Lectures and Events
ARTIST LECTURE: GABRIELLE BAKKER Bakker, whose paintings are immersed in archetypes and mythology, gives a lecture and slideshow. 2 p.m. Sun. Feb. 29. Frye Art Museum, 704 Terry Ave., free, 206-622-9250.
ARTIST LECTURE: MARY FRANK The artist, designer and activist discusses a compelling question: “What is Art for?” 8 p.m. Tues. March 2. PONCHO Concert Hall, Cornish College campus, 710 E. Roy St., free.
ARTIST LECTURE: ANNE GALE Figurative painter Gale digs deep into her subjects’ psyches when painting her relentlessly revealing portraits. She’ll discuss art and perception. 7:30 p.m. Fri. Feb. 27. Seattle Academy of Fine Art, 1501 Tenth Ave. E., free, 206-526-2787.
DECORATIVE ARTS LECTURES Ulysses Grant Dietz, curator of decorative arts at the Newark Museum, gives two talks: an examination of silver in the American home; and a lecture on how the Newark Museum transformed an opulent Victorian home into the Ballantine House Gallery. 10:30 a.m. and 1 p.m. Sat. Feb. 28. Seattle Art Museum, 100 University St., $12-25, 206-654-3100.
LECTURE: ELLEN NEEL AND NATIVE ART Pam Creasy, a Ph.D. candidate in anthropology, talks about the life and work of her mother, Ellen Neel, an accomplished Kwakwaka’wakw carver and artist. 3 p.m. Sat. Feb. 28. Seattle Art Museum, 100 University St., free with admission, 206-654-3100.
NIGHT BLOW Watch Richard Royal blow glass while you dance to the music of Korla Wygal and Her Private Reserve. 7 p.m-9 p.m. Sat. Feb. 28. Museum of Glass, 1801 East Dock St. Tacoma, $25-$35, 253-396-1768.
SAM AFTER HOURS: MARCEL MARIAS Hungarian-born DJ Marcel Marias spins records in a multimedia event in conjunction with the Christian Marclay exhibit. 5:30 p.m.-7 p.m. Thurs. Feb. 26. Seattle Art Museum, 100 University St., free with admission, 206-654-3100.
Openings
BLACK LAB “Parades and Other Disturbances,” features new photos by local photographer Keith Johnson. Reception: 7 p.m.-11 p.m. Sat. Feb. 28. 4216 Sixth Ave NW, 206-781-2392. Noon- 5 p.m. Mon.-Fri.
G GIBSON “Benediction” is new paintings from Seattle resident Laurie Le Clair. Also: “Little Dresses and other tintypes” from Portland’s Susan Seubert. Reception: 5:30 p.m.-8 p.m. Wed. March 3. 514 E. Pike St., 206-587-4033. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Wed.-Fri., 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sat.
NICO “You Said Yes” includes artist Niilartey DeOsu’s various figures in charcoal inspired by the Tarot. Reception : 6 p.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Feb. 26. 619 Western, Suite 22, 206-229-4593, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Sat. and by appointment.
SECLUDED ALLEY WORKS Artist, curator, and impresario Kristine Evans (aka Kinoko) opens a brief, 5-day group show, “Rabbits and Robots,” at SAW with the usual audio-visual mayhem attending such hipster events: live painting by graffiti artists, electronic experimental music, and other off-kilter antics. Art includes work by Matthew Porter, Randy Wood, Sam Trout, and Bwana Spoons. Reception: 4 pm.-midnight Sat. Feb. 28. 113 12th Ave. (at Yesler), 206-839-0880. Noon-5 p.m. Sat.-Sun.
Last Chance
AIA “Kumamoto Artpolis” collects 70 photos of architecture built under the innovative Artpolis movement, a design system that since 1988 favors adapting structures to local environmental and cultural contexts. 1911 First Ave., 206-448-4938. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Fri. Ends Thurs. Feb. 26.
ARTEMIS “Entre Chien et Loup,” (translation: somewhere between dog and wolf) is the title of freelance photojournalist Paul Souders’ solo show of photographs of the shifting, ghostly nature of twilight. 3107 S. Day St., 206-323-0562. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Sun. Feb. 29.
CAPITOL HILL ARTS CENTER Thom Heileson’s video installation “Scend” evokes the empty spaces of Death Valley. 1621 12th Ave., Mon.-Fri. 6 p.m.-2 a.m. Ends Fri. Feb. 27.
CAROLYN STALEY The nineteenth-century prints in “Japanese Literature and Legend” are teeming with princesses, magical foxes, Kabuki heroes, and baby-trampling demons. 314 Occidental Ave., 206-621-1888. 10:30 a.m.-5 p.m. Tue.-Sat. Ends Sun. Feb. 29.
CDA GALLERY “Corduroy Symptom” finds drawings and paintings by Seattle artist Michael Ottersen. Thick layers of paint and playful studies in geometric and organic forms predominate. 506 Second Ave., Suite 200 (Smith Tower), 206-296-7580. 8:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Mon-Fri. Ends Fri. Feb. 27.
DAVIDSON “Uncertain Journey” is Montana artist Stephanie Frostad’s accomplished but sentimental exploration of the plight of refugees in the wake of war (some of the paintings have the feeling and detail of Pre-Raphaelite idylls, but on the whole the series feels a little naïve). 313 Occidental Ave. S., 206-624-7684. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Fri. Feb. 27.
FRANCINE SEDERS Ink on paper abstract works by local artist Robert McNown. Recycling old drawings from his graduate school years, McNown cuts, colors, and reshapes the old works into new grids and organic forms. 6701 Greenwood Ave. N., 206-782-0355. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.- Sat, 1 p.m.-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Sun. Feb. 29.
JACK STRAW NEW MEDIA GALLERY Artist Jesse Paul Miller set out to find some peace and quiet in the nature preserves of North Central Florida, and brought audio equipment to document it. What he found wasn’t exactly solitude free of human noise, as this interactive installation demonstrates. 261 Roosevelt Way N.E., 206-634-0919. 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. Ends Fri. Feb. 27.
LISA HARRIS Emily Wood’s Northwest landscapes recall the work another Emily—B.C. artist Emily Carr, whose mystical paintings of rainforests helped solidify the iconography of the Pacific Northwest early in the 20th century. Wood’s “Recent Travels” traipses from Mowich Lake near Mount Rainier to the Palouse, and all the paintings are infused with an appealing warmth (although I’m convinced the yellow waters of Lake Coeur d’Alene are the result of toxic sediments, not artistic license). 1922 Pike Pl., 206-443-3315. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat.; 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Sun. Ends Sat. Feb. 28.
MARTIN-ZAMBITO Realist paintings of Seattle landscapes and the human form by former Cornish instructor Michael Stasinos. 721 E. Pike St., 206-726-9509. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tue.-Sat. Ends Wed. Mar. 3.
PHOTOGRAPHIC CENTER NORTHWEST Cornish alum Benjamin Wilkins has carved his niche taking elaborately staged black and white photographs of surreal tableaux. In the solo show “Think Vents,” human figures are entangled in a dance (or wrestling match) with various geometric forms. The result is a kind of symbolic, otherworldly kinetoscope. 900 12th Ave., 206-720-7222. Noon-9:30 p.m. Mon.; 9 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Fri. Feb. 27.
PRICELESS WORKS Work by five artists from the Bluebottle art gallery on Capitol Hill: Kynan Antos, Tory Franklin, Joe Alterio, Chad Cook, and Matthew Porter. 619 N. 35th St., Suite 100, 206-349-9943. Noon-7 p.m. Fri.-Sun. Ends Sun. Feb. 29.
SEATTLE ART MUSEUM “International Abstraction: Making Painting Real:” offers superb examples of the post-World War II abstract expressionist and minimalist movements while “The View From Here: The Pacific Northwest 1800-1930” serves up a potpourri of paintings, photographs, and Native American art from the region’s first boomtime. 100 University St., 206-654-3100. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends Sun. Feb. 29.
SECOND AVENUE PIZZA “Drawing Resistance” is a touring exhibit of anti-globalization, anti-corporate, pro-anarchy, pro-Zapatista drawings, posters, and miscellaneous agit-prop by 31 artists. 2015 2nd Ave, 206-524-6624. Ends Sun. Feb. 29.
SOIL “Flashpoint” includes recent work by SOIL cooperative members Dan Dean, Jennifer Zwick, Margie Livingston, Randy Wood, Thom Heileson, and others. 1317 E. Pine St., 206-264-8061. Noon-5 p.m. Thurs.-Sun. Ends Sun. Feb. 29.
Museums
HENRY ART GALLERY “A Door Meant as Adornment” offers a twenty-year retrospective of Seattle furniture designer, architect, and artist Roy McMakin. Whether he’s using furniture as a way to recall memories of childhood, or to playfully overturn our perception of the banal details of life, McMakin transforms the ordinary dresser into a totemic sculpture. “Ellen Gallagher: Preserve/Murmur” collects mixed-media collages, cut-paper paintings, and 16 mm films by the 36-year-old New York artist. In a somewhat underwhelming show, some of the pieces co-opt stereotypical images of race, while “Watery Ecstatic” uses paper slashed by a blade to meditate on life in the deepest corners of the sea. Throughout Gallagher’s work is a strange sort of ambiguity somewhere between humor and rage. UW campus, 206-543-2280. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun; 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Thurs.
MUSEUM OF NORTHWEST ART Simon Schama once observed that landscapes are always culture before they’re nature. “The Grand View,” a new exhibit at the Museum of Northwest Art in La Conner confirms this. Ranging from the soaring visions of Albert Bierstadt to quirky investigations by contemporary painter Michael Brophy, this exhibit explores the importance of place in the region’s art. 121 South First St. (La Conner), 360-466-4446. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. daily.
MUSEUM OF GLASS “Moving Through Nature” explores variations on landscape and nature through installations by sculptors Mayme Kratz and Stacey Neff as well as Michael Kenna’s dreamy, Zen-inspired black and white photographs of Japan. “Breathing Glass” and “Raining Popcorn” are two huge installations by artist Sandy Skoglund: the former employs massive quantities of miniature marshmallows and thousands of glass dragonflies, while the second fills a room with drifts of knee-deep popcorn. How the hell do they keep the ants out, I wonder? 1801 East Dock St. Tacoma, 253-396-1768. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. (third Thurs. of the month until 8 p.m.), noon-5 p.m. Sun.
MUSEUM OF HISTORY AND INDUSTRY For anyone who’s ever dreamed of inventing something, MOHAI’s touring Smithsonian Exhibit “Doodles, Drafts, and Designs” should offer inspiration if not comic relief. Seventy-four original sketches (sorry, none on cocktail napkins) capture the origins of all sorts of patented inventions. Some were successful (the Crayola crayon, for instance) while others were inspired failures (a man-sized hunting blind shaped like a large goose). 2700 24th Ave. E. (Montlake), 206-324-1126. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. daily.
SEATTLE ART MUSEUM Swiss-born artist and musical wunderkind Christian Marclay’s exhibit at SAM is fun, but not particularly deep. Impossible instruments (a twenty-foot drum kit, a tuba grafted onto a trumpet) are set alongside clever collages made from album covers The most compelling work in the whole music-as-art shtick is the 13-minute, four-screen film Video Quartet, a John Cage-like cacophony of musical samples from Hollywood movies. 100 University St., 206-654-3100. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.
SEATTLE ASIAN ART MUSEUM “Larger than Life Heroes” presents Ukiyo-e and woodblock prints on the subject of sumo wrestling. Yup, big sweaty fat guys grappling with each other in loincloths. In all seriousness, though, this is supposed to be a definitive exhibit on Japan’s strange national pastime, with works ranging from 18th century artist Katsukawa Shunsho to contemporary video of the sport. “Discovering Buddhist Art: Seeking the Sublime, ” recycles Buddhist sacred art from the museum’s permanent collection. Also on display, two contemporary scrolls by Chinese ink painter Li Jin, including one 59-foot behemoth that pokes fun at the excesses of Chinese celebrations and cuisine. Volunteer Park, 1400 E. Prospect Ave., 206-625-8900. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.
TACOMA ART MUSEUM In “Lewis and Clark Territory,” contemporary artists Ann Appleby, Mark Brophy and others investigate themes of race and place in the West 200 years after the Corps of Discovery set out. Also on display, “A Transatlantic Avant-Garde: American Artists in Paris, 1918 – 1939” documents the American artistic exodus to Paris in the twenties and thirties. More than a hundred artworks, including samplings from Alexander Calder, Stuart Davis, Charles Demuth, and Man Ray run the gamut from abstraction to Dada. 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, 253-272-4258. Every third Thursday free. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat.; 10 a.m.-8 p.m. Thurs.; 12 p.m.-5 p.m. Sun.
