The Best Exhibitions Events in San Francisco Right Now

Exhibitions events in San Francisco are feeling extra loud right now—in the good way. You can see it in the numbers (hundreds of people already circling this week’s shows) and feel it in the city: friends sending links, coworkers quietly blocking off their calendars, your group chat suddenly full of Eventbrite screenshots. If you’ve been meaning to swap the same-old bar night for something actually interesting, this is the week to do it.

This month’s lineup is delightfully all over the place, which is very on-brand for SF. You’ve got After Dark: Sexplorations turning the Exploratorium into a grown‑ups‑only playground, the Oakland Chinatown 34th Lunar New Year Bazaar flooding the streets with red lanterns, snacks, and aunties who absolutely know better than you. There’s Pay What You Wish Day! for when your wallet says “no” but your curiosity says “fine, just this once,” and The Futurists: Artists You May Not Agree With if you enjoy having your brain poked a little. MoAD & SFMOMA Present: Building Universes is the one to bookmark if you care about where contemporary art is headed, and Apex CES – Consumer Elite Shows in San Francisco Bay Area, USA is your scene if you’re the friend who always knows about the next gadget six months too early.

The big venues are doing what they do best. Moscone Center – yes, the place you normally associate with giant name badges and lanyards – continues to host the kind of large‑scale events that swallow whole city blocks for a weekend. The Masonic in Nob Hill is still where you go when you want something that feels like An Evening, not just a quick stop—think big‑deal talks, special programs, and the occasional crowd that actually dresses up. And then there’s Letterform Archive, the quiet overachiever tucked away for the design nerds, type geeks, and anyone who secretly judges restaurant menus by their fonts.

If you’re trying to pick your battles: After Dark is your book‑first ticket—especially if you like your science with cocktails and a side of mild chaos. The Lunar New Year Bazaar is pure East Bay energy: busy, vibrant, slightly overwhelming, and absolutely worth crossing the bridge for. MoAD & SFMOMA’s Building Universes feels like the smart, slower-paced choice for a Sunday afternoon when you actually want to think. Pay What You Wish Day! is the easy, low‑pressure option, perfect for dragging along the friend who “isn’t really an art person.” Apex CES is more for superfans and industry obsessives, but if you love future‑tech spectacle, you’ll be in your element.

In other words: this is what discovery looks like in San Francisco right now—bouncing from Nob Hill to SoMa to Oakland, saying yes to the weird, the thoughtful, the crowded, and the unexpectedly moving. Pick one and go. The algorithm can recommend it later; your week will be better if you just show up first.