BEST BETS Thursday 10/18

8pm

Dance

After an absence of three years, the National Ballet of Cuba returns to Orange County with two programs: a mixed bill of highlights from famous ballets and a production of “Coppelia” choreographed by company founder and general director Alicia Alonso. The mixed bill, today and Friday, will include scenes from “Giselle,” “Sleeping Beauty,” “Nutcracker,” “Don Quixote” and “Swan Lake,” plus Gottschalk’s Symphony No. 1 (“A Night in the Tropics”). A different cast of principals will alternate in “Coppelia.”

* National Ballet of Cuba, Orange County Performing Arts Center, 600 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa, 8 p.m. Also Friday at 8 p.m. The company will dance “Cpelia” on Saturday at 2 and 8 p.m. and on Sunday at 2 p.m. $20 to $70. (714) 556-2787.

10am-4pm

Photography

Eight years ago, more than 900 glass plate negatives were found in a dusty shed on Claudina Street in Anaheim. The images were taken by civic leader Judge James S. Howard, a professional photographer and Anaheim’s justice of the peace, who for two decades documented on his plates the milestones of Anaheim’s births, deaths and marriages. These early photographs from a century ago are on view at the Anaheim Museum. The show is guest curated by Jane Newell.

* “Anaheim, Turn of the Century 1900-1920s: Portraits of a Small Town,” Anaheim Museum, 241 S. Anaheim Blvd., Anaheim. Reception Nov. 4, 4-6 p.m. Museum hours: Wednesday-Friday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.; Saturday, noon-4 p.m.; Sunday-Tuesday and holidays, by appointment only. Ends Jan. 12. (714) 778-3301.

6-8pm

Art

The 35 selected collages and mixed media pieces of Orange County artist Paul Darrow are on exhibit at the Huntington Beach Art Center. Darrow will speak today on how he transforms ordinary, cast-away objects such as shoes, book bindings, scraps of paper and cardboard, into unusual poetic compositions. His interest in Eastern philosophy, Tibetan meditation, calligraphy and mandalas are part of his work.

* “Rhapsody,” featuring works by Paul Darrow, Huntington Beach Art Center, 538 Main St., Huntington Beach. Artist talk, 6-8 p.m. Hours: Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, 12-6 p.m.; Thursday, 12-8 p.m.; Sunday, 12-4 p.m.; closed Monday and Tuesday. Free. Ends Dec. 1. (714) 374-1650.

Noon

Art

New media artist Grahame Weinbren’s “Frames” makes its West Coast premiere as a game-like interactive cinema installation based on Hugh Diamond’s photographs of psychiatric patients made in the 1840s and 1850s. Diamond used photographs as a diagnostic tool to evaluate a patient’s condition by analyzing expressions. In Weinbren’s installation, gold frames containing sensors are suspended in front of projected images. By pointing at the image through one of the frames, viewers can transform a performer into one of Diamond’s patients.

* “Frames,” Beall Center for Art and Technology at UC Irvine, Claire Trevor School of the Arts, 712 Arts Plaza/101 HTC, Irvine. Gallery hours: Daily, 12-5 p.m.; Thursdays, 12-8 p.m.; closed Mondays. Free. Ends Dec. 2. (949) 824-6206; www.beallcenter.uci.edu .

By appointment

Art

“Dual Traditions: Vietnamese Art on Handcrafted Paper” will be the last exhibit in Southern California for djr International Art. The gallery will relocate to New York. Paintings by the six featured artists in the final show illustrate the Southeast Asian countryside and culture. The artists are Nguyen Quang Huy, Phan Cam Thuong, Dinh Thi Thom Poong, Nguyen Can Cuong, Pham Luan and Nguyen Tu Nghiem.

* “Dual Traditions: Vietnamese Art on Handcrafted Paper,” djr International Art, 2431 W. Coast Highway No. 204, Newport Beach. Hours: By appointment only. Free. Ends Friday. (949) 548-6249.