After Dark: In with the New

The essence of exploration begins with what is new and yet to be known. Join us to celebrate a New Year, a bevy of new exhibits, and tasty treats!

Everything old under the sun is new again when you begin your visit with an otherworldly encounter with Metamorphosis, a 1:1000 scale model of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, designed by Jason Klimoski and developed and fabricated by David Delgado and Dan Goods. Then enter strange realms when you generate mesmerizing fractals with Nathan Kandus' Between Dimensions. See-and be seen by-Joerg Student's Blumen Lumen, an illuminated flower that responds to your presence with a blooming display. For Strata #4, Quayola delved into iconic paintings to examine composition, color, and proportion-and created contemporary abstract images based on these universal rules of beauty and perfection. 

Let the Explainers usher you into new experiences. Take a floor walk and challenge your perceptions of time, learn some new magic tricks, deepen your understanding as familiar objects are dissected right before you, then push your perception exploring the world through goofy and upside down goggles. Tick, tock, the swing of the pendulum will reveal the laws of physics and create art you can take home.

We'll dig into the dark corners of our vintage 16mm collection and dust off a handful of archaic, unknown, and unseen educational and industrial films. And then we'll ring in with the new, a short program of recently acquired works and eye-catching abstractions designed to inspire a new vision for the New Year, including Paul Clipson's abstract 16mm film study Light Year,  animation visionary Norman McLaren's Fiddle Dee Dee, and animator Max Hattler's Sync, based on the idea that an underlying unchanging synchronization rules all time, all physics, all life.

Explore some of our newest exhibits including Ciencia Pública, a collaboration with the San Francisco Boys and Girls Club; Watch Water Freeze; Color Collider; Spark Chamber; and Trust Fountain, Freeloader, and Text Fish, part of the Science of Sharing exhibition, which is investigating competition, cooperation, and social interaction.

SeaGlass Restaurant will add to the flavor of the festivities with various foods and beverages thought of as "lucky" for the New Year, including Hoppin' John, collard greens, corn bread, and lucky BBQ pork.