'I Do Believe' book release

Photography and the written word have become bedfellows over the past few years. In the self-published "I Do Believe," photographer Tucker Gerrick and writer/poet Amber Courteau approach the same topics and ideas with varying results. "It was amazing how much of it overlapped when we did show each other," says Gerrick. The book's subjects -- inanimate objects and the reactions that can be projected onto them -- are an abrupt departure from Gerrick's youth-culture subjects and documentary style, but should carry no less of an emotional punch. Free opening reception 8-10 p.m. Sat 12/18. Through Jan. 19. Umber Studios.

• Jahna Peloquin

MPLS Art Show

Helmed by guest curator Mark Rivard, a noted skateboard artist known as the "king of the Sharpie," this group show highlights the landmarks and iconography of Minneapolis. But don't expect the typical downtown skyline art found at mall kiosks -- instead, look for everything from stark black-and-white photography of the interior of the Gold Medal Flour Mill to a screenprinted, pre-highways map of Minneapolis. Free opening reception 8 p.m. Sat 12/18. Cult Status Gallery.

• Jahna Peloquin

'Embarrassment of Riches: Picturing Global Wealth'

Undecided about those tax cuts for the über-rich? "Embarrassment of Riches," which closes in two weeks, probably won't alter your vote because it's not a political show, but it does offer 21 thought-provoking photos of what wealth looked like in the past decade in Dubai, Shanghai, Manhattan, Paris and other posh venues. Sometimes it adopted the trappings of Old Money. Elsewhere kids with money partied, 20-somethings danced, parents fretted, the elderly tottered and the landscape changed. The images are stunning.

• Mary Abbe