Weekend picks: Feb. 12-16

Next week, Upon a Time, an exhibition featuring collaboration between ceramic sculptor Brian Somerville and painter Sibel Kocabasi, opens on the Eissey Campus of Palm Beach State College in Palm Beach Gardens.

Kocabasi, a Turkish-born artist who received the Hector Ubertalli Award in 2006 and exhibits widely, creates paintings that “reflect the ultimate potential for beauty in art.” Yet, in these beautiful paintings she “protests injustice in its political, religious and environmental forms.” Somerville, on the other hand, creates in-your-face animals that anthropomorphically reveal humanity’s basic animal instincts.

The exhibit opens with a reception from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday in the Gallery at the college, which is located in the BB Building at 3160 PGA Blvd. Hours are Monday, Wednesday and Thursday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Tuesday from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Friday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. For more information, visit www.pbcc.edu/artgallerypbg.xml or call (561) 207-5015.

Muriel Kaplan helped found the Armory Art Center in West Palm Beach, and has been both a teacher and student there. Faces of Humanity, an exhibit featuring more than 70 of Kaplan’s sculptures and drawings, opens tonight at the center and runs through March 6.

The works in clay, bronze, resin, polyester and charcoal were created over a period of 68 years, and many will show Kaplan’s fascination with faces, especialyl those of powerful people. Included in the exhibition are portraits of political leaders such as John F. Kennedy and Yitzhak Rabin. “A portrait sculpture is a three-way affair – the sitter, the artist, and the material must all come to terms with each other if the sculpture is to be a work of art,” Kaplan says. The exhibit is curated by noted artist and art historian Richard Frank and the opening reception runs from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. today. It’s free to members and $5 to non-members. For more information, visit www.armoryart.org, or call (561) 832-1776. — K. Deits

Opening Saturday at the Norton Museum of Art are three major exhibits, including Reclaimed: Paintings From the Collection of Jacques Goudstikker. A Dutch art dealer who died accidentally on a ship in 1940 while fleeing the Nazi invasion of the Netherlands, his collection of art was raided by the Germans, and only in 2006 were Goudstikker’s heirs able to retrieve 200 of the paintings after a protracted legal battle with the Dutch government. More than 40 paintings are on display in this exhibit organized by the Jewish Museum of New York. Tickets: $12 adults, $5 ages 13-21. Hours: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday. called 832-5196 or visit www.norton.org.

Film: The great Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar has a muse in Penélope Cruz, who has appeared in such movies of his as All About My Mother, Volver and now Broken Embraces, which plays like a greatest hits of his cinematic obsessions. It jumps about in time, it juggles reality and illusion, folds movies within movies, plays with identity and ponders the nature of art. Almodóvar showcases Cruz at her best — without her struggling with the English language — as an office temp who becomes a prostitute, or else a movie actress playing an office temp who becomes a prostitute. Either way, it is a celebration of the storytelling skill that film allows, and it is highly entertaining. At Emerging Cinemas in Lake Worth and Mos’Art Theatre in Lake Park.

Stage: Soon to be seen on Broadway co-starring with Dame Edna Everage, pianist/vocalist/musicologist Michael Feinstein comes to the Kravis Center on Valentine’s Day with his tribute concert to Frank Sinatra. Rather than risk the inevitable comparisons, Feinstein endeavors not to copy Ol’ Blues Eyes sound, but to take songs he made famous and deliver them with new arrangements, often in styles that were not yet in vogue when Sinatra sang them. Backed by a 17-piece orchestra, The Sinatra Project sounds like a swinging show to see with your designated sweetheart. In Dreyfoos Hall on Sunday, at 8 p.m. Call (561) 832-7469. — H. Erstein

Music: The great American violinist Joshua Bell, a frequent seasonal guest, returns to the area Monday with another frequent guest, pianist Jeremy Denk. The two will be in recital at the Broward Center, where their program includes the Ravel Violin Sonata (something of a favorite of touring violinists this year), and sonatas by Grieg (No. 3 in C minor, Op. 45), Schumann (No. 1 in A minor, Op. 105), and Bach (No. 4 in C minor, BWV 1017). The concert begins at 8 p.m. in the Broward Center in downtown Fort Lauderdale. Tickets are $35-$75. Call 954-462-0222 or visit www.browardcenter.org.

The Delray String Quartet, which played three concerts last week, plays the same program Saturday afternoon in its first-ever appearance in West Palm Beach. Joined by violinist Megan McClendon at second violin, the Delrays will play music by Haydn (Quartet in D, Op. 76, No. 5), Alexander Glazunov (No. 5 in D minor, Op. 70) and the Lullaby of George Gershwin, written in 1919 when the composer was barely into his 20s. The concert begins at 4 p.m. Saturday in the Persson Recital Hall on the campus of Palm Beach Atlantic University. Tickets: $20, $10 for students. Call 561-213-4138 or visit www.delraystringquartet.com.

On the symphony front, Samuel Barber is getting a lot of attention this week, first with two performances of his Cello Concerto with Sol Gabetta and the Detroit Symphony (4 p.m. Sunday, Arsht Center), and this Sunday with the Boca Raton Symphonia, where Barber’s Capricorn Concerto, named for the New York house where he lived, is on the program. Conductor Alexander Platt and the Boca orchestra also will celebrate the 200th birthday of Frederic Chopin with a performance of his Piano Concerto No. 2 (in F minor, Op. 11), played by the fine Italian pianist Alessio Bax. Rounding out the concert will be the Symphony No. 31 (in D, K. 297, Paris) of Mozart. 2:30 p.m., Roberts Theater, St. Andrew’s School, Boca Raton. Tickets: $29-$49. Call 561-376-3848 or visit www.bocasymphonia.org.

And the Palm Beach Symphony, which last week accompanied rising young pianists in three concerti, on Tuesday features its own musicians in a four-concerto outing at Palm Beach’s Bethesda-by-the-Sea Episcopal Church. Beth Larson will perform the solo part in the Piccolo Concerto (RV 444) of Vivaldi, and trumpeter Brian Stanley will play the familiar Haydn Trumpet Concerto (in E-flat, Hob.VII: 1). Bethesda organist Hal Pysher takes the console for the Poulenc Organ Concerto (in G minor) and the evening concludes with the Marimba Concerto of the underappreciated American composer Paul Creston, played by Michael Launius. Also programmed are excerpts from Handel’s Water Music. 7 p.m. Tickets: $50. Call 655-2657 or visit www.palmbeachsymphony.org.

On the pop music scene, Willie Nelson stops by the Sunset Cove Amphitheater on Saturday night for a concert that no doubt will include favorites from his deep catalog, including Crazy and Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain. Nelson has been suffering from carpal tunnel syndrome in recent days, according to his Website, but as of Friday, the concert was still on. Tickets: $49.50-$59.50. Visit www.ticketmaster.com or call 1-800-745-3000.

And Win Blodgett’s Live Arts Florida series continues this weekend with Scotland’s Tannahill Weavers, a much-admired quintet that has been playing traditional Scottish and Celtic music (Farewell to Fiunary, The Geese in the Bog) since 1976. 8 p.m. Sunday, Wellington Community High School Theatre. Tickets: $25-$30. Call 1-888-841-ARTS or visit www.livearts.org. –– G. Stepanich