Shake the city this week and you’ll break the art: It’s all ceramics. Just about every gallery has something in conjunction with the annual conference of the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts, set to draw 5,000 clay lovers. Alwyn O’Brien’s ceramics are the smartest to come out of the UW’s great program in the last few years, and the sexiest, too. They’re like patches of weeds embedded with video feeds. In that tangle of porcelain you might find a mysterious photograph of a blindfolded crowd in a meadow, say. All you know for sure is that you will follow these curving transports. Many galleries will be celebrating ceramics tonight, but you want to start here. (James Harris Gallery, 312 Second Ave S, www.jamesharrisgallery.com, 6–8 pm, free)