USAAF 2026: Common Ground
Learning to move forward, together.
This year’s theme, Common Ground, invites us to reflect on our relationships with each other and with the spaces we move through together as AAPIs in the diaspora by exploring what it means to take up space and practice placemaking for others. The festival will celebrate modes of thinking about solidarity through shared experiences and histories by underscoring how visibility in public spaces can cultivate belonging.
How do API communities continue to create spaces for gathering and community care through arts and culture? How do we use these spaces to act in solidarity with other BIPOC and/or LGBTQ+ communities and work towards collective liberation?
What does it mean to create and hold space for healing, and how does API cultural expression inform the ways that we are able to expand reflective spaces within ourselves?
How do we continue to create spaces to amplify API narratives in the face of injustice and erasure in the United States? How can the arts help us imagine new ways to tell our stories and steward our histories for future generations?
Thank you to our many partners and funders including the San Francisco Arts Commission, San Francisco Grants for the Arts, California Arts Council, Zellerbach Family Foundation and startsmall.
At A Glance
Reach
Artists
Staff & Crew
Locations
Artists
Programming
USAAF 2026 Lineup April - June 2026
Featured Artist:
Maya Fuji
Artist Talk with Maya Fuji, Shingo Yamazaki, Nibha Akireddy
5.20 @ 6pm
Jonathan Carver Moore Gallery
Outdoor Showcase:
6.12 @ 5-10pm • Sunset Night Market
Alice Hur, For the Culture, Dance Performance
Nu Tekno presents DJ Yuka Yu with Al Yu, DJ + Music Performance
Theater/Performance:
Eddie Jen - Seeking a Penpal for the End of the World
5.2 @ 7:30pm • 5.9 @ 6pm
Marsh Studio Theater
Thao P. Nguyen - White Power: A Comedy
5.29 @ 8pm • 5.30 @ 8pm
Bindlestiff Studio
Megan Lowe Dances - Air Between Us
5.15 @ 7pm • 5.16 @ 2pm
5.16–7pm • 5.17 @ 2pm
Yerba Buena Gardens
King LOTUS BOY, Piss E Sissy, and EUPHEMIA - Rhythms of Resistance: Queer Dance Party Celeb. Black & API Solidarity
6.6 @ 8pm
SOMArts Cultural Ctr
Multimedia Events:
Hamesha Proj. & Dilpreet Anand Brown Thumbs: Punjabi x Mexican Land Solidarity
6.14 @ 5pm
Dance Mission Theater
Sami See - Island Bound: Listening Party
6.13 @ 5:30pm
447 Minna
Visual Art Exhibits:
Lineages of Organizing: Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center at 30
Produced by APICC and Curated by Colin Choy Kimzey
Festival Kick-off & Opening*: Thu 4.23 @ 6pm
Community Archiving Day: Sun 5.3 @ 1pm
Closing*: Sun 5.24 @ 1pm
Gallery Open: Thu-Sun
SOMArts Cultural Center
GLBTQ+ Asian Pacific Alliance (GAPA) - Holding (Queer) Space Opening Reception
5.29 @ 6PM
Sentro Filipino
Film:
Priyanka Suryaneni - SAFAR: Journey of Recollections
6.14 @ 3:30pm
Creativity Theater
QWOCMAP - 2026 International Queer Women of Color Film Festival
6.12-6.14
Presidio Theatre