GOINGS ON SANTA BARBARA : Holiday Signs : Up the coast, exhibits on students’ angel art and a modernized version of the ‘Nutcracker Suite’ are just around the corner.

Well, the holiday season is in full swing. Never mind the smell of turkey wafting from your kitchen today. Just look at the events scheduled up the coast in the coming week: They include two “angel art” exhibits and one version of the “Nutcracker Suite.”

What do young people think of when they think of angels? The current exhibit at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art’s Ridley-Tree Education Center should give a clue. Classes from Crane School, La Cumbre Junior High and Anacapa High created artwork for the theme “An Angel Passes (Un Ange Passe).”

The younger students made a group mural and sculpture. The high school students each worked on individual pieces to form one large project. The junior high students, said Ridley-Tree education director Beverly Decker, were asked to draw pictures of whatever they conceived an angel to be.

The work will be on exhibit through Jan. 31. The center is at 1600 Santa Barbara St. and is open weekdays, 1 to 4 p.m. For more information, call 962-1661.

This show is running in conjunction with a competition-exhibit at Westmont College’s Reynolds Gallery. Artists from the tri-county area submitted works on the same angel theme and those judged best are now on display. The college is at 955 La Paz Road in Montecito. Gallery hours are 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday to Friday, and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. For more information call 565-6162.

Santa Barbara Dance Theatre’s production of “Nutcracker Nuevo,” beginning Sunday at the Center Stage Theatre, will be a modernized, localized version of the traditional Christmas ballet. It will focus on the adventures of a young girl and boy (Clara and Fritz) who live in a Santa Barbara home with a view of the Channel Islands. Of course, their Christmas presents--including ants on dirt bikes--become rebellious, but eventually things turn out fine.

Along with the company’s regular dancers, the cast will include 35 Santa Barbara children. Kendra Douglas, a Laguna Blanca School student, will play Clara; Noah Gaines, a Montessori Center School student, will play Fritz, and Graham Martin a of Santa Barbara Middle School will be the Nutcracker. The show will run through Dec. 22, Wednesdays through Sundays at 7 p.m., and Saturdays and Sundays at 2 p.m. Admission is $10 (general), $9 (seniors and students) and $6 (children under 12). For more information, call 963-0408. Center Stage Theatre is upstairs in the Paseo Nuevo Mall.

Santa Barbara’s Museum of Natural History will celebrate Latin American culture Saturday and Sunday with textile and photograph exhibits and a performance by the Mexican trio Quetzalcoatl.

The textiles were woven by Mixtec Indians in the jungles of southern Mexico, and the photos will feature, among other subjects, Mixtec women at work. Both collections will be on display at the museum’s Fleischmann Auditorium from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. both days. Admission is free.

Quetzalcoatl will perform traditional Latin American music in the auditorium from 1 to 3 p.m. both days. Admission is $2. The museum is at 2559 Puesta del Sol Road. For more information on any of the events call 687-7687.

Sunday is “A Day Without Art,” designated as such by the World Health Organization to acknowledge the effects of AIDS on the art world. The Santa Barbara Museum of Art and other Santa Barbara organizations will pay tribute by holding a quilting bee outside the Contemporary Arts Forum for those who want to help make a panel for the International Memorial Quilt. A 12-square-foot section of the quilt, conceived to honor people who have died from AIDS, will be on display at the museum through Sunday. The Contemporary Arts Forum is on the second floor of the Paseo Nuevo Mall. The museum is at 1130 State St. For more information, call 963-4364.

Metropolitan Opera star Roberta Peters will perform pieces by Mozart, Verdi, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Lehar and Puccini in a concert at the Lobero Theatre Dec. 3. Tickets for the 8 p.m. show are $24 and $19. Call 963-0761. The theater is at 33 E. Canon Perdido St.