Camilo Alvarez and Marissa Nadler

We asked, they told. We check in with the folks behind the scenes to see what they're up to this weekend.

Camilo Alvarez

owner, director, curator of Samson Projects
Tonight's installment of the monthly First Friday, when 450 Harrison Ave. transforms into an art house-hip party circuit, gives Alvarez a chance to showcase his gallery's current exhibit of the work of Kader Attia, a French-Algerian artist whose art is also on display at the ICA. Tomorrow, he's flying to meet his wife, Alexandra Cherubini, in Houston, where their friend Franklin Sirmans has just become curator of contemporary art at the Menil Collection. They'll take in some nightlife before scooting to Palm Springs, Calif., on Sunday. Alvarez is helping Cherubini, president of EquiFit, a company that designs and manufactures products for performance horses and riders, set up her booth for the equestrian show Thermal Desert Circuit.

Marissa Nadler

musician/fine artist
Today is a birthday for Nadler's father, but she’s eschewing post-holiday sales in favor of something more personal: the gift of song. When she meets her parents for birthday dinner tonight at the South End's Giacomo’s, the chanteuse will come bearing a custom-recorded CD for him. Nadler returned from five months of touring in October and is heading back to Europe in March. In the short stretch she's home, she's writing and recording demos for her fourth album in her home recording studio in Brighton. To generate ideas, there are always books at hand. Lately it's been "The Seduction Cookbook" and "The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2007."