Palm Springs Art Museum in collaboration with Del Vaz Projects presents Steven Arnold’s Nocturnal Dream Show, an evening of lively short films celebrating the filmmaker and artist Steven Arnold (1943–1994) and the exhibition A Queer Arcana: Art, Magic, and Spirit. 

The Nocturnal Dream Shows were a renowned midnight movie series Arnold launched at the Palace Theatre in San Francisco in 1968. Curated by Arnold (as well as filmmaker Sebastian), these screenings were playful, imaginative, and otherworldly. They brought together experimental films, early cartoons, and cinematic classics alongside opening acts of avant-garde performance, most notably the Cockettes. 

In the spirit of the original San Francisco events Palm Springs Art Museum and Del Vaz Projects will bring together films shown in the Nocturnal Dream Shows series as well as new works as a part of our Free Thursday Night programming.

Original Cockettes Rumi Missabu and Miss Harlow alongside artist Steven Arnold recall the Nocturnal Dream Shows midnight movies series and the origins of the Cockettes.

About Del Vaz Projects 

Del Vaz Projects is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit art space based in Los Angeles, California, which was founded by Jay Ezra Nayssan in 2014.

Forging collaborations across vast generations and geographies, Del Vaz Projects is a curatorial platform that produces on-site and off-site exhibitions that are free and accessible to the public; a research collective comprised of fellows and freelancers who pair cutting-edge scholarship with experimental authorship to craft insightful texts for Del Vaz Projects’ shows and publications; an independent press that designs, publishes, and distributes artist books and exhibition catalogs—featuring critical texts commissioned by contemporary writers and cultural innovators; and an artist production fund that secures fiscal and material resources through their extended community of collaborators in order to support underfunded artists as they pursue ambitious projects.

Steven Arnold: Cocktails in Heaven is on view at Del Vaz Projects through April 25, 2026. In 2027, the exhibition will travel to the GLBT Historical Society Museum in San Francisco for the Further Triennial.