Hug a Tree

For the third year in a row, Giant Robot is throwing a "Tree Show," in which painters and illustrators and other folks from the comics, printmaking, and design scenes compose small works dealing with our leafy friends. I don't know about you, but something about "tree art" just screams adorability -- perhaps it's the residual impact of Shel Silverstein's The Giving Tree (and, yes, we know the book can be read as a terrifying environmental screed, if you want to go ahead and ruin childhood). Organizers have built up the usual impressive list of contributors, this time totaling nearly 40 people, including APAK!, Kelly Tunstall, Bigfoot, Eric Nakamura, Ferris Plock, Albert Reyes, Matthew Feyld, and Matt Furie. And if you think buying art can't help the environment, a portion of each sale goes toward the San Francisco nonprofit Friends of the Urban Forest, which, since 1981, has helped keep our city stocked with freshly planted trees, to the tune of 1,500 a year.