The tour was created for the Oakland Pride celebration earlier this month and will be offered again on 9/28.

The history of the gay rights movement in the Bay Area and throughout the state of California will be explored on a special docent led tour at the Oakland Museum of California (OMCA) on Friday, September 28 at 7 p.m.  A selection of artifacts from the museum’s permanent collection will be spotlighted in a program that will trace from the early 20th Century to today, touching upon the emergence of sexual identity politics, the overlap of gay liberation with the hippie and beatnik movements, the rise of Harvey Milk and the LGBT community as a political force, and the current drive for gay marriage equality. The tour is included with admission, only $6 after 5pm.

Dedicated to the art, history, and culture of our state, the Oakland Museum of California (OMCA), is often overshadowed by San Francisco’s powerhouse DeYoung, MOMA, Academy of Sciences and other museums. But—in addition to permanent collections focused art, history, and nature as seen through a distinctively Californian lens—OMCA steadfastly mounts some of the Bay Area’s most intriguing temporaryexhibitions and special programs, such as this month’s LGBT tour.

Come early on tour night to check out the recently extended The 1968 Exhibit, which spotlights that watershed year of Vietnam, the assasinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy, feminist protests at the Miss America pageant, Black Power demonstrations at the Olympics, and more.

Throughout 2012, OMCA has presented shows at once provocative and crowd-pleasing, including a retrospective of internationally acclaimed Oakland graphic novelist and cartoonist Daniel Clowes; an eye-popping, mindbending collection of social justice posters; and a installation featuring thematically interwoven video interviews of 1500 black men throughout the United States.

There’s more to come in 2013…so keep posted on their programs and make sure that OMCA gets out from under your radar.

Jim Provenzano

Writer Jim Provenzano‘s latest novel, Every Time I Think of You, won a 2011 Lambda Literary Award for Best Gay Romance. It’s a coming of age/coming out story that also addresses the challenges of physical disability, without ever feeling didactic or issue-oriented. Former sportswriter Provenzano—perhaps best known for his wrestling novel, PINS—is also the editor of BARtab, the Bay Area Reporter‘s glossy monthly guide to GLBT arts and nightlife, making him an ideal addition to our rogues gallery of Insider Tipsters.

Given his recent fictional focus on a character with disabilities, Provenzano suggested that, in addition to his personal favorite spots in San Francisco, he’d like to share some useful websites for travelers with disabilities. We couldn’t be happier to facilitate that:

• The San Francisco Access Guide:  A resource hub from The San Francisco Travel Association                            
• San Francisco On the Level: Wheelchair accessible tours of the city with no grades of more than 8%
• Ability Trip: San Francisco:  SF section of a trusted global guide to accessible travel

And now, on with Provenzano’s picks…

What’s your favorite SF cultural institution?

Aside from the GLBT Historical Society, which Michelle Tea previously spotlighted in your blog, I’d have to say The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, at least the foyer— it’s architect Mario Botta’s masterpiece, and word is that it’s going to be smashed apart to make way for, I dunno, something else. Really a shame. See it while you can, the way it is now.

Treasure Island with a hot Army guy before Don’t Ask Don’t Tell was abolished, on July 4, while holding hands. Sorry, that’s sharing a bit too much. Seriously, I’d recommend taking in the skyline while kayaking outside a Giants game in McCovey Cove; or from Angel Island; or from across the Golden Gate Bridge in the Marin Headlands.

Provenzano’s tips continue, after the jump

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Whether or not you’re a regular art museum attendee, and whether or not you’re a fashionista, if you’re in San Francisco over the next two weeks make sure not to miss the enormous—and enormously entertaining—exhibition “John Paul Gaultier: From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk,” which will end its run at the de Young museum on Sunday, August 19.

Fashion exhibits have become something of a cash cow for fine arts museums in recent years: the Alexander McQueen exhibit at the Met in New York and last year’s Balenciaga show here at the de Young have drawn enormous crowds, including many infrequent gallery-goers. Given the popularity of Project Runway, red carpet coverage, and other clothing-focused television programming, it’s easy to see how these museum shows have proven to be a mass-market lure. With any luck, new visitors to the museums have wandered astray of these travelling blockbusters and discovered some of the institutions’ own collections as well. It’s debatable.

It’s also debatable whether these exhibitions are having much influence on the opinion of more frequent museum-goers: Are more connoisseurs of painting and sculpture coming to feel that fashion is a “fine art”? Does the old-money old guard secretly sniff that couture belongs at the galas, not in the galleries? Quite possible.

But the tension between high art and pop culture is one of the things that makes the Gaultier show so exciting—and so much fun to talk about after a visit. And the exhibit itself: Wow! It’s one of the most theatrically presented museum exhibitions you’ve ever seen, with a conveyor belt “runway show,” talking mannequins, and stunning lighting design. There are 140 costumes on display—from punked out tartan plaids to Catholic saint pastiches to Madonna’s conical bras—along with sketches, video, and other archival ephemera.

But perhaps the most eclectic collection on offer is the crowd the show is attracting: An energizing mix of old and young, tourists and locals, those who find Gaultier’s designs inspirational and those who find them ridiculous. It is a paradise of people-watching and eavesdropping.

Check out John Paul Gaultier’s foray into dance music (Video after the jump)

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If you’re planning ahead—whether for the weekend, or for Christmas—mark Friday through Sunday (August 3-5) on your calendar for a visit to the American Craft Council’s annual exhibition at Fort Mason Center, featuring work from over 200 artists. With prices ranging from the tens- to the tens-of-thousands, the country’s largest juried craft show west of the Rockies is highlighted this year by two new exhibition categories sure to appeal to the Bay Area’s crafty cognoscenti:

• Foodieware features fully functional art for the kitchen and dining room. From cutlery to serving platters to woven table dressings, this is the intersection of beauty and utility. While it can be  nervewracking to select purely artistic craftwork to give to others, the practical dimension of the items on display in these booths makes them particularly gift worthy.

• Men’s Department focuses on one-of-a-kind handmade wearables and accessories for guys, including Santa Rosa leather artist Richard Davis’ museum-worthy murses.

Lesbian jewelry artists Lou Ann Townsend and Mary Filapek try to capture the cosmos in their work.

Members of the Bay Area’s overlapping scientific and GLBT communities will want to check out the bold sterling silver and polymer jewelry created by art- and life-partners Mary Filapek and Lou Ann Townsend, from North Carolina. The pair point to atomic and cellular structure as a major influence on their work, and the copy on their website suggests that they’ll be quite a hit with the local girl-geek crowd: “Two sodium atoms are walking along the street when one stops and says, ‘Oh my God, I think I’ve lost an electron.’ ‘Are you sure?’ asks the other sodium atom. ‘Yes,’ replies the first sodium atom, ‘I’m positive.’”

On Friday  from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.,  admission to the exhibition will be discounted to $5 (from $14), with live music and free sampling of Balvenie Single Malt Whiskey livening up the evening hours

PASSPORT magazine favorite Bryan Batt, of Mad Men and Jeffrey fame,  recently visited the ACCS’ East Coast show in Baltimore to find items for his  New Orleans design shop, Hazelnut.  Video after the jump

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The dirty kid brother of the Folsom Street Fair takes place this Sunday

On occasion, I’ll be sharing snapshots of some of the most interesting signage and promotional material I come across in the San Francisco Bay Area. Perhaps due to our relatively mild weather, we’ve got a veritable street front museum of vintage retail signage. We’ve also got a large percentage of clever, sassy, and flat-out weird folks in our midst—and they sometimes find highly amusing ways of expressing themselves. And we’ve got plenty of hardworking entrepreneurial immigrants who, frankly, have every right to focus on running the nuts-and-bolts of their businesses rather than proper English spelling and translation—But let’s face it, there are some mighty funny errors to be found on Chinese menus and the like.

Today, as we head into this weekend’s notorious annual Up Your Alley street fair, may I proudly present the difference between our part of the world and the Vatican:  One of the most irksome recent acts by the Catholic church was its smackdown of the Yale Divinity School’s Sister Margaret Farland, who sensibly suggested that masturbation—in addition to providing pleasure—could be a sensible part of the world’s birth control repertory.

Clearly, that’s not the presiding perspective in the Bay Area, as inadvertently noted by this delightful storefront awning I discovered in Oakland last week*:

And woman, too…right Sister Margaret?

*Beyond the laughs-in-translation value of its slogan, this store is truly remarkable.  Check out the MAN MUST WAK video after the jump…

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A fabulous (fictional) view at the Palomar Hotel

There’s a 100% guarantee that your view of the bridge will never be obscured by fog in the newly tricked out Golden Gate Suite at the  Palomar Hotel.

Sure, that’s because the “view” from room 512 is a giant, 5-window decal—the Palomar is located way across town from the bridge. Still the whimsical window treatment, headboard, and pillows capture the spirit of the city’s year long celebration. And the nightstands and coffee table–by local artist Richard Bulan—are made of actual bridge steel, salvaged when a pedestrian handrail was replaced in 1993.

Meanwhile, the Hotel Vitale is also jumping on the Golden Gate bandwagon by promoting its views…of the Bay Bridge.

As it happens, San Francisco’s other glorious span is in the midst of its own 75th anniversary year (The Bay Bridge opened to traffic in November, 1936).  For all the Golden Gate hoopla around town these days, the Vitale will become the place to stay come autumn, when the Bay Bridge begins its two-year display of The Bay Lights, Leo Villareal’s site-specific art piece. Over 25,000 white L.E.D bulbs positioned along the west span will be triggered by traffic, weather, and the sway of the bridge to create ever changing patterns of illumination over a mile wide and over 200 feet high. That’s one hell of a night light for your hotel room.

Sweet view from the Vitale Hotel: That's not the Golden Gate either!

SF transplant Wesley Gibson (Photo: Chelsea Station Editions)

In next month’s print edition of PASSPORT (May, 2012), I’ve selected San Francisco-based author Wesley Gibson’s new novel, Personal Saviors, as our Airplane Read of the Month. The book is a heartfelt gay coming-of-age tale set in the deeply religious, profoundly racist American South of 1969. Gibson writes so convincingly from the perspective of a young Southerner that I’ll admit to being momentarily surprised when I learned, after reading the book, that he’s lived here in San Francisco for the past six years.

You may be able to take the boy out of the Southern Gothic, but you can’t take the Southern Gothic out of the boy: Gibson describes his adopted hometown as “a strange combination of loveliness and kinkiness and darkness.  It’s an adult Disneyland run by recent escapees from a mental institution, or maybe just eccentrics of all stripes from all over.” I asked him to share some of his favorite aspects of SF with Agenda readers:

What’s your favorite cultural institution to spend time at in the city?

SFMOMA, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.  There’s always something interesting there.

Currently featured is an exploration of the utopian architect Buckminster Fuller, and the debut U.S. museum exhibition of eccentric contemporary Dutch graphic artist Parra.

Where’s your favorite view in the city?

From the Hammon Observation Tower  at the DeYoung Museum.  It’s a 360 degree view from an intimate, beautiful space.

The tower is open to the public, with no need to pay museum admission.  That said, there’s good reason to pay museum admission these days: a blockbuster John Paul Gaultier fashion retrospective runs through August 19.

See the view and learn more of Gibson’s picks after the jump

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Daniel Dallabrida, artist

This Monday, March 26,  at 7 p.m. a multi-generational gathering of gay writers and performers will participate in “Younger Than Jesus: Older Than Aids” at the magnet community space in the Castro. The evening is an extension of artist Daniel Dallabrida’s current exhibition, discussed below…

“I want today’s young gay men to realize that those of us in our fifties and beyond have something to offer,” local artist Daniel Dallabrida told John and I over drinks at the  Eureka Lounge a few weeks back.

“Those of us who lived through the AIDS crisis can walk down the street here in the Castro and feel like we’re invisible today, in this culture of Glee and gay marriage and kids coming out in junior high school.”

Even the setting of Dallabrida’s current exhibition addresses the tensions and connections embedded in his art: His photography and photographed mixed-media collages are on display through next Wednesday, March 28, at magnet, the Castro’s sexual health services center, where so many of today’s young gay San Franciscans are regularly tested for HIV.

The small exhibit, titled  In Now’s waters burn the stars of Then, features works that combine Dallbrida’s casual, snapshot of denim clad, mustachioed gay men circa 1980—the united, unknowing members of a generation soon to be decimated—with posed, slickly lit images of twinks, bears, pigs and other self-proclaimed subtypes torn from the colorful party flyers that confetti the Castro today.

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When I first moved to San Francisco in 2009, I was committed to learning about the history of my new hometown. I soon discovered San Francisco CityGuides, a remarkable resource for locals and tourists alike, which offers over 50 different walking tours – all at no charge. The itineraries (typically 90 minutes long) range from stalwart sightseers’ favorites – the Golden Gate Bridge, Chinatown – to unexpected forays that will delight even longtime residents, including “City Scapes and Public Places,” which includes visits to several semi-secret roof gardens in the midst of the Financial District.

Up to a dozen different tours are offered between early morning and late afternoon, every day of the year with the exception of major holidays.

 Before leading their first tour, each of the 34-year-old non-profit’s 200+ volunteer guides is required to take an intensive, months-long training program that immerses them in the history, architecture, and sociology of San Francisco as a whole, and also requires research on the specific topics and places they’ll be introducing to their tour groups.

How passionate are these guides about sharing their city? They actually pay to take the training course.

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The de rigeur spring break weekend for San Franciscans this year is a trip north to Tacoma, Washington for the only West Coast showing of  HIDE/SEEK: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture.  And LGBT travelers planning to visit the Bay Area should consider adding a day or two to their trip to take advantage of a rare opportunity.

Running from March 7 to June 10, the landmark exhibition views the history of American art from the 1880s to the present through a keenly focused lavender lens. Curators Jonathan Katz and David Ward’s exhibition notes and labels decode references to gay sexuality and romance that have traditionally been tiptoed around by art historians loathe to acknowledge the homosexual within the canonical. The veil is removed from—and important social context restored to—works by artists including Thomas Eakins, Marsden Hartley, Georgia O’Keefe, Charles Henry DeMuth, Romaine Brooks, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg. The exhibition also explores the slow emergence of more overt references to gay sexuality and culture in art, in works by Keith Haring, Robert Mapplethorpe, and others. The Tacoma Museum is also offering an extensive series of talks and guided tours to enrich attendees’ experience.

Co-curator Katz talks about the exhibit in a fascinating video after the jump.

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