Tenfold will debut the art gallery's first official artist roster including artists based in Austin, New York, Los Angeles, and Kansas City.Thurs. June 5, 6pm-9pmMcLennon Pen Co. Gallery
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Arts
Dance
Dance Repertory Theatre Presents Equinox
UT’s Dance Repertory Theatre constantly explores the possibilities in movement and storytelling. Equinox keeps this up with an explosive celebration of spring’s imminent arrival. Both local choreographers and dance-denizens from farther sides of the globe have crafted works specifically to spark a sense of wonder and newness. It’s dance made, in DRT’s words, to “question our sense of self, identity and connection.” Emerge from that wintry cocoon and glory in life. – Cat McCarreyMarch 5-9 -
Arts
Visual Arts
Cyanotype Workshop
Ever wanted to learn how to take a photograph without a camera? You can this Sunday morning at Golden Mean from 10am-12noon, with a cyanotype workshop taught by New Orleans-cum-Austin local Laura Rostad. Rostad has recently settled at Good Dad Studios to pursue her work in collage, photography, and installation, and plans to host more workshops there soon – just in case you take to this beginner-friendly class. Cyanotype is one of the most fulfilling ways to turn this summer’s punishing sun into something beautiful and blue, and you’re guaranteed to come away with at least two to four original pieces from this workshop. – Lina FisherSun., April 6 -
Arts
Visual Arts
Greater Austin Clay Studio Tour
You wanna get your hands into some slip? Spin that sexy ceramic wheel? Buy a cool bowl? Y’all gotta get on that studio tour trail, created and hosted by informal ceramic network Greater Austin Clay Artists. Over 20 different studios and artists will have their doors wide open for folks to wander into – showcasing the clay crafting they’re up to all year round. Each stop boasts their own special workshops and events to take part in, from Katie Ann Clay & Guests’ daily chai and treats to the newly opened Ceramigos offering hand-building ceramic activities all-day along with coffee & donuts, Agent Cooper-style. To see more events taking place over Saturday and Sunday, as well as the accessibility of each stop, check out austinclay.org/studiotour. And remember: No Ghost-ing! You know what I mean. – James ScottApril 5-6Multiple locations -
Arts
Books
Solar Powered Book Tour
SATX author Gume Laurel III surfs down to Burnet Road to discuss his newest novel Solar Punks, a February 2025 release about a tropical island in the future featuring renewable energy and a stranger washed up on the shore.Sun., April 6, 1pmBirdhouse Books and Gifts, 5925 Burnet Rd. -
Arts
Books
Texas MFA Showcase
Don’t worry: As far as I know, the creative writing MFA programs at both UT-Austin and Texas State University weren’t funded by the CIA as an attempt to assert U.S. literary superiority over Soviet fiction. (Note the “as far as I know” as a preventive measure should circumstances later change!) Instead, these post-grad programs have produced talented creatives – including the Chronicle’s editor-in-chief – and Hyde Park hot-spot First Light tributes a half-dozen writers from Texas State and UT’s Michener Center for Writers at this showcase. India Annamanthadoo, Daphne DiFazio, Reena Shah, Irene Han, Joe Lozano, and Kathryn Bailey all step up to the reading plate at 6pm, so enjoy their words while sipping from FLB’s swell espresso bar. – James ScottSun., April 6
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Arts
Visual Arts
Art & Parks Tour
This sweet opportunity comes to us from the Downtown Austin Alliance, the Pease Park Conservancy, and Ride Bikes Austin – so we know it's a damned good thing indeed. Take the self-guided Art & Parks Tour to explore the best of what Downtown Austin art and parks have to offer through this selection of curated murals, artworks, and green spaces. You can sign up anytime, so click that URL and get ready to learn the most vibrantly visual parts of your city soon – live and in person. -
Arts
Visual Arts
“Transcendence: A Century of Black Queer Ecstasy, 1924-2024”
Across politics and pop culture, depictions of queer Black life most often emphasize pain, if not patronization. “Transcendence: A Century of Black Queer Ecstasy,” a multimedia exhibition presented by UT-Austin’s Art Galleries at Black Studies, flips the script, offering a century’s worth of works that focus instead on Black joy. Organized around seven themes – Portraiture, Beyond Figuration, Dance and Movement, Spirituality, Sex and Sensuality, Black Queer Futures, and Altered States – the works of over four dozen artists remind us that even in the face of adversity, we can achieve transcendence. – Carys AndersonThrough May 9Christian-Green Gallery, 201 E. 21st St. & Idea Lab, 210 W. 24th St. -
Arts
Comedy
Cap City Comedy Club
That's right: Cap City Comedy Club, the longtime cornerstone of Austin's comedy scene for nearly four decades is at a new venue in the Domain. And here's Valerie Lopez with a closer look at what's in store for the scene via the venue. Click for details! -
Arts
Theatre
Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! The Musical!
Beep beep! Make way for this vehicular bird, who springs from author Mo Willem’s Pigeon picture books onto the Zach stage for this family-friendly musical. Originally commissioned by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the production is suitable for kids 3 years old and up – so a perfect pick if you’ve got antsy toddlers yearning to dance and sing during stageplays. Plotwise, this isn’t a challenging piece: When a bus driver disembarks from their seat, a mischievous fowl takes the wheel to expectedly chaotic results. Feathers will fly, I’m told. – James ScottThrough May 18 -
Arts
Theatre
Hamilton
I love a good at-home viewing party as much as the next person; screens and sweatpants are a match made in heaven. But Disney’s pro-shot live-stage recording of the multiple Tony award-winning Hamilton doesn’t come close to the real thing. True spectacle needs space – especially when that spectacle rocked the musical world and ushered in a new era of what can make a Broadway show. Experience Lin-Manuel Miranda’s rapping revolutionaries “in the room where it happens.” Here’s hoping you escape without King George’s songs on loop for the rest of your life (if so, you’ve got me beat). – Cat McCarreyThrough April 6 -
Arts
Visual Arts
Jiab Prachakul: Sweet Solitude
Whoever says Austin isn’t a fine art town can get the hell out of here. We continually break artistic ground with innovative and international taste. The Contemporary once again adds to that rep by hosting artist Jiab Prachakul’s first solo museum show. Born in Thailand, living in France, and with a solid film background behind her, Prachakul’s work has a bold style and clear point of view. Heavy graphic lines and soul-stirring colors fill her art. Each moment could be a film still, each stroke staking her claim on a far-too-Western art world. Widely accessible but intensely intimate, Prachakul’s scenes beg for close inspection. Join the Contemporary, and the artist herself, in examining her offerings during Friday’s opening night festivities or in conversation on Saturday, Feb. 1. – Cat McCarreyThrough August 3 -
Arts
Visual Arts
Laguna Gloria
This local treasure of a venue, run by those Contemporary Austin folks who also bring us the Jones Center shows Downtown, is all about the outdoors – which is perfect for these trickily navigated times of ours, n'est-ce pas? Recommended: Stop by and breathe in the air, enjoy the lawns and gardens and the many examples of world-class sculpture arrayed across the property, and (as Frankie used to say) r-e-l-a-x.Thu.-Fri., 9am-noon; Sat.-Sun., 9am-3pm -
Arts
Visual Arts
Landmarks: Self-Guided Walking Tour
Use your smartphone to access self-guided tours of the outdoor public art sited by UT's award-winning Landmarks program any time you feel like it. BONUS: There's also a free, docent-led tour starting at Marc Quinn's "Spiral of the Galaxy" (1501 Red River) on Sun., Jan. 8, 11am. -
Arts
Theatre
MotherTree
Looking to branch out in your live performance viewing? Leaf it to the Vortex Theatre – purveyors of “urgent, unashamed art to create action in a shifting age” – to provide a production unlike any other. Planted by producing Artistic Director Bonnie Cullum with music direction by Anderson Dear, stagecraft meets climate science in this exploration of the human connection to trees. In keeping with the theatre’s goal to promote active praxis through performance, themes of beauty, magic, and grief are woven together by ensemble members Gabriel Maldonado, Caili Crow, Nicole Boyd, Alaithia Velez, Benjamin Cervantes, Blaise Ricin, Sigh, Pablo Munoz-Evers, Katrina Saporsantos, Tyaga Welch, Laura D’Eramo, and Logan Lasiter. It’s not going out on a limb to say the current climate crisis affects us all, so join the Vortex as “we travel through the mycorrhizal network to learn from the Trees.” – James ScottThrough April 20 -
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Visual Arts
Museum of Illusions
Enter the fascinating world of illusions in this new venue that boasts a stunning array of intriguing visual, sensory, and educational experiences among new, unexplored optical wonderments.$20-24.11010 Domain #100 -
Arts
Visual Arts
Ranran Fan: “Inhale the Interruption 动弹”
Described in their about-the-artist as a “device-maker,” current new media art assistant professor at University of North Texas Ranran Fan digs into time-telling with their latest exhibition. Opening Saturday, March 22, this three-part installation features an ongoing incense burning – recalling the Chinese cultural association of incense with time measurement and memory. Exhibition attendees are invited to share their response to the scents and sensations to a chatbot trained on Fan’s personal writings, which will speak out its own replies. Also on display will be automated time-tracking sculptures, interactive video projections, and an outdoor sundial sculpture – all of which Women & Their Work says “explores the passage of time and the potential for healing.” – James ScottThrough May 8 -
Arts
Visual Arts
Sara Jane Parsons: “Project Pollination”
Tales of dwindling bee populations are guaranteed to send me into an existential panic. Which is why I fully embrace any reminder of pollinators’ goodness, purity, and beauty – especially when those reminders are as lovely as Sara Jane Parsons’ watercolor works. For her latest exhibit, “Project Pollination,” Parsons pairs portraits of her food and their pollinator pals. Luscious fruits and vegetables hang near moths and bees on the wing. The figures glow with life, becoming all the more impressive when you learn Parsons mouthpaints, as she’s paralyzed from the neck down. It’s a process of persistence and environmental preservation. The paintings are viewable for the next month, but get a more personal view at the Wednesday, March 19, opening. – Cat McCarreyThrough April 19; opening reception on March 19 -
Arts
Theatre
Steel Magnolias
Do you need to drive all the way to Cottonwood Shores for a good cry? If you’re a fan of Steel Magnolias – either Robert Harling’s original stage play or Herbert Ross’ 1989 film with Sally Field and Julia Roberts – then the answer is heck yeah. The crying part doesn’t really come on till the end; first you get to laugh, a lot, at this big-personality buncha Southern ladies supporting one of their own with a debilitating illness. (My fave of the bunch is definitely Ouiser, and Shirley MacLaine’s version is my icon, in style – gardening overalls – and comportment – sour-faced – both.) But I’m not gonna sugarcoat it: There will be weeping, so best bring Kleenex. Opening night is Friday, March 28. – Kimberley JonesThrough April 13Hill Country Community Theatre, 4003 W. Ranch to Market Rd. 2147, Cottonwood Shores, -
Arts
Comedy
The Hideout
The diverse lineup of hilarious, always surprising improv shows continues, with Pgraph and Maestro and the Big Bash and more, for the most unexpected delights of in-person entertainment.$10 and up. -
Arts
Visual Arts
The Museum of Fine Arts, Austin
Art by Charles Walter, Benjamin Bayne, and other international, national, and local artists.Sundays, 3-5pm. Donations accepted.1638 E. Second #326 -
Arts
Visual Arts
Third Annual San Marcos Studio Tour
With the fate of fall’s Austin Studio Tour uncertain, now’s a good time to push your chips in with San Marcos. The brainchild of MotherShip Studios, an industrial warehouse park turned gallery and studio space founded in 2020 by Courtney Peterson and Jacqueline Overby, the San Marcos Studio Tour will showcase 87 local artists – many operating out of home base MotherShip, a few gently testing the San Marcos city limits to include neighboring Lockhart. Friday’s free kickoff party provides an early look at the art, plus live music and libations (open to the public, but RSVP online), while the rest of SMST – now expanded to two weekends – unfurls at your pace noon-6pm, Saturday & Sunday. – Kimberley JonesApril 4-6 & 12-13Locations across San Marcos -
Arts
Theatre
Walden (remix)
Is anyone truly alone anymore? We’ve got the entire world in our pockets: a steady stream of information and connections at our fingertips. What would happen if we were just… left to ourselves? Playwright KJ Sanchez tackles that and other questions of social justice and conservation in Walden (remix). Instead of strictly retelling Henry David Thoreau’s isolated-ish years in a cabin by Walden Pond, Sanchez adds a spacey twist. Astronaut “H” lives alone on the moon, harvesting matter for Earth’s energy crisis. Ties to friends and family start to fade. Her AI companion starts to evolve. Questions arise about the corporation she works for. Sanchez explores potential next steps for our existence, grounding us further in Thoreau’s root concerns. “Things do not change; we change.” – Cat McCarreyApril 3-13 -
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Visual Arts
Words and Wonder: Rediscovering Children’s Literature
One of the pleasures of having a first-rate research center and archive in town is how the Harry Ransom Center will regularly comb through its own vast holdings and hand-pick gems to present in a new context. Hence the HRC’s latest exhibit, “Words and Wonder: Rediscovering Children’s Literature,” which pulls from its manuscript, art, photography, film, and performing arts holdings to spotlight early 20th-century authors and illustrators catering to a young readership. The exhibit includes magic lantern slides from Aesop’s Fables, John Tenniel’s illustrations of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, and Ernest H. Shepard’s indelible images from the Hundred Acre Wood, among other treats. Runs through August 17. – Kimberley JonesThrough August 17