• Diane Carlson: Oil paintings — The artist is a UC Davis graduate who studied with professors Mike Henderson and Wayne Thiebaud. Said Carlson: “I try to create paintings that reflect the influence of my own inspirations and vision, bringing a colorful and off-kilter perspective and excitement to the canvas. ... I regard myself as a perceptual experimenter and my art as a laboratory in self-expression. I paint in bold colors and wide strokes and seek emotional expression in a visual context without giving too much detail in the painting." Through  December, Buehler Alumni and Visitors Center. Hours: 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, and 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday.

• Conversations About Race — Built around this year's Campus Community Book Project: Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? And Other Conversations About Race, by Beverly Daniel Tatum. The General Library Committee on Diversity prepared the exhibition. Through spring quarter, lobby, Shields Library. Hours: 7:30 a.m.-midnight Monday-Thursday, 7:30 a.m.-6 p.m. Friday, noon-6 p.m. Saturday and noon-midnight Sunday.

• Disability Is Everywhere, Once You Think to Look for It — In connection with National Disability Employment Awareness Month and the recent grand opening of UC Davis' Center for Accessible Technologies. History professor Catherine Kudlick provided the exhibits and descriptions, showing, for example, a tactile replica of Paris' Institut National des Jeunes Aveugles, where Louis Braille invented his system of raised dots for reading and writing; a tactile map of Washington, D.C., with Braille labels; and the books Forgotten Crimes: the Holocaiust and People with Disabilities and Through Deaf Eyes: A Photographic History of an American Community. Through fall quarter, lobby, Shields Library. Hours: 7:30 a.m.-midnight Monday-Thursday, 7:30 a.m.-6 p.m. Friday, noon-6 p.m. Saturday and noon-midnight Sunday.

• Harvesting Sugar Beets, 1942 — Comprising work by F. Hal Higgins, a prominent California agricultural journalist of the early to mid 20th century, who had been asked to document — in words and pictures — the importation of Mexican guest workers under a U.S.-Mexico agreement that later became known as the Bracero Program. Patsy Inouye of the University Library's Special Collections Department assembled the exhibition from the library's F. Hal Higgins Collection, one of the largest and most significant agricultural technology history collections in the United States. According to the University Library's website, Higgins' photographs offer an extraordinary look at the optimism and promise that the Mexican guest workers brought to California agriculture. Through fall quarter, lobby, Shields Library. Hours: 7:30 a.m.-midnight Monday-Thursday, 7:30 a.m.-6 p.m. Friday, noon-6 p.m. Saturday and noon-midnight Sunday.

• Who We Are: Selections from the Chicana/o Studies Poster Workshop — In connection with the Campus Coimmunity Book Project. Carlos Jackson, assistant professor, leads the workshop that sees the poster as a voice art form used by Chicanas/os and other people of color to point to the defects of social and political existence and the possibility of change, from the artists’ perspectives, according to the course description. Through today (Dec. 17), ArtLounge, second floor, Memorial Union.

• Works by Maurine (Fay) Morse Nelson — Largely overshadowed by her husband, the Nelson Gallery namesake, Fay Morse Nelson "was "clearly a talented artist in her own right," says Renny Pritikin, director of the Nelson Gallery, who curated this exhibition. It includes almost all of Fay Morse Nelson's works from the university's Fine Arts Collection — with most of the works being exhibited for the first time in 13 years. Through Jan. 21, Gallagher Hall (home of the Graduate School of Management).

OFF CAMPUS

Wayne Thiebaud, professor emeritus of art — Five of his paintings are on display at the California Museum in Sacramento, in conjunction with his induction Dec. 14 into the California Hall of Fame. See separate stories on Thiebaud, "Painter, teacher, visionary" and his induction into the California Hall of Fame. The museum has gathered personal items from all of the 2010 inductees, for an exhibition that is scheduled to run through next Oct. 31. Thiebaud's picks: Bikini Figure (1966), Waterland (1996), Two Tulip Sundaes (2009), and Intersection Building and Cliff Ridge (both from 2010), all oils, on canvas or wood. The museum is in the California State Archives building at 1020 O St., at the corner of 10th Street, one block south of Capitol Park. Hours: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Saturday and noon-5 p.m. Sunday. (No one admitted after 4:30 p.m.) Closed Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day, and open all other major holidays and furlough Fridays.

Fins, Feathers & Flowers: Art From Nature — An exhibition of delicate fish and plant prints by Christopher Dewees, professor emeritus in the Sea Grant Extension Program and a Cooperative Extension specialist in Wildlife, Fish and Conservation Biology, and his wife, Christine. Through Jan. 21, Davis Community Gallery, 2051 John Jones Road. Hours: 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Monday-Friday and by appointment. See their work online.