The Jan Shrem and Manetti Shrem Museum of Art’s inaugural exhibitions are staying up into the new year, with varying closing dates, and the museum itself is the subject of the Design Museum’s winter quarter exhibition, opening Monday, Jan. 9. The C.N. Gorman Museum’s winter exhibition, Protest & Prayer, will open Tuesday, Jan. 10.

Manetti Shrem Museum

Besides its four ongoing exhibitions, UC Davis’ new museum closes out the year and moves into the new with these related programs:

• “The Art of Giving”: Exchange Day — This event is one of the designated periods during which museum visitors are invited to exchange personal objects for those displayed in Pia Camil’s A Pot for a Latch exhibition. 3:30-5 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 18. Read more about the exchange days.
• “Recovered His/Herstories of the First Generation” — Francesca Wilmott, associate curator at the museum, presents this introduction to the lesser known members of the UC Davis art department’s first-generation faculty, by way of a tour of the exhibit Out Our Way. 6:30-7:30 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 5.
• “Light Our Way”: Talk and Tour — Rachel Teagle, the museum’s founding director and co-curator of Out Our Way, presents an introduction to the importance of light in the work of first-generation faculty. Followed by an exhibit walk-through. 3-4:30 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 8.
• “An Artist’s Perspective”: Conversation and Exchange Day — A public conversation with Betti-Sue Hertz, guest curator of A Pot for a Latch, and Stephanie Syjuco, Guggenheim Fellowship award-winning artist and an assistant professor in the Department of Art Practice, UC Berkeley. Their broad-based conversation will touch on the connections among art, culture, economies and the global market. 7-10 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 12. Talk, 7-8 p.m.; exchange, 8:30-10 p.m.

Here are the inaugural exhibitions at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art:

• Out Our Way — The legacy of the UC Davis Department of Art, showcasing works by the first-generation faculty. Through March 26.
• Hoof & Foot: A Field Study — Video installation by Bay Area artist Chris Sollars, highlighting the symbiotic relationship between animals and students at UC Davis. Through Feb. 19.
• A Pot for a Latch — Participatory sculptural installation by Pia Camil, inspired by the outdoor market booths of her native Mexico City, as well as indigenous gifting economies and modernist art and design. Through Feb. 19. You’re invited, on select days — including Dec. 18 — to exchange your objects for others on display.
• SO–IL: Museum as Process — Artifacts that illustrate and interpret the process of creating the museum. Through July 30.

The Manetti Shrem Museum is open from noon to 6 p.m. Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday; noon-10 p.m. Thursday; and 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Winter break closure: Dec. 23-Jan. 2. Admission is free.

Design Museum

A Site for Convergence and Exchange: Designing the 21st-Century Art Museum — Featuring photographs, drawings, scale models and prototypes associated with the design process for the Jan Shrem and Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, which opened Nov. 13 at UC Davis. The exhibition, according to the curator, Mark Kessler, associate professor, provides valuable information to anyone interested in the development of this innovative museum building. Jan. 9-April 23, Design Museum, Cruess Hall. Reception: 6-8 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 12. Regular hours: noon-4 p.m. Monday-Friday, and 2-4 p.m. Saturday. The museum is closed until this exhibition's opening day.

A pick for ‘Best Architecture of 2016’

A “bold idea,” the $30 million museum “has a big presence despite its modest size,” The Wall Street Journal says in its year-end review. “The canopy is fashioned from triangular-shaped aluminum beams with perforations to make the steady daylight dance.”

‘It boosts your faith in the future of American architecture’

Christopher Hawthorne places the new museum in his top 10 for 2016. “Wrapped in glass and walls of corrugated precast concrete and topped with a white canopy of aluminum beams, it is a building to boost your faith in the future of American architecture.”

C.N. Gorman Museum

Protest & Prayer — Contrary to popular belief, Native American Indigenous communities have protested for the past 500 years — protested against the stealing of lands, children, women, intellectual property and identity. Protest has been creatively put forth in many forms, including oratory, music, letters, visuality and prayer. Though deemed invisible by a deaf, illiterate, blind and at times faithless adversary, we continue in our protest with the faith that our ancestors bequeathed. This exhibition features imagery of past and current protest by Indigenous communities and those communities in peril, and includes a series of programmed events and activities. Jan. 10-March 17, C.N. Gorman Museum, ­­1316 Hart Hall. Regular hours: noon-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, and 2-5 p.m. Sunday. The museum is closed until this exhibition's opening day.

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