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Penfold Theatre brings a bounty of ghostly elegance to your Halloweening season, as Liz Fisher directs Dave Malloy's happily haunted musical about love, death, and whisky. Listen in as four friends drink and spin yarns about two fairy-tale sisters, a tree house astronomer and a lazy evil bear, a subway tragedy, and the ghost of Thelonious Monk, the disparate narrative threads interweaving into a centuries-long tale of encounters with the otherworldly. (Note: The final two performances will be at the Driskill Hotel, with pre-show entertainment beginning at 7:30pm. Oct. 31: Ghost stories told by paranormal expert Nathan Jerkins. Nov. 1: Round Rock Ballet Folklórico share traditional Día de los Muertos dances and discuss the importance of the holiday.) Also? Our reviewer? Was rather blown away.

This new play by debbie tucker green is the inaugural production for Horizon Line Theatre. Directed by Chuck Ney, it's a provocative and darkly humorous show that focuses on the aftermath of one woman’s violent attack and how it has destroyed her life and her family, and it stars Nadine Mozon, Barbara Chisholm, and (yes, Chronicle Arts Editor) Robert Faires.

Salvage Vanguard Theatre roars back to the foreground of Austin's stagework scene with this second annual showcase of works and workshops curated by Kate Taylor. Examine the power of curses, the stranglehold of categorization, and the courage to overcome in two weekends of solo performances featuring dancer and choreographer Kelsey Oliver, actor and visual artist Kriston Woodreaux, and actor and activist Crystal Bird Caviel. Also: a pre-show interactive exhibit by Alyssa Dillard, a movement class led by Oliver, and that grotesquely gorgeous (and vice versa) Rogue at Rogge Monsters’ Ball. Ah, there's so much to see and do, we reckon that a full-festival pass is the best way to go. See website for details!

Don't mistake this for comedy, exactly. The Black Vault is a fully improvised show that spins horror tales in the style of H.P. Lovecraft, the writer best known for his "Cthulhu Mythos." The show explores many of Lovecraft’s themes – ancient unspeakable terror, impossible twisted dreamscapes, unseen forces from beyond the stars that infect our minds, and the real horrors that humanity inflicts upon itself – but, note: This new production tells tales of creeping alien horrors via the experiences of those not typically represented in Lovecraft’s work. In other words: Boo-yah, Howard Phillips, you old dead racist! Ia! Ia!

Beth Burns and her Hidden Room cohort – Ryan Crowder, Liz Beckham, Brock England, Judd Farris, Valoneecia Tolbert, Robert Matney, and other fierce talents – return with John Webster’s true-crime masterpiece of power, corruption, fate, and forbidden love, doing this classic revenge tragedy up right with period playing practices, live music, 1614-style garments, and proper makeup techniques. Note: After its Austin run, Hidden Room will take the show to Shakespeare’s Globe Wanamaker Playhouse in London. And here's our full review of the show!

Listen to ghastly folktales by bilingual storyteller Carolina Quiroga-Stultz, accompanied by a live performance from acclaimed composer Graham Reynolds. Also, there'll be a costume contest, costume contest, a writing workshop from Austin Bat Cave, a live bat exhibit from Austin Bat Refuge, and more.

The Asian American Resource Center presents four exhibitions that reflect on community, cultural heritage, and nature in various mediums: "Colours of Life: An Indian Perspective" by Shruti Mehta; "Pink Lotus" by Marcella Kourkova; and the group shows "Everything That Matters" and "Abstractions of AVAFest."

The author presents the third book in her Soulfire series – with guests Brennan Utley and Kendall Smith.

Feel like heading a little north, citizen? This statewide juried arts competition, organized by Georgetown Art Works, features exhibitions at the Georgetown Public Library and the Georgetown Art Center.

This showcase features the mixed-media work of Laura Caffrey – who finds beauty in the intentionally discarded and the inadvertently abandoned, the crumpled and cracked, and the back sides of things – and the digital collage work of Dave McClinton – who combines his love of photography, art, and graphic design to create works that speak powerfully to the viewer. Oh, and here's our review of a recent McClinton show.

This is a modern dance festival – happening in April of 2020 – that will present professional showcases, artist interviews, master classes, a youth concert, pop-up dances, and a dance-on-film screening. Artists working in modern dance, postmodern dance, and contemporary dance are invited to apply for the professional showcases. Pre-professional youth companies are invited to apply for the Youth Edition Concert. Also accepting submissions to “Dance on Film.” Dance on over to the website for details.

The ASO will will get you in the Halloween spirit this night, with César Franck’s Le Chasseur Maudit (The Accursed Huntsman), about the Count of the Rhine being hunted by all of Hell’s demons. Then, it's the Austin debut of cellist Matt Haimovitz, performing Saint-Saëns’ Cello Concerto No. 1 in A Minor. The evening will conclude with Berlioz’s dark Symphonie Fantastique. Ahhh, all this wonderful, seasonally appropriate music and grandeur – and nobody felt like they had to use the word "spooktacular;" perhaps there is a God, after all, and She's even a benevolent one.

This exhibition, presented in collaboration with the Austin Veteran Arts Festival, features altars created in honor of fallen Latino soldiers.

What is this? It's a group show with original Texas bizarro artists Andy Don Emmons, Chicken George Zupp, David Patrick Dennis, and James Lawrence Thornton, that's what it is.

This exhibition chronicles the daily life and art of Bear Lopez, East Austin resident of 60 years, a steadfast witness to the transformation and gentrification of our city's sunrise side. Artists Ivete Lucas and Patrick Bresnan met Bear at the Austin American-Statesman’s printing warehouse where Lopez has been working for more than 20 years without a single day off, delivering papers. What kind of life is that? There's more to the story than you might expect.

Here's a live concert from the three-time winner of the Guitar Foundation of America's international guitar competition.

Sara Madandar's new series of paintings takes its inspiration from Persian history, exploring how complex notions of gender and national identity have changed in Iran between the 19th and 20th centuries.

Yippee ki yay, space cadet, it's time to head 'em off at the Pass Nebula as the State History Museum presents an exhibition that spans more than 150 years of Western and science fiction history and features 100-plus artifacts (including props from Star Trek, Star Wars, Firefly, and other skiffy media fare). And our arch-geek himself, the estimable Richard Whittaker, also a part-time Sith Lord, reviews the show for you here.

Imagine a dystopia in which women suffer endless harassment, and right-wing politics wrenches away women's control over their own bodies; in response, American women heed the call of Dionysus, and flee to new, strange, euphoric rites in Iraq, the cradle of civilization, and … you won't believe what happens next in this radical re-writing of The Bacchae from acclaimed poet and combat veteran Jenny Pacanowksi. Produced as part of this year's Austin Veterans Arts Festival, this is a collaboration between military veterans and their families, an Iraqi composer, a diverse cast, and an all-Austin community chorus. Directed by Karen Alvarado and J.M. Meyer for Thinkery & Verse and Canopy Theatre. And, look, here's our review of the show.

This new adaptation of Bram Stoker’s classic vampire tale is a sensual fantasy with a surprising twist: a bold heroine who dares to defy the ruler of the night. "Seductive, romantic, and empowering, this foray to the dark side is a juicy date-night," we're advised – and that seems, yup, just about right. Written and directed by Steven Dietz for Zach Theatre, with a kickass cast featuring Sarah Kimberly Becker as Mina Harker and Keith Contreras-McDonald as the titular bloodsucker.

20 million years ago, two supernovae collided – causing ripples in the very fabric of space-time. 20 million years later, generative artist James Pricer created cataclysmic portraits of this event using the actual gravitational wave data. The exhibition features a box set of eight gravitational wave prints, a collision video, two unique explosion prints, and several generative objects.

This local comic is the co-host and creator of the Wilful Ignorance podcast and the hit video showcase Battle of the Sketches. Bonus: Scott Sticker opens.

Some artists try to capture their city, their geographical region, and they succeed at it. Only the best will ever succeed as well as Austin's John Mulvany does in capturing his Eastside neighborhood. Listen: "Everything in life is present in the neighborhood," says the artist. "If you are inclined to walk around with your eyes and senses open, you notice things you might otherwise miss. A dead grackle in the road, the unkempt beauty of East Austin backyards, the violent magenta-pink veil of cherry blossom enveloping a vacant house, a cockroach carried away by ants. This exhibition is an invitation to look closer. The neighborhood, like the natural world, is in a constant state of creation, transformation and decay." And this is precisely what you'll see, in Mulvany's array of realist, atmosphere-haunted paintings on the familiar grayDUCK walls. (See Barbara Purcell's review of the show right here.)

The two-person creative team of Carlos Carrillo and Yevgenia Davidoff and multidisciplinary artist Rachelle Diaz present an homage to infrastructure that exposes the vulnerability of built and natural environments while documenting the sweeping social changes of late-stage capitalism on a human scale. It's a collaboration that features assemblage, photography, and painting, and it'll immerse you.

Here's an exhibition of original artwork based on Jewish themes and symbols, including mosaics, hamsa, and Zentangles, by Marvin Beleck, Marion Stoutner, Ginette Jordan, Martha Kull, and Susan Ribnick – also featuring reproductions of 18 mosaics honoring the victims of the shooting of the Pittsburgh Tree of Life or L'Simcha Congregation.

Howard Ashman and Alan Menken's classic musical about an insatiable man-eating plant is staged for TexARTS' professional series, with a fine cast cavorting with the pithy and puppeted carnivore, the whole spectacle under the direction of Val Williams.

McMakin brings us recontextualized furniture and untold (actually, very carefully quantified) numbers of coats of paint, with his "Two Bowls, a Cabinet Door, Two Tables, and a Window (with a Blue Wall)," and Keyser's got a new showcase of her vivid "Works on Paper."

This New York-based funnyman was birthed in New Orleans. So, up there, he's like an invasive species, right? Like, uh, like a zebra mussel? No, thats wrong – Normand's just a solid standup guy, with gigs all over your tv and at SXSW and Montreal and the Great American Comedy Festival, and so on.

The dark, celebratory, and comical work of Christine Garvey and Bonnie Staley has much in common with rotten little fruit – the outsider, problematic, misbehaving body – as both artists "reference the history, anatomy, pains, and joys of the female body to create objects that operate in a space between traditional classifications of painting, drawing, and sculpture."

Manchester-born Kevin Cummins has an international reputation as one of the world’s leading photographers and is famed for his portraits of musicians, including Joy Division, New Order, David Bowie, Nick Cave, Mick Jagger, Patti Smith, and Oasis. This weekend, Modern Rocks Gallery (now in its fifth year) launches the photographer’s first retrospective show in the United States, featuring his most iconic images.

Here's the newest iteration of that storytelling show where adults share their most embarrassing childhood letters, lyrics, journals, home movies, and artwork in front of total strangers.

This exhibition at Sage features new work of scenes from the road – cars, trucks, maps, and common sights along Texas highways – by 10 Texas-based contemporary artists with intellectual and developmental disabilities: Rick Fleming, Charlie French, Elijah Giorgi, David Sulak, Anna Burke, Sam Eiler, Larin Harp, Richmond F., Jackson Sutton, and Gav Sears. Bonus: roadtrip-inspired music, and a live painting demo.

This installation presents new work that expands Lily Cox-Richard’s research into the contextual history of materials, making visible unseen systems that dictate materials’ production, value, and use, and engages larger questions of natural resources, labor, the specifics of place, and the politics of viewership.

The complex relationship between contemporary art and anthropology shapes the subject of "The Sorcerer’s Burden: Contemporary Art and the Anthropological Turn," an 11-artist exhibition representing a wide range of media – including painting, sculpture, photography, video, and performance. And here's our own Robert Faires with a full review of the show.

Here's the 15th annual exhibition at Austin City Hall, presenting a wide array of painting, sculpture, drawing, and other media by 113 local artists. This year, the exhibition includes a special selection of photographs: The Bold Beauty Project of Texas, featuring images of Texas women with disabilities taken by photographers from across the state.

Yeah, no, this is a monumental showing of work – including a series of paintings commissioned for the exhibition – by one of the best, most provocative artists working on this planet. The former Austinite (he taught at UT for 20 years) Michael Ray Charles "is known for art that investigates the legacy of historic racial stereotypes of African Americans. Since the 1990s, he's created complex, layered paintings that challenge stereotypes, power dynamics, and social and cultural hierarchies." Ah, words can't even – but our Arts Editor Robert Faires offers a fine preview right here.

Will Klemm, a realist master of tone and texture in oils, was one of the first artists represented by Wally Workman back in the day. By this time he's revealed more than 50 solo exhibitions across the country. "My intention is to communicate something abstract and interior, while still referencing our everyday lives," says the artist. And now the Workman walls are filled, in image after image, with his sublime success in achieving that intention.

Preetika Rajgariah’s new exhibition is where culture, capitalism, and classism collide on the yoga mat, with the artist exploring – through sculpture, video, and performance – how this spiritual practice with deep roots in Hinduism has proliferated into nearly every part of American society.

That Welsh rocker Jon Langford and the Belgian artist Jo Clauwaert share a double bill of visual exhibitions at this South Congress bastion of folk art, bringing a bifocal look at contemporary culture via painted portraits and more.