Five Free Arts & Culture Events This Week

It is seriously about to be September, you guys, which means one thing and one thing only: being able to spend as much time outside as you want without dying of heatstroke. The mercury may not seriously drop for a few months to come, but you can at least pretend that it’s fall because the summer slump of arts and culture programming is officially over. There’s plenty to do, and you need to be out there doing it.

This week, we’ve rounded up the five best totally free arts and culture events across a variety of interests. You have no excuse to pretend that Dallas is boring or without culture if you don’t make it out to at least one of these before the week is over. Consider the gauntlet thrown.

Bar Politics Episode 5: Housing & Development Edition
Monday, August 31
Ten Bells Tavern
Free

This wildly popular politics-and-drinking event is going strong in Dallas, and if you’re missing it, you’re a fool. This week’s event focuses on housing and development in our fair city, a topic that impacts you as a citizen much more than you probably think it does. The topic of discussion, featuring Meri Dahlke of Ten Bells Tavern and co-founder of Go Oak Cliff Rob Shearer, will be the much-maligned “Gateway To Bishop Arts” project, and there will be plenty of opinions (and drinks) to go around. Monday actually kicks off a three-day-long Bar Politics spree across Bishop Arts bars, with guests including Angela Hunt, Philip Kingston and other influential Dallasites. 

Cocktails & Conversations
Thursday, September 3
The Trophy Club
Free

If you can’t think of a better time than drinking cocktails and talking about the Dallas Arts District, then this free event at The Trophy Club is going to be a real riot. Featuring decision-makers from the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, the Perot Museum, AT&T Performing Arts Center and Klyde Warren Park, this discussion is sure to be lively and informative. Plus, there will be free snacks.

North Texas Masters Of Light
Thursday, September 3
Kettle Art Gallery
Free

In this exhibition of photography at Kettle Art Gallery, you’ll get to check out work from some of the area’s most talented folks who don’t shoot all their photos with an iPhone. More than 20 local artists will be showing their work, so it’s a good one-stop-shop to get a survey of what’s going on in the city’s photography scene. And you could probably use a few pointers for all those Instas you’re ‘gramming.

The Smaller Exotics Of Texas
Saturday, September 5
Bath House Cultural Center
Free

Curated by Diane Durant and Adam Neese, this exhibition of art will explore the myths, stereotypes, cliches and realities of the Texas landscape, and how the artists interact with their terrain. Painting, mixed-media, sculpture, video and photography will all explore this topic in a tongue-in-cheek sort of way. If anything, you should go to figure out this exhibition’s “also known as:” “or, how the barren ground caribou would never occupy the same space as the javelina.”

Dallas Zine Party
Sunday, September 6
The Wild Detectives
Free

We’ve been pretty stoked about the Dallas Zine Party for a while now, and it’s finally happening this Sunday. At The Wild Detectives, you’ll be able to peruse the innovative and occasionally bizarre zines and micropublications created by artists, writers and other thinkers in Dallas and beyond. This is the inaugural Dallas Zine Party, and they’ve already attracted more than 20 exhibitors. Bring a little cash to support these fledgling zines — they usually only cost a few bucks, and they're sometimes free. On Saturday, Dallas Zine Party will host a panel discussion and zine workshop at the Dallas Library in case you want to make it a full weekend of zine festivities.