Updates for the new year…

I recently added more event planning and journalism information to the blog, and, after a hectic few months, will be returning to art gallery spotlights next week with the Twilight Artist Collective in Pioneer Square.

Native Inspiration at The Stonington Gallery

The Stonington Gallery features Northwest and Alaskan Native inspired art.

Continuing my search for art galleries in the Pioneer Square neighborhood, I recently came across a gallery featuring work specializing in an area that I was equally unfamiliar and fascinated with; Pacific Northwest Coast Native tribal art.

“The gallery features a mix of Native artists and people inspired by Native art,” said Gallery Assistant Carolyn Stone. This can be seen in the range of artists exhibited in the gallery, from David Franklin, a former Denver graffiti crew artist who became inspired by Northwest Native art, to work by (among the many tribes represented) members of the Haida, Tahlot and Aleut tribes.

With such a diverse group represented, the gallery does not focus on one particular medium (containing carved wood panels, totem poles, paintings and glass sculptures). The gallery instead attempts to showcase work that best represents Northwest Coast and Alaskan art in all of its many forms. There are three current exhibitions, with the October exhibition, “This Coast Salish Place,” focusing on work by Salish tribal communities. The two November exhibitions display work by artists David Franklin and Courtney Lipson.

Next month the gallery will be opening a new exhibition, “Transformation & Change on the Pacific Northwest Coast.” Stone said that the December show will focus on artists’ interpretations of shamanistic rituals. The show will feature work by Hib Savin and Phil Charette and includes an Artists’ Opening Reception on December 4 from 6-8 p.m.

The Stonington Gallery is located at 119 South Jackson Street Seattle, WA 98104. More information on the gallery can be found at The Stonington Gallery Web site.

While Pioneer Square may be known as the heart of Seattle’s art scene, and not to mention containing seemingly enough galleries to fill entries in this blog for the next year, the area is only one of many exciting districts in the city. Next week I’ll be exploring the nearby Belltown neighborhood and spotlighting the only gallery in Seattle to exhibit Urban Contemporary Art – the BLVD gallery.

Creating “dialogue between cultures” at The ArtXchange Gallery

According to the Pioneer Square Community Association, there are “more galleries and public art within walking distance than any other Seattle neighborhood.” From the arts of Japan (Kagedo Japanese Art) to exhibitions by local artists (Some Space Gallery), art from seemingly every locale can be found at one gallery or another in this district. This diversity is perfectly exemplified in the ArtXchange Gallery. Whether in bamboo tableware made in Vietnam, Egyptian ceramic beaded necklaces or cross-culture installation work, the gallery strives to create an understanding of differing cultures through art.

“We have an educational mission to promote cultural exchange and create dialogue between cultures,” said Gallery Manager Lauren Davis. This mission statement is carried out through showcasing work in a range of mediums by both regional and international artists.

Davis said that exhibitions are also sometimes made in conjunction with nonprofits. Photographs by Gallery Director Cora Edmonds for example, are currently on display and will benefit the Namaste Children’s Fund.

The exhibition Pattern Play by local artist June Sekiguchi illustrates this spirit of cultural exchange through displays inspired by a combination of children’s blocks and patterns from cultures around the world. One segment, inspired by Jacks, shows several large-scale game pieces as interpreted by the artist.

The ArtXchange gallery is located at 512 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104. More information on the gallery can be found at The ArtXchange gallery Web site.

More information about the artist whose work is being displayed in the current exhibition, June Sekiguchi, can be found at the Artist’s Web site. 

Northern Exposure at the Francine Seders Gallery

After noticing that each of my entries so far have been about galleries in the downtown area, I decided to eschew the usual, leave my comfort zone and explore a district that I had only been to in passing – Phinney Ridge.

In the heart of the Seattle neighborhood, the Francine Seders Gallery is currently displaying two exhibitions from what I found to be starkly contrasting artists. The first, Lauri Chambers, is a Seattle abstract artist whose oil paintings (all of which are entitled oddly enough “not titled”) appear at first simplistic and devoid of life. However upon closer inspection startling shades can be found in each, adding new depth to each. The second exhibition, Michelle Bolinger’s “I’ve Been Through the Desert,” is a collection of vibrant abstract paintings inspired by, according to the artist, “the western landscape.”

In December the gallery will be displaying work by painter Jacob Lawrence and local sculptor Marita Dingus.

The Francine Seders gallery is located at 6701 Greenwood Avenue N Seattle, WA  98103. More information on the gallery can be found at http://www.sedersgallery.com/ .

Starting next month the north end district will be joining the list of Seattle neighborhoods which hold monthly art walks. The event, “”Art Up/Open Up,” will be held on the second Friday of each month from 6 9p.m., with the first walk to be held Dec. 12. According to the district’s Chamber of Commerce Web site, the event is an attempt to put “the Greenwood-Phinney neighborhood prominently on the Seattle Arts & Culture map”.

Pike Place Paintings

For this week’s entry I decided to find a gallery located in one of the city’s most famous landmarks, the Pike Place Market. While wandering through the area I stumbled across a fascinating gallery that specializing in works by Northwest artists – Lisa Harris Gallery. While easily missed in a scenic view loft (the gallery is across from the market, and not easily identifiable) the gallery has had an established presence in the area for the past 25 years. “We’re definitely well known in the arts community,” said Gallery Assistant Amanda Dellinger.

The gallery mounts changing monthly paintings, prints, drawings, sculpture, and photography exhibitions by local artists, and features work by one artist per month.

This month the gallery is featuring oil paintings by artist Lois Silver. The exhibition will be on display until Nov. 29. Silver’s work includes landscape scenes, portraits and indoor narrative scenes. Her oil bar pigments alternate between solemn and serene, featuring tense moments in relationships and characters alone seemingly deep in thought. In December the gallery will feature new oils and gouaches by Ed Kamuda.

 

Lisa Harris Gallery is located at 1922 Pike Place Seattle, WA 98101. More information on the gallery can be found at the Lisa Harris Web site, http://www.lisaharrisgallery.com.

Breaking the Northwest mold at the R E Welch Gallery

While many galleries in Seattle focus on local artists, the R E Welch Gallery stands apart through specializing in work by international artists.

The Seattle location is one of two R E Welch Galleries with the second, and original, in Palm Desert, California. Palm Desert Gallery owners David Roberts and Ron Welch collected art for 15 years before opening their first gallery in 2005.

“European art just has a different vibe, and we think our international flavor sets us apart,” Welch said in a 2007 Desert Art Scene article. The focus by the gallery on European artists, mainly French, Italian and Belgium, does indeed distance the gallery from others in the area.

Gallery Owner Richard Smith said that while the gallery has been open since 2007, it has unfortunately received barely any press over the last year. Smith attributes this to not only to the artist’s featured in the gallery but the type of artwork displayed as well. “I feel that there is a prejudice in this area,” he said. “This is such a diverse city and we need to show more than just Northwest art.”

With work by 15-16 artists displayed at any given time, viewers should not let this deter them from entering the gallery. From landscape artist Lorraine Jordan to Spanish sculptor Isabel Miramontes (who designed my favorite piece of the gallery, At, in which a human figure is sculpted into an @ symbol) a range of artists and mediums are featured in the gallery.

Through October the exhibition Geometrical Elegance, featuring sculpture by Jean-Louis Corby, will be on display.

The gallery is located downtown at 1214 First Avenue.

 

See with your soul, your belly, your heart

The outside of the gallery, located on Seneca and First Avenue in downtown Seattle.

Upon walking into Benham Studio Gallery, I was immediately presented with a photograph depicting a barren, yet striking, patch of desert scorched by a lone bolt of lightning. The print, Visual Thunder, is a perfect indication of the exceptional quality of art featured in the gallery.

The Benham Studio Gallery, located downtown on Seneca and First, features fine art photography by local and international artists.

Seemingly random quotes by artists, philosophers and theologians adorn the walls of the gallery. One line, “See with your soul, your belly, your heart. Then you are truly seeing,” stood out to me and appeared to convey the heartfelt thoughtfulness that the gallery inspired.

The gallery’s current exhibition Simplistic Form (featuring the aforementioned print) contains work by photographers Jahnavi Lisa Barnes and Jeri Eisenberg. Each focuses on simple items in nature (such as boulders or driftwood) and plays with the visual space in the image, distorting the viewer’s perception. While Barnes achieves this through large format photography, Eisenberg obscures the image, making her photos appear as if they were painted.

Entries in the Guest Book, “Jahnavi, touched by the power and depth of your images and the beauty of your prose,” and “Jahnavi-amazing grace, amazing creation, amazing dissolving-and all in you and displayed here,” attest to Barnes’ ability to bring to life simple rock and driftwood formations. One photo that especially stood out in this series was Evening Rocks/Alki Pier, displaying several boulders appearing suspended in the clouds.

Also displayed in the gallery are photos by artist Nina Berman, whose work I first saw at Bumbershoot 2008 as part of the Power of One exhibit; “a multi-media exhibition to inspire the inner hero.” Her pictures and interviews of soldiers injured in Iraq remain both intriguing and haunting. The artist described the experience as one that was “profoundly disturbing,” and that “when viewed together, the words and photographs make for a complex, and sometimes contradictory portrait of America’s youth.”

The gallery’s next exhibition, Breaking Tradition, opens Nov. 19 and features images by David Armentor, Rosanna Salonia and Matthew Yateswith, with an Artist Reception (and non-traditional holiday party) scheduled for Nov. 21.

Introductions

While major art galleries and museums in Seattle may feature well known and fascinating displays, Seattle is also home to a seemingly endless number of smaller (and underrepresented) galleries. From Glass art to photography, contemporary to traditional, nearly every type of visual art can be found at one gallery or another throughout the city.

The goal of the Emerald City Art blog is to provide you with information on local galleries and studios, and to help those interested in Seattle visual art find artists that they might not have otherwise come across.

With this in mind, the blog will not be covering displays at any of the larger institutions, such as the Frye Art Museum, the Henry Art Gallery or the Seattle Art Museum.

Each week the blog will spotlight a different district of Seattle and feature one or more galleries from that area, as well as provide any art-related news for the week from that area. The weekly focus will contain information on artist receptions, commentary on the art, as well any details relevant to the gallery or artist.