Matplotlib: how to set the current figure?

You can simply set figure f1 as the new current figure with:

pl.figure(f1.number)

Another option is to give names (or numbers) to figures, which might help make the code easier to read:

pl.figure("Share values")
# ... some plots ...
pl.figure("Profits")
# ... some plots ...

pl.figure("Share values")  # Selects the first figure again

In fact, figure “numbers” can be strings, which are arguably more explicit that simple numbers.

PS: The pyplot equivalent of pylab.figure() is matplotlib.pyplot.figure().

PPS: figure() now accepts a Figure object, so you should be able to activate figure f1 with figure(f1).