Disco Riot: 'Ex Nihilo'

Dance

Contemporary dance company Disco Riot is about to embark upon a series of performances in the Bay Area with San Francisco-based FACT/SF, which was cofounded by Oceanside native Charles Slender-White. FACT/SF will then come to San Diego next spring to perform a show together.

Before Disco Riot goes, however, they'll do one performance of their new piece, "Ex Nihilo," for local audiences. It's a 35-minute quintet, informed by lectures by philosopher Alan Watts and also has original music from Jonny Tarr.

Details: 4:30-5:30 p.m. on Saturday, July 30, 2022. City Heights Performance Annex, 3795 Fairmount Ave., City Heights. Free/donation based (RSVP required).

Theater

Watch for my feature next week on this world premiere play, coproduced by the La Jolla Playhouse and Tectonic Theater Project known for 2000's "The Laramie Project," based on the 1998 murder of Matthew Shepard. "Here There Are Blueberries" follows the true story of a young archivist at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum who receives an album of photographs from Auschwitz. The photos show the lives of the Nazis who ran the camp in their free time and the archivist set out to figure out who they were.

The play uses projection to give the audiences their own relationship with the photographs.

Courtesy of the La Jolla Playhouse

For playwrights Moiss Kaufman and Amanda Gronich, telling a story that addresses the real lives of Nazi guards and workers came down to the clear distinction the creative team drew between humanizing and thinking of the people in the photographs as human beings.

"Our play is not exonerating. It is not forgiving," Gronich said. "As one of our characters says, the Holocaust did not happen in a passive voice. People actively determined to do this."

Kaufman said that historians' approaches to the Holocaust are transforming. "There is also a great interest now in the perpetrators, and how did they do what they did, and how did they become what they became," Kaufman said.

Details: This weekend's preview performances are 8 p.m. Thursday and Friday; and 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. Saturday. Performances continue Tuesday Aug. 2 through Aug. 21, 2022.

Visual art

Tijuana-born artist Armando de la Torre's Park Social project is a mini festival at the Southcrest rec center, in a part of the neighborhood that's separated by the 94 freeway. The pop-up is informed by folk arts like puppetry and storytelling, particularly in a community gathering model with music, poetry and artmaking. De la Torre is a teaching artist with the San Diego Guild of Puppetry.

Audience members can participate in workshops or create their own art, or listen to or watch performances throughout the mini, one-day festival.

Details: 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., Saturday, July 30, 2022. Southcrest Community Park, 4149 Newton Ave., Southcrest. Free.

Doug McMinimy

Dance, Visual art

Contemporary, modern dance company LITVAKdance will collaborate with a handful of other dance companies for a set of performances on Saturday: Los Angeles-based Whyteberg and Entity Contemporary Dance, Tijuana's Lux Boreal, and locally based The Rosin Box Project. With live music by Perla Negra Latin Jazz Quartet, the dancers will perform outdoors at the ICA San Diego North campus.

While you're there, check out the visual art currently on view. It's the final days of Aaron Glasson's "Primordial Refuge," which closes July 31.

Brian De La Cerda

Details: 4:30 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, July 30, 2022. ICA San Diego North, 1550 El Camino Real, Encinitas. $25.

Visual art

The Athenaeum Music & Art Library in La Jolla will open its annual juried exhibition the 30th year they've done it. There were close to 900 works submitted to the call for artists, from a record of 316 artists. Juried by Anita Feldman, deputy director for curatorial affairs for the San Diego Museum of Art, and visual artist Marianela de la Hoz, 40 artists were selected, including Carlos Castrejon, Brandie Maddalena, Bridget Rountree, Sibyl Rubottom and more.

Details: Opens with a reception at 6:30-8:30 p.m. on Friday, July 29, 2022. Additional gallery hours this weekend are 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Saturday. Athenaeum Music & Arts Library, 1008 Wall St., La Jolla. Free.

Music, Choral

The San Diego Gay Men's Chorus has a new artistic director, Dr. Charles Beale, and this is his first show with the group. It's also a great way to wrap up San Diego Pride month. The chorus will perform arrangements of '80s hits, including Journey, Whitney Houston, Pet Shop Boys and more.

Details: 8 p.m. on Saturday, July 30 and 3 p.m. on Sunday, July 31, 2022. Balboa Theatre, 868 Fourth Ave., downtown. $30.50+.

More music: Check out my story on the La Jolla Music Society's SummerFest, which kicks off Friday .

Visual art

In a one-evening-only pop-up event, The Hill Street Country Club will show works by artist Addy Lyon, including a 6 p.m. screening of her short film.

Lyon's work is informed by her own experiences with mental health, and she uses her art as both a tool of healing and a way to normalize the societal conversations around mental health. Lyon also uses sustainable art practices in her art, including the use of recycled canvases and other materials, including donated paint.

Details: 4-8 p.m. on Saturday, July 30, 2022. The Hill Street Country Club, 530 S. Coast Hwy., Oceanside. Free.

For more arts events, to submit your own, or to sign up for the weekly KPBS/Arts newsletter, visit the KPBS/Arts Calendar here.

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San Diego weekend arts events: 'Spring Tide,' 'Here There Are Blueberries,' lots of dance and more - KPBS