“My family is pleased to know that the Haight Street Art Center will be featuring a Grateful Dead exhibition this summer. What originated here in the ‘60s and the resulting cultural shift felt across the world will never be forgotten. There’s nowhere like San Francisco and there’s nothing like the Grateful Dead!”
— Trixie Garcia
Haight Street Art Center announces Forever Grateful, a two-part exhibition series honoring the enduring legacy of the Grateful Dead — and marking the organization’s 10th anniversary.
The first exhibition, Forever Grateful, opened July 3, 2026, at Haight Street Art Center. Spanning both floors of the Center, the collection-driven exhibition brings together more than 400 works — paintings, original lithographs, pen and ink drawings, photographs, vinyl records, instruments, and rare ephemera — chronicling the band’s journey from 1965 to 1995. Curated by Ben Marks, with advisors Dennis McNally and Susana Millman, is among the most comprehensive presentations of Grateful Dead visual culture ever assembled.
The second exhibition, Forever Grateful, Golden Gate Park at the Hall of Flowers opens September 5, 2026. As part of the second Forever Grateful exhibition, Third Rail Projects, the award-winning New York immersive performance company, will create moments of experiential performance that animate parts of the exhibition.
Together with a team of local artists, Third Rail Projects adds psychedelic and performance-driven experiences to the exhibition, during which visitors will encounter performers at various points throughout their journey, from dance parades to intimate exchanges. Anchored by Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters’ legendary Furthur bus and Jerry Garcia’s BMW, the exhibition encourages opportunities to share, reflect, and enjoy the kaleidoscopic, transformative energy of the Deadhead community.
Forever Grateful goes beyond visual art to showcase the Grateful Dead’s legendary sound innovations, highlighted by a working 1:4 scale model of the band’s iconic Wall of Sound.
Combined, these exhibitions offer the Bay Area — and visitors from around the world — two distinct and complementary ways of experiencing the music, the art, and the community the Grateful Dead made possible.
[Text compiled by Linda Kelly from HSAC press release].
