We’ve been saying a lot of thank yous lately—both in text and in person (if we have crossed paths with you). If you haven’t heard directly from us yet, please know that we see you and we appreciate you more than we could ever say. As of now, we have received donations from 279 donors which is a lot of thank yous!!

We have just one week left to raise $28,600 which is….a steep hill to climb, admittedly. But we are keeping the faith based on what has transpired over the past 3 weeks.

If you are in a position to support our organization and haven’t had a chance to donate yet—now is the time!

If your workplace offers matching donations, you can double your impact! Take a look at our donation page for details. Both your donation and the matching donation will be counted towards this campaign.

If you happen to have ties to foundations or other sources of institutional investment for small organizations with big dreams, please help us connect!

And if you can help us keep the fundraiser active in the feeds, that’d be great too. Every little bit helps us get that much closer to the finish line.

Again, so many thank yous. We appreciate this community immensely.

Do-Over Music Series - Rot Diet / Davis / Lonberg-Holm / Mezzacappa
Thursday, April 2, 2026
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): Rot Diet (Mitch Stahlmann and Christopher Farstad)

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

Ben Davis - cello
Fred Lonberg-Holm - cello
Lisa Mezzacappa - bass
Rot Diet
Films, film loops and other visual interventions by the Shapeshifters Performance Group (Ellie, Kathleen & Gilbert)

Abigail Child: Foreign Film Series
Abigail Child In Person
Presented in association with San Francisco Cinematheque
Friday, April 3, 2026
7pm
Admission: $15 (discount for Shapeshifters and SF Cinematheque members)

As an artist and writer, Abigail Child has worked seriously across a range of media. In all of them, her principal form has been montage, developing, as Tom Gunning writes, "a system founded not on coherence, but on breakdown, not on continuity, but interruption." (Colin Beckett)

Abigail Child has been at the forefront of experimental media and writing since the 1980s, having completed more than fifty film/video works and installations and written six books. An acknowledged pioneer in montage, Child addresses the interplay between sound and image, to make, in the words of the LA Weekly: “brilliant exciting work… a vibrant political filmmaking that’s attentive to form.” In her work, Child has restlessly explored different mediums and modes, often working with preexisting footage—drawn from Hollywood films, advertisements, home movies and many other sources—which she radically transforms in ways that unite formal experimentation and social-political analysis. But what unifies her moving-image work above all is the unparalleled dynamism of her investigations into the relationship between sound and image, the still not-fully-tapped possibilities of cinematic montage, the technique of audiovisual fragmentation and the complex mechanisms of language. Child’s films, videos, and installations activate the potential energy of the cinema to an extraordinary degree. In her first San Francisco appearance since 2013, Cinematheque and Shapeshifters Cinema are thrilled to welcome Abigail Child in person to present a two-program sampler retrospective drawn from her rich and complex body of work. (Program note adapted from Anthology Film Archives)

"We perceive that a set of concerns builds up, with artful indirectness: women's power; the gestures of gender; manipulation of a spectator's sensibility through the medium of film; large-scale political implications of small moments." –Karen Schiff, Big, Red and Shiny).

SCREENING: To and No Fro (2005) by Abigail Child; digital video, b&w, sound, 5 minutes. Mirror World (2006) by Abigail Child; digital video, color, sound, 12 minutes. (If I Can Sing a Song About) Ligatures (2009) by Abigail Child; digital video, b&w, sound, 6 minutes. Salomé (2014) by Abigail Child; digital video, b&w, sound, 20 minutes. vis à vis (2013) by Abigail Child; digital video, b&w, sound, 25 minutes. TRT: 68 minutes.

Abigail Child also appears in person at Gray Area, San Francisco, on Wednesday, April 1 to present Is This What You Were Born For? (1981–1989). Full details here.

Kingdom of Not, Plonsey Scheme & Victoria and the Vaudevillains
Saturday, April 11, 2026
7pm
Admission: $16 (discount for members)

Kingdom of Not is absurdist writer/performer Dan Carbone and surrealistic one-man band, Andrew Goldfarb and special guest performer Baby-Ding-Dong. They sing from their hearts and play from their guts about demon children, demon blackbirds, demon dogs, demon Eskimos and most of other popular demon themes beloved by all the people. THE ONLY EXHIBITION OF ITS TYPE IN NORTH AMERICA! “KoN gets under your skin, and into your brain.” Ben Graham/ The Quietus (U.K.) “It’s magnificent stuff!” – Kramer (Bongwater/ Shimmy Disc) "A Riotously Funny Two-Headed Sideshow Assault!” -SF Weekly

Plonsey Scheme is a collaboration between Dan Plonsey (compositions and structures for improvisation) and Mantra Plonsey (words, song), in which neither tells the other what they're going to do until it happens. Dan has a pedigree over which he constantly trips, while Mantra repeatedly fails to prove that she is not a robot. A third collaborator, Kattt Atchley, is responsible for projecting images of tableaux of dolls (still or on turntables) with backdrops of art. The three will be joined by Cory Wright, reeds; Fred Lonborg-Holm, cello; and Tomek Sinclair, guitar.

Victoria Victrola (she/her) is the front woman of Victoria and the Vaudevillains. She throws the occasional whimsical boozy tea party, the occasional séance, owns 3 Victrolas, surprisingly zero cats, and never enough books. You can often find her standing still, falling down stairs, and pounding on the piano. Her music ranges from soft and whispery to clangy bangy piano rock. She is, much to her own disappointment, not the author of Sweet Valley High.

Flow State: a reflection on film inspection and archiving
Co-presented by Canyon Cinema
Sunday, April 12, 2026 (new date!)
7pm
Admission: $12 (discount for members)

Flow State is a celebration of film inspection and archival work. Film archivist and library assistant Autumn Armstrong has curated this program of work by renowned filmmakers Toney Merrit, Sandra Davis and Christopher Harris—films that were personally inspected by her while working as an intern at Canyon Cinema. New work by Toney Merritt will be screened as well! Autumn will share some thoughts about her experiences working as a film archivist after the program.

Gravitational Lensing, Program 14: Speculative Histories
Friday, April 17, 2026
Presented in association with San Francisco Cinematheque
7pm
Admission: $15 (discount for members)

The films in this program, each in their own way, open up space to consider history and historical events—personal, cultural and societal—through multi-faceted lenses. Using speculation as a tool, the filmmakers are able to address absence, loss, inaccessibility and occlusion. When evidence is sparse or completely absent, speculation becomes a generative method for circumnavigating the unknowable by flooding the void with possibilities. These films reach their own conclusions by asking questions rather than providing answers.

Screening: Dream of Me (2007, Super-8 film/DV shown on DV) by A. Moon, Voice On the Line (2009, DV) by Kelly Sears, Light Signal (2022, 16mm film) by Emily Chao, Three Missing Letters (2021, DV) by Lana Lin and H. Lan Thao Lam, Un-tidal (2022, 16mm film shown on DV) by Masha Vlasova and Across the Street (1982, 16mm film) by Lynn Marie Kirby

Find out more about the Gravitational Lensing series

Summer Camp Registration is Now Open!

The Shapeshifters Summer Youth Media Makers Camp is a week-long, hands-on, workshop-style camp for youth, ages 12-17 to learn a variety of DIY, experimental film and sound-based processes from experienced Bay Area-based artists and educators. This year we are offering two sessions: June 22-26 and July 20-24 covering panorama crankies, found sound, cut paper collage animation, multimedia poetry, material cinema, shadow puppets, virtual sound making, apparent motion, creative coding and phytography. Guest artist-instructors this year are Cheryl E. Leonard, Lydia Greer, Risa Lenore & Jon Leidecker.

Sign up for both sessions and get a 10% discount (applied automatically).

Find out more and register now

Shapeshifters members are the heart of the organization.

By joining the Shapeshifters Membership Program, you become part of an engaged, diverse, creative community working in and around experimental moving image, sound and time-based art.

In exchange for your generous support, we offer a wellspring of fantastic benefits including:

• 10% discount on tickets, registrations and everything purchased in both the cinema and café (Seer level, $60)

• A special, limited edition beer mug (with original image designed this year by Anna Firth!) + one free beer at every on-site event you attend (Clairvoyant level, $100)

• Shapeshifters T-shirt or tote bag (Conjurer level, $150)

• One free admission to every screening hosted in our cinema (Magus level, $300)

• Named sponsorship of one Shapeshifters Fellow (Shapeshifters level, $500)

Help ensure the future of Shapeshifters Cinema. Become a member now.

Want to support the organization without committing to a membership? Consider making a tax-deductible donation through our fiscal sponsor, San Francisco Cinematheque, a 501(c)3 nonprofit. All donations go directly towards covering the costs of operating our venue, without which we can’t continue to do what we do. And if the company you work for offers matching donations, you can double your impact! Every donation makes a huge difference and is greatly appreciated.

We have re-stocked our collection of the popular 6-in-1 flipbook series (and added a new one!) in our shop. These are innovatively-designed flipbooks made in Spain featuring six different image sequences in one book. Each book focuses on work by pioneering artists related to pre-cinema and early cinema history, including Eadweard Muybridge, Étienne-Jules Marey, Georges Méliès, Lotte Reiniger, The Lumière Brothers and Josepth Plateau. We have a limited stock of each book. Get them while you can!

Other recent additions to our shop include Lynne Sachs and Lizzie Olezker’s Hand Book: A Manual on Performance, Process, and the Labor of Laundry, Marielle V Jakobson’s Star Core LP and Analog Cookbook, Issue #8: All Recipes.

Take a look at all the items available in the Shapeshifters Shop.

We also have gift cards! Shapeshifters gift cards can be purchased in any amount you choose and can be used in both the cinema and café. That means that your recipient can use it to buy whatever they want! A latte, a book and a ticket to a film screening; or, a beer, a record and admission to a workshop. The variations are endless! Not only are you giving your favorite creative person access to a treasure trove of great things (and experiences), you are also supporting your favorite microcinema/brewery/café. It’s a win-win scenario! Buy a gift card now.

ATA Monthly Open Screenings: Artists’ Television Access (ATA), the stalwart experimental microcinema holding ground in SF’s Mission District since 1984, hosts Open Screenings every first Thursday. This free community film/video show welcomes short format work (15 min or less) from all genres made by independent filmmakers, experimental artists, rogue visionaries and inspired tinkerers who work with the moving image. ATA’s Open Screenings happen the first Thursday of every month at 8:00 pm. Entries must be received by 7:00 pm on show night. Find out more.

Open Call: Regeneration Art Exhibition: The office of Berkeley Mayor Adena Ishii is seeking artwork from Berkeley community members that celebrate the theme of Berkeley's regenerative culture, whether that is renewal, material reuse, or the art of giving new life. All mediums and backgrounds welcome. Selected works will be showcased in the Mayor’s office January-April 2026. Deadline to submit is March 31, 2026. Find out more.

Job Opening at Roxie Theater: Roxie Theater (SF) seeks a creative, organized, and collaborative Communications Associate to support the theater’s marketing, outreach, and programming initiatives, with a focus on audience development. Deadline to apply is March 31, 2026. Find out more.

CROSSROADS 2026 Call for Submissions Extended: San Francisco Cinematheque seeks submissions of recent films, videos and works of performance cinema for CROSSROADS 2026, the seventeenth iteration of our annual film festival. CROSSROADS 2026 will be held September 4–6, 2026  at Gray Area/Grand Theater in San Francisco. Submission deadline has been extended to March 31, 2026. Find out more.

Roxie Mixtape #9 Call for Submissions: Roxie Theater calls all Bay Area filmmakers to be a part of its on-going mini-festival, Roxie Mixtape, a Bay Area tradition featuring diverse and engaging short works showcasing talented voices from The Bay. All submitted films will be considered for screening on May 20th, in the Big Roxie theater. All genres are welcome, including but not limited to animation, documentary, narrative, experimental, live performance with a film component, music video, and found footage. Deadline to submit is April 2, 2026. Find out more.

Creative Capital 2027 Open Call: Creative Capital For Artists seeks proposals from individual artists in all 50 states for new artistic works in Visual Arts, Performing Arts, Film, and Literature. The Creative Capital Award provides unrestricted project grants of up to $50,000 to individual artists to create new work. The new State of the Art Prize provides unrestricted artist grants of $10,000. The application portal opens on Monday, March 2, 2026. Deadline for submission is April 2, 2026. Find out more.

Dresher Ensemble Artist Residency: The Dresher Ensemble Artist Residency (D.E.A.R.) supports Northern California artists actively exploring new aesthetic premises and pushing the boundaries of conventional art forms and media. The program provides artists free studio space and up-to-date equipment to create new work in time-based arts such as theater/performance, dance/movement, music/sound art/instrument invention, and collaborative and interdisciplinary work. Deadline to apply is April 6, 2026. Find out more.

Teach at Kala: Kala Art Institute (Berkeley) is currently accepting class proposals to teach art classes and workshops for their July-December 2026 season that explore a range of mediums, from relief printing to figure drawing to ceramics, weaving, and more. Priority deadline for submissions is April 10, 2026. Find out more.

Film-Makers’ Coop New Year/New Work Festival: Calling all filmmakers, video-makers, and moving image artists! Film-Makers Cooperative (NYC) is now accepting submissions for its 13th annual New Year/New Work festival. The festival will take place at The Film-Makers' Cooperative screening room over two evenings: Thursday, May 7th, and Friday, May 8th, 2026. The deadline to submit is April 10, 2026. Find out more.

Berkeley Film Foundation 2026 Documentary Grant Program: The Berkeley Film Foundation (BFF) is now accepting applications for its 2026 Documentary Grant Program which supports the production, post-production and distribution stages of documentary projects by East Bay-based emerging and established independent filmmakers whose work combines intellectual clarity with creative use of the medium. Deadline to submit is April 13, 2026. Find out more.

Media City Film Festival Call for Submissions: Media City Film Festival is a trailblazing international festival for film and digital art, presented in Windsor, Ontario and Detroit, Michigan since 1994. Media City seeks entries for its 28th edition which will take place in person in Windsor–Detroit, September 15–19, 2026. Deadline to submit is May 1, 2026. Find out more.

Little Scuzzy Film Fest Call for Work: Initiated in 2012, Little Scuzzy is a rag-tag event held on a farm on the outskirts of Carbondale, IL. Films are screened outdoors with festival-goers setting up blankets and chairs around fire pits. They are seeking work by artists who especially feel aligned with this ethos. This year’s fest will take place on Saturday, June 13, 2026. Deadline to submit is May 15, 2026. Find out more.

Found Footage Magazine Call for Submissions: Authors are invited to submit essays, interviews, video-essays, film and book reviews for Found Footage Magazine, Issue #12. Deadline to submit is June 1, 2026. Find out more.