Five gallery shows not to miss in San Francisco

FOR-SITE Foundation, the ecologically minded arts nonprofit responsible for multiple installations throughout the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, including Andy Goldsworthy sculptures in the Presidio and an Ai Weiwei installation on Alcatraz, is activating another space at Fort Mason Center for Arts and Culture. The Guardhouse Program will feature a rotation of artists exhibiting in the historic guardhouse located at Fort Mason’s entrance — and first up is local photographer Kija Lucas. Lucas’ exhibition includes a wallpaper pattern installed throughout the space, featuring photographs of botanical specimens populating the surrounding area, as well as framed photographs of plants and gardening tools. Lucas’ use of native and non-native species brings to mind concepts of belonging and coexistence, through an immersive and informative art experience. The Guardhouse, 2 Marina Blvd., S.F. Through March 23 and viewable 24 hours a day through windows. Free. for-site.org/in-the-field/kija-lucas-at-the-guardhouse

‘Dismantling Monoliths’

SF Camerawork’s second exhibition in its new home at the Fort Mason Center for Arts and Culture, “Dismantling Monoliths,” curated by Jamil Hellu, presents alternative perspectives on the Western canon of art and history. Tarrah Krajnak restages iconic Edward Weston nudes, reclaiming the role of both photographer and model. In Xandra Ibarra’s video “Turn Around Sidepiece,” 2018, the artist sits astride a rotating stone bench, continuing to turn her nude body away from the viewer. Marcel Pardo Ariza’s installation of photographs of queer bodies challenges canonical concepts of representation. Alanna Fields’ and Aaron Turner’s interventions are more material, Fields painting directly on photographs and Turner printing on fabric and collaging to examine how Black bodies are made visible and obscured. Forrest McGarvey’s digital collages combine screenshots and stock images to explore the mediation of identity. Through this range of approaches, all six artists introduce questions into the ethics of who is represented and how they are looked at. SF Camerawork, 2 Marina Blvd., Building A, S.F. Noon-6 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday, noon-8 p.m. Friday and 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Saturday. Through March 25. Free. sfcamerawork.org/ dismantling-monoliths

B.J. Newton at Cushion Works

The late outsider artist B.J. Newton, who spent most of his adult life alternating between Folsom Prison and a job as a line cook in San Francisco’s North Beach neighborhood, is the subject of a retrospective at Cushion Works — the first showing of his work since 1970. The 11 paintings on view are by turns humorous and horrendous, presenting strange, bulbous characters and religious iconography populating arid landscapes in a maelstrom of masterfully manipulated oils. That Newton made these paintings from the confines of a jail cell might be reflected in the expansive imagination at play in his compositions, which include a hunchback monk licking the foot of a woman in repose and what looks like a giant eyeball interrupting a mountain range. The legacy of the artist’s work is no less strange: three paintings reside in the Smithsonian; many others might have been donated to Goodwill. Is the work hallucinogenic or visionary? Go see for yourself. Cushion Works, 3320 18th St., S.F. Through March 25: 2-5 p.m. Thursday and Saturday. Free. cushionworks.info

Ocean Escalanti at In Concert

The last few months have witnessed a string of new, independent art spaces opening throughout the Bay Area: Add to that list In Concert. Co-directors Gabriel Garza and Theadora Walsh, previously responsible for Thats A More, which mounted exhibitions inside artists’ homes, aim to continue exhibiting local artists as well as expanding their programming to include workshops and performances in the space they currently share with Cushion Works. “Natural Findings,” In Concert’s first solo exhibition showcasing Oakland-based painter and textile artist Ocean Escalanti, is a delightful experiment in mixed media. Small, quilted textiles include fabric photograms of items Escalanti collects beachcombing, adorned with delicate embroideries, while the paintings, one large and one delightfully small, show coastal scenes, one incorporating a surrealist figure surrounded by floating seashells. The point is material as much as it is immaterial, an examination and exemplification of the interconnectivity of art and nature. In Concert, 3320 18th St., S.F. 2-5 p.m. Thursday and Saturday. Free. inconcertsf.com

‘Resting Our Eyes’

The second major exhibition at the freshly minted Institute of Contemporary Art San Francisco, and the first group show, “Resting Our Eyes,” is a celebration of Black women enjoying leisure, including acts of rest and physical adornment. Curated by Tahirah Rashid and Autumn Breon, the exhibition’s 20-artist lineup features local names like Sadie Barnette and Leila Weefur, to contemporary icons Carrie Mae Weems and Mickalene Thomas, working across mediums from video to sculpture to collage. Ja’Tovia Gary’s neon sculpture “Citational Ethics (Saidiya Hartman, 2017), 2020,” which reads “Care is the antidote to violence,” reflects the thesis of the whole exhibition. The show also raises the question of art-viewing as a leisure activity and art as an aesthetic commodity. Art itself can be a place where we hash out questions of culture, politics and identity and it can also be a place where one comes to rest, to feel supported and celebrated. ICA SF, 901 Minnesota St., S.F. Noon-5 p.m. Wednesday, noon-7 p.m. Thursday and Friday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Through June 25. Free. icasf.org/exhibitions/3-resting-our-eyes