San Francisco and its surroundings come alive after a long, rainy summer. Galleries return from hiatus, and museums kick off the season. This year’s fall program brings together resistance, community, and aesthetic innovation across major institutions and smaller art spaces.
Here are 10 exhibitions not to miss in the Bay Area:
Mike Henderson: Truth, Love, and Curiosity
📍 Haines Gallery, San Francisco
🗓️ Until October 25
At 82, Henderson remains innovative and experimental. Films and “worry paintings”—reworked canvases—from the 1970s to 2000s reveal the artist’s patient yet explosive energy.
Julio César Morales: OJO and My America
📍 Gallery Wendi Norris, San Francisco (Sep. 19–Nov. 1)
📍 Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, Davis (Until Nov. 29)
Migration, human trafficking, and hope intertwine in Morales’ neon works and delicate watercolors. The neon text “Tomorrow is for those who can hear it coming” makes visible the line between hope and despair.
Auudi Dorsey: What’s Left, Never Left
📍 Jonathan Carver Moore, San Francisco
🗓️ October 9–December 20
New Orleans painter Dorsey reimagines Lincoln Beach amusement park. Once a hub of joy for the Black community, it fills the silent voids of history on his canvases.
Jim Melchert: Where the Boundaries Are
🗓️ October 18–January 3, 2026
A retrospective for conceptual ceramics pioneer Melchert, whose geometric abstractions intersecting with photography and performance probe the balance between earth and sky.
MAKIBAKA: A Living Legacy
📍 Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco
🗓️ Until January 4, 2026
“Makibaka,” meaning “resistance” in Tagalog, honors San Francisco’s Filipino community. Protest posters to paintings bring together works by over 20 artists and collectives.
Suzanne Jackson: What is Love
🗓️ September 29–March 1, 2026
Painting, dance, poetry, gallery management—Jackson’s multifaceted practice comes together in a comprehensive retrospective for the first time, with her acrylic suspended sculptures standing out as bursts of color and form.
Black Spaces: Remain & Reclaim
📍 Oakland Museum of California
🗓️ Until March 1, 2026
From Fillmore to today, Black communities’ loss of space and resistance are under the spotlight. Artists and activists joyfully redefine the sense of “home.”
Ferlinghetti for San Francisco
📍 Legion of Honor, San Francisco
🗓️ Until July 19, 2026
Beat Generation poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s paintings, drawings, and prints, featuring figures from Ginsberg to Freud, leave a strong mark in both literature and visual art.
Unbound: Art, Blackness & the Universe
📍 Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco
🗓️ October 1–August 16, 2026
From Rashaad Newsome to Lorna Simpson, spanning Caribbean skies to galaxies, the museum returns after a long renovation with this ambitious exhibition.
Rooted in Place
📍 de Young Museum, San Francisco
🗓️ Until December 6, 2026
Bringing together ceramics, weavings, and beadwork from Karuk, Yurok, Hupa, Tolowa, Tsnungwe, and Wiyot communities, this exhibition celebrates the rooted yet innovative spirit of Native art.
