Join us at the Taste Of Jack London Beer and Food Festival happening this Saturday, August 2, 12-5pm in Jack London Square. Shapeshifters will be one of the many local vendors participating in this first annual event, organized and hosted by the Jack London Improvement District and the Jack London Brewing District. More information and tickets can be found here.

Do-Over Music Series - Romus / O'Kane / Ewing / Robinson / Glenn
Thursday, August 7, 2025
7pm
Admission: $10 (discount for members)

The Do-Over Music Series at Shapeshifters Cinema, organized by Lisa Mezzacappa and Jordan Glenn, is a monthly series of sound performances presented by a rotating cast of local luminaries and special guests. The first set features performances of creative - improvised - composed - electronic - acoustic - music. The second set opens up to a live improvised collaboration of sound and visuals made using images culled from the Shapeshifters 16mm film collection.

Set 1 (7pm): Rent Romus & Suki O'Kane

Rent Romus - reeds
Suki O'Kane - percussion

Set 2 (8pm): expanded cinema + improvised music with:

Rob Ewing - trombone
Kevin Robinson - saxophones
Jordan Glenn- drums
Films, film loops and other visual interventions by the Shapeshifters Performance Group (Ellie, Kathleen & Gilbert)

Gravitational Lensing: Feminist Film Dialogues
Program 10 - Craft, Tradition & Ritual
Presented in association with San Francisco Cinematheque
Friday, August 22, 2025
7pm

Films that honor personal and familial legacies by focusing on activities traditionally passed down through matrilineal lines including sewing, crafting, gathering, weaving and decorating.

Screening: On the Inside We Are Color (16mm film shown on DV) by Elena Pardo, Water Ritual #1 (1979, 16mm film shown on DV) by Barbara McCullough, Primitiva (2023, 16mm film shown on DV) by Azucena Losana, Thread (2022, 35mm film shown on DV) by Abigail Smith, Nana (2021, DV) by Kani Kamil, Le Tarantole Dormono Sotto Le Pietre (2023, 16mm film shown on DV) by Giada Cicchetti and Seeing Her (2020, 16mm film shown on DV) by Lindsay McIntyre.

Find out more about the Gravitational Lensing: Feminist Film Dialogues series.

Cel Jam
Instructor: Anna Firth
Sunday, August 3, 2025
12-5pm
In-person at Shapeshifters Cinema
Admission: $75 (Discount for Shapeshifters members and students)

Try your hand at handmade animation in this all-levels workshop with Oakland-based experimental animator, Anna Firth. Part history lesson and part materials exploration, participants are invited to paint a simple scene, one transparent layer at a time, to contribute to a greater group vision. We will use a slightly DIY approach using supplies you can easily source from local craft stores so you can continue to paint cel beyond the workshop. All materials provided and any level of experience welcome! Feel free to bring any of your favorite materials (collage/drawing/photos/etc.) to customize your background art.

A Few Good Magic Tricks—A Low-stakes Workshop for the Magic-Averse
Instructor: Kirk Pearson
Thursday, August 14, 2025
7-9pm
Admission: $25 (discount for members)

Magic is the oldest performing art in the world—which means we've had thousands of years for some terrible tricks to be invented. Magic has been hijacked by bad magicians doing bad magic, and frankly, it's time for a comeback. Because when a trick is good—really good—it can be transcendent. A Few Good Magic Tricks is a low-stakes workshop for anyone who wants to dabble in the dark arts of sleight-of-hand, misdirection, and charmingly-suspicious behavior. Instructor Kirk Pearson will share approachable tricks that are fun to learn, impressive to perform, and built on time-tested techniques and simple props. You will not only learn how the tricks work, but also why they work—plus the performance skills that turn a trick into a miniature miracle of theatrical mischief. This is magic for regular humans—artists, weirdos, introverts, extroverts, skeptics, believers, and the magic-curious. All genders, ages, and experience levels are welcome. No experience necessary. Props will be provided. Smirks encouraged. Top hats optional.

Images Festival Call for Submissions: Images Festival (Toronto, Canada) showcases the intersection of emerging and established practices and invites open critical dialogue in the film and media arts community around the political herstories of moving image production, distribution, exhibition, and representation. The next Images Festival is scheduled to take place April 1-9, 2026. Deadline to submit is July 31, 2025. Find out more.

Ann Arbor Film Festival Early Bird Submissions: The submission window is now open for experimental, animation, documentary, fiction, and performance-based works for the 64th annual Ann Arbor Film Festival, the oldest avant-garde and experimental film festival in North America. Early Bird deadline is July 31, 2025. Find out more.

Kinesthetic Cinema Call for Submissions: Artists are invited to submit works of “kinesthetic” or, interactive media that invites audiences to kinesthetically engage and/or participate beyond a single-channel theater-viewing experience. This open call welcomes film, video, and/or performance works that prompt or engage the viewer kinesthetically–through spoken word, sound, song, gesture, or full-body movement for a program that will be curated by Kym McDaniel that will be exhibited at the Wexner Center for the Arts in September 2025. Deadline to submit is September 1, 2025. Find out more.

Experiments in Cinema Call for Submissions: Experiments in Cinema seeks submissions for the next edition of EIC (v21.5) happening in Albuquerque, NM April 16-19, 2026. Deadline to submit is November 1, 2025. Find out more.

Single Frame Call for Submissions: Single Frame has opened up its call for entries of experimental documentary shorts under 20 minutes for its 5th annual event happening on April 19, 2026 at UNEXPOSED, a microcinema facilitating the growth of experimental and avant-garde film in the Triangle, NC. Deadline to submit is January 1, 2026. Find out more.