>> Green: It’s so hot at the moment — the color of spring, environmental conservation and Mountain Dew Slurpees (my favorite!). And, now, it’s the newest exhibition at The Textile Museum. Green: the Color and the Cause opens on Saturday with contemporary works by 32 international fiber artists, two site-specific installations — a growing garden sculpture and a handmade paper sculpture emulating the ebb and flow of coastal New Jersey’s important estuary ecosystem — plus a special interactive online exhibition catalog/website, and lectures and workshops hosted by the exhibiting artists. Check out the Museum’s site for a full list of programs and head on down!

>> The National Gallery of Art continues its ongoing free film program this weekend, starting with Gauguin in Tahiti and the Marquesas (where he saw the boobies) on Friday at 2:30 p.m. Saturday’s line-up includes Who Was Kafka at 12:00 p.m., The Marsdreamers at 2:30 p.m., and the Washington premiere of Josef Birdman Astor’s new film Lost Bohemia at 4:30 p.m. The films conclude on Sunday with Eric Rohmer’s A Tale of Winter at 4:00 p.m. Can’t make it this weekend? Check out the NGA’s handy online schedule and add them to your calendar. East Building Auditorium, free.

>> The Torpedo Factory Art Center is celebrating their Second Thursday Art Night: Spring Awakening with a jam-packed schedule of events centered around the meaning of “home” — including the reception for Nest, part of The Nest Project, a four-part collaborative project that includes a juried exhibition at Target Gallery, 12 outdoor installations along the waterfront built by local art groups, a community-built nest in the main hall of the Torpedo Factory led by Habitat for Humanity, and in-studio nests created by Torpedo Factory artists. Stop by Target Gallery on Thursday for the opening and pick up a map of the outdoor installations along the waterfront. 6 to 9 p.m. with a gallery with a gallery talk at 7 p.m. Free.

>> Also on Thursday, The Art League Gallery presents the opening of Food, Glorious Food, Cindy Packard Richmond’s solo exhibit of bright, unique food-scapes. Richmond’s food critic background is evident in her brightly-colored and highly-detailed renderings of our nourishment in its most simple form. These larger-than-life landscapes get you so up close and personal with the reddest, juiciest strawberries that you may find yourself fighting the urge to lick the canvas. Don’t miss the opening — a celebration — catered by one of her close friends. 6:30 to 8 p.m. Free.

>> The Smithsonian American Art Museum has taken the liberty of planning your boring Thursday afternoon, so clear your schedule, ditch work early and relax with a bottle glass of wine and a snack at the Courtyard Cafe under the wavy glass ceiling. Next, check out To Make a World: George Ault and 1940s America and stop by the museum store to browse through the To Make A World exhibition catalog written by exhibition curator Alexander Nemerov. At 6:30 p.m., find a good seat in McEvoy Auditorium for a screening of the 1940s classic, It’s a Wonderful Life, with a introduction by Mary Owens, daughter of Donna Reed.

>> The Corcoran Gallery of Art kicks off their Scholar’s Selection Gallery Talks on Thursday with Thomas Corcoran and Hannah Lemmon Corcoran (Mrs. Thomas Corcoran). Ellen G. Miles, curator emerita, department of painting and sculpture at the National Portrait Gallery, will discuss Charles Peale Polk’s portraits of William Wilson Corcoran’s parents. 6:30 p.m. Free with gallery admission.

>> Of the 28,830 blank sketchbooks sent to artists in 94 countries participating in The Sketchbook Project, just under 10,000 of them were returned, with 700 from artists right here in the Washington area. For two days only, they will be on display at Hillyer Art Space this Friday and Saturday. This exhibition is taking place in conjunction with Transformer Gallery‘s SKETCH exhibition, which focuses on artistic development and the creative process and features the work of 16 Washington D.C. artists working in a variety of mediums. The Sketchbook Project will tour nationally through the end of July, at which point it will enter the permanent collection of The Brooklyn Art Library.

>> The Pure Drop, a collection of over 100 live-action drawings by artist Carlotta Hester, opens with a reception at Govinda Gallery on Friday. Hester documented musicians, singers and dancers in every festival setting during the largest of all traditional Irish music festivals, Fleadh Cheoil na hÈireann, which took place in the summer of 2010. 6 to 9 p.m., Free.

>> Chloe Watson explores the familiarity of space and memory through abstract imagery in her new work, Travel Season, opening this Friday at DC Arts Center. Her paintings present a world of places — previous dwellings, studios, galleries, and hotel rooms — stripped of detail, leaving behind geometric patterns which become spaces for reflection and the projection of experience. Opening reception on Friday 7 to 9 p.m., and mark your calendars for the artist talk on May 7 at 5 p.m. Free.

>> Head over to Arlington Arts Center on Friday evening for dual openings. AAC Spring Solos 2011 features six self-contained installations spanning seven exhibit areas from six D.C. and Baltimore-based emerging, cutting-edge contemporary artists. Bridget Lambert’s I Had Fun Last Night combines photography and miniatures to create scenarios involving relationships, voyeurism and desire. 7 to 9 p.m. Free.

>> Michelle Frankfurter spent over two decades of research and field work creating Destino, a collection of photographs taken along Mexico’s migrant trail, opening at The Gallery at Vivid Solutions on Friday. Since the late 1980’s, Frankfurter has lived and worked in Guatemala and Nicaragua, and relays her direct experiences of the social impact of immigration policies, civil wars and drug violence through her work. 6 p.m. Free.

>> Also in Anacostia, Honfleur Gallery, in partnership with The Windup Space, explores the similarities and differences in the work of four emerging Baltimore visual artists, focusing on their own approach to heavy color and pattern in New Clear Daze. Opening reception Friday at 7 p.m.

>> Gallery Plan B presents a trio of artists in a process-driven show opening with a reception on Saturday. Painter Greg Minah creates woven surfaces by manipulating the flow of paint; Mars Tokyo’s works on paper offer a different view of global coastlines; and Andrew Wapinski combines layers of pigment, resin, and gold leaf in a multi-dimensional way. 6 to 8 p.m. Free.

>> Hamiltonian Gallery hosts the second installment of Call + Response: Textures, which pairs artists and writers that results with an installation bridging together two distinct art forms. The show launches Saturday with a panel discussion at 5:30 p.m., followed by an opening reception from 7 to 9 p.m.

Art Notes:

• Get out of the city and check out photographs by Alexandra Silverthorne, Beamie Young and DCist Exposed winner Erin Antognoli at BlackRock Center for the Arts in Germantown. On view through April 30.
• Get down to Lamont Bishop Gallery for The Polaroid Retrospective II, an ongoing exhibit dedicated to the world of Polaroid and instant film photography — then rush home to dig out your own Polaroid cameras because you can still get film.
• The NVCC Photography Club hosts the opening reception for 2011 Juried Photography + Media Student Show in the Tyler Gallery at Northern Virginia Community College’s Alexandria Campus. 5:30 to 7 p.m.
• Tango Your Taxes Off at Eastern Market’s North Hall during Friday’s opening reception for the Dance Is The Answer region-wide arts festival. The festival will feature tango demonstrations and lessons and the unveiling of the BOX O’ ART, a traveling visual art and movement installation.
• The Del Ray Artisans are accepting project proposals for Art Camp 2011 for 25 students aged 8-14 (9 a.m. – 4 p.m., July 25-29, 2011). The ideal project will be fun, instructional, support the theme “around the world in 5 days,” and be tailored to age groups 8-10 and/or 11-14. Projects should combine educational elements with hands-on opportunities for creativity and relate to a current or historic craft founded in cultural tradition.
• The last day to see The Hyperbolic Crochet Coral Reef, currently on display at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, is April 24.
• The deadline to apply for Touchstone Gallery’s MiniSolos@Touchstone is May 15.
• Washington Studio School is enrolling for their Spring Term. View the schedule and register soon, because classes start April 18.
• Northern Virginia Fine Arts Association presents Seen and Unseen / Joanna Knox at the Athenaeum Gallery in Alexandria with an opening reception on Sunday from 4 to 6 p.m.
• The next Hirshorn After Hours late-night art gallery dance party is April 29. Get your tickets now because they always sell out.
• There’s still time to catch Approximate Landscape (Ungefähre Landschaft – Superficies) Photographs by Christoph Engel at Geothe-Institut Washington through April 29.
• FotoDC presents FLASH DANCE this Friday, wrapping up their month-long show FLASH, which closes on Sunday. Tickets are $18. 9 p.m. to 12 a.m.