Jack Fischer Gallery : Amanda M. Smith - Candy Gardens and Sparkling Sabers.

Comment by AB: Fanciful upbeat intricate layered ceramic wall plaques by Amanda Smith, a number of which appear to have autobiographical overtones. Smith tells me that among other things, she often fires layers separately using glazes to adhere one layer to another. Most pieces are entirely glazed, some highlighted with oil paint. Fun show, nice work-- like it.

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Marx & Zavattero : Matt Gil - Reel to Real.

Comment by AB: The centerpiece of the show is Matt Gil's exquisitely constructed oval mechanical conveyor belt. Operating kinda like an airport baggage claim machine, it automatically turns on when you enter the gallery and runs for four minutes (two complete rotations). During that time, an enticing selection of Gil's festive moderne ceramics passes before your eyes, each displayed on a circular metal section of the belt. It's almost like watching meal options float by at a sushi boat restaurant (I recommend Isobune Sushi in Japantown). The ceramics (or sushi) come to you rather than you having to go to them, making this the ultimate convience in fine art buying.

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The Armory, 1800 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA 94103: Mission Bazaar .

Comment by AB: First public event at The San Francisco Armory in over 30 years. I'm more than curious to see what the place looks like, and I'm not disappointed-- it's huge. As for the Bazaar itself, options include art, craft, fashion, jewelry, performance, tunes, delectables, and more. My guess is that once word gets out, the Mission Bazaar will attract many more people (and vendors)-- although attendance at this inaugural episode is certainly respectable.

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Fecal Face Dot Gallery : Alexis Mackenzie & Jessica Cusik - Savage Whiskers.

Review by Libby Nicholaou: Two female artists create seamless collages, one using solely paper cutouts, and the other combining paper with mixed media. You have to get inches away from the compositions to tell exactly where the glue lines are, and even then it's not easy. Alexis Mackenzie's pieces take you back to the 1920's in terms of female fashion but then shove you through your imagination with skeletons, bats, sea kelp, and other fantastical combinations. Jessica Cusik's work incorporates more familial elements, hierarchies among the sexes, and places for socializing such as a church. ?While they exist on different realms than everyday life, one offers a floating environment and the other a diagram of a rooted world. ?

The combination of these two collage artists sharing an exhibit is affective, as is the gallery's intimate space for displaying these delicate constructs.?

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Bucheon Gallery : Mars-1 and David Choong Lee - Mental and Material Realms.

Comment by AB: This one's a total mind blow, a bona fide art inundation. The gallery's so dense with creatables you hardly know where to begin. The show kind of whirls around you like you've been sucked into the vortex of a tornado. There's the urban escapades of David Choong Lee, many of which are painted on boxes (especially wooden cigar boxes), literally stacked one on top of one other, along the walls as well as freestanding on the floor. You might call Choong Lee's art on boxes painted sculptures because they show equally well on walls as they do positioned on flat surfaces. And then there's the expansive cosmic imagi-lands of Mars-1 beguiling you in for fantastic extradimensional excursions. As if that's not enough, he seasons his unreal realities with a medley of strange alien sculptures. Plus several pieces look collaborative (but I'm not totally sure). The payoff? One word: Woah!

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Gallery Three : Hugh Leeman - On Condition of Anonymity.

Review by Libby Nicholaou: Hugh Leeman draws from his experiences traveling in the Middle East and from techniques of graffiti to create his paintings. Instead of canvas, he paints and applies stencils onto recycled materials, ranging from wood boards to old street signs. ?His work is highly politicized and contains intense social commentary. ?Mixing sexual images with the brutality of murderous killing instruments, such as explosive bombs and machine guns, makes it hard for the viewer not to be shocked. ?He plays off the fears so prevalent in the United States during this dismal era of international affairs.

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Giant Robot : Tree Show IV.

Artists: Andrice Arp, Sasha Barr & Meagan Hall, Melinda Beck, Robert Bellm, Chris Bettig, Bigfoot, Kelie Bowman, Aaron Brown, Martin Cendreda, Shawn Cheng, Josh Cochran, Cupco, Jo Dery, Theo Ellsworth, Austin English, Jordan Fu, Matt Furie & Aiyana Udesen, Tim Gough, Katherine Guillen, Lizz Hickey, Andrew Holder, Maxwell Holyoke-Hirsch, Jordin Isip, Yellena James, Kelly Lynn Jones, Kaori Kasai, Dan-ah Kim, Diana Kwok, Olaf Ladousse, Le Merde, Little Friends of Printmaking, Munkao, Alexis Mackenzie, David Magdaleno, Jacob Magraw-Mickelson, Matt Moroz, Beci Orpin, Tyler Parker, PCP, Rohitash Rao, Albert Reyes, Brian Rush, Emilio Santoyo, Scrappers, Keith Shore, Ashira Siegel, Ryan Jacob Smith, Daniel St. George, Hannah Stouffer, Rachell Sumpter, Deth P. Sun, Daria Tessler, Matthew Thurber, Elisabeth Timpone, Jeremy Tinder, Kelly Tunstall, Edwin Ushiro, Sarah Utter, Francois Vigneault, more.

Comment by AB: Art about trees-- that simple and no more complicated. The show's also a fundraiser for San Francisco's Friends of the Urban Forest . Nobody knows how to pack more art more better into a small space than Giant Robot.

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Madusalon : Amanda Sage & NoMe Edonna - Extensions.

Comment by AB: Surreal meets camp in an unconventional display of portrait and figure painting.

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