Multidisciplinary Triennial Features Emerging & Established Bay Area Artists

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - As part of its commitment to nurturing local artists, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA) presents Bay Area Now 5 (BAN 5) through Nov 16, 2008. YBCA’s multidisciplinary triennial, now in its fifth iteration, is devoted to featuring emerging and established local artists and serves as the most expansive survey of contemporary art created in the San Francisco Bay Area. Designed to establish a standard for serious consideration of art being produced regionally, Bay Area Now generates dialogue about the Bay Area’s significance as a cultural region, acknowledges the work of established artists and introduces audiences to emerging artists.

Bay Area Now 5 explores the many ways artists are influenced by their experiences both inside and outside of the Bay Area. YBCA’s curators chose BAN 5 visual and performing artists based on their visions of new work and enabled them to realize these works through financial support. In addition, to reflect the dynamic Bay Area arts scene, YBCA has tapped four visual arts guest curators and six guest film programmers to present programming exclusively for BAN 5 audiences. BAN 5 also goes beyond YBCA’s walls with its guest curated projects and community engagement programming.

“YBCA is a cultural institution that builds community through art. At no time is this more apparent than during Bay Area Now. This triennial event gives those who live here, and those visiting San Francisco, a chance to come together in celebration of our local artists,” says YBCA’s executive director Kenneth Foster.

YBCA’s Bay Area Now 5 community engagement programming highlights culturally vibrant areas in the Bay Area – these neighborhoods include Richmond, San Francisco’s Mission District and West Oakland. Programming with the organizations (InSitu: Richmond, Red Poppy Art House and Black New World) in each of the neighborhoods and at YBCA is planned.

Bay Area Now, initially started as a visual arts survey, expanded into a multidisciplinary festival with a performing arts and film/video component in 2005. Many past Bay Area Now artists, including Barry McGee, Chris Johanson, Todd Hido, Rachel Neubauer and Kota Ezawa, have gone on to achieve recognition at other major festivals and exhibitions.

Bay Area Now 5 - YBCA First Floor Galleries - Sat, Jul 19–Sun, Nov 16, 2008

Twenty-one BAN 5 visual artists were selected by YBCA curators Kate Eilertsen and Berin Golonu after extensive studio visits throughout the Bay Area. Artists in the exhibition include : Maria Antelman, Elaine Buckholtz, Joshua Churchill, Brian Conley, Ala Ebtekar, Ana Teresa Fernández, Donald Fortescue and Lawrence LaBianca, Misako Inaoka, Jonathon Keats, Edmundo de Marchena, Ian McDonald, Praba Pilar, John Roloff, Paul Schiek, Erik Scollon, Leslie Shows, Ginger Wolfe-Suarez and Primitivo Suarez-Wolfe with poet Moira Roth, Canan Tolon and lauren woods.

Bay Area Now 5 - YBCA First Floor Galleries - Sat, Jul 19–Sun, Nov 16, 2008.