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Photo: Cullen328, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
As a visual arts venue, BAMPFA is dedicated equally to art and film. Its art collection and exhibitions reflect the diversity of the UC Berkeley campus and San Francisco Bay Area, with particular strengths in 20th- and 21st-century work. The museum, run by the University of California, is in a building that is itself an impressive work of modernist architecture, incorporating a 1939 Art Deco-style building. With one of the most extensive film archives in the world, the PFA offers many film series throughout the year, focusing on directors, eras, or artistic movements. It also screens some of the films during the annual San Francisco International Film Festival.
The Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive are a combined art museum, repertory movie theater, and film archive associated with the University of California, Berkeley. Jules Rodrigues Widholm is the current Executive Director since August 2020. She succeeds Lawrence Rinder who served from 2008 to 2020. The museum is a member of the North American Reciprocal Museums program.
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Berkeley Rep
With its consistently high-quality productions of contemporary and historical plays, Berkeley Rep is one of the primary centers of theater on the West Coast. The theater is also very pleasant, in a modern way.
UC Berkeley, or "Cal"
90-minute student-led walking tours are offered seven days a week. (M-Sa at 10AM, Su at 1PM). Be prepared to climb the hilly campus terrain. For a break, take a seat in the Doe Library's reading room (but don't bring the kids or bother the students). If you're touring alone, the main attraction is a ride up the Campanile/Sather Tower ($5 adults, $4 seniors and children < 18, free for Cal students with ID), which offers sweeping views of the Bay Area.
More of a "smell" than a "see", this one-of-a-kind archive includes all manner of interesting scents. For a full sensory experience, you can touch many objects and experience dozens of smells. Tickets include four sticks dipped into displays to take home. The archive includes objects that are centuries old, covering alchemy books, botanical specimens, perfumes, and other aromatics. Reservations in advance are recommended; expect to spend about an hour.
Amphitheater that mostly hosts musical performances by well-known artists.
Above the Berkeley campus, Memorial Stadium plays host in the fall season to UC Berkeley football games. But if you want to watch a game for free, head above the canyon to Tightwad Hill, a hill where students and the public gather to watch games. It's also an ideal location for spectacular views of the Bay Area when there's not a game going on. Anyone is free to come as long as they pick up their own trash and don't wear the colors of Stanford University (red).
A half-hour's walk north of the UC Berkeley campus. Especially nice for watching the sunset, with a view of the bay.