Category: Seattle

Chihuly Garden & Glass

The Humble Fabulist5 Comments

Enter the intricate, fragile world of Dale Chihuly – or, to be fair, the world of a small army of designers, glassblowers, sculptors and assemblers, working under the ”Chihuly” umbrella. Let’s take a moment to appreciate and recognize their work, even if we will never see their names in the credits.

It wasn’t the first time I saw a large ”Chihuli” exhibition, such as this. In October 2017, I had the chance to enjoy this immense work of glass making, in a truly magical setting: the New York Botanical Garden, in the Bronx. The gardens remained open in the evening and the sculptures, scattered all over the gardens and conservatory, were illuminated. The result was spectacular. There are several posts about that exhibition, the most popular being ”Into the Night”.

Seattle, WA

June 15th, 2018

 

The Narrow Face

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Echo, 2011
Jaume Plensa

Jaume Plensa’s sculpture Echo is named for the mountain nymph of Greek mythology who offended the goddess Hera – she kept her engaged in conversation and prevented her from spying on one of Zeus’ amours. To punish Echo, Hera deprived the nymph of speech, except for the ability to repeat the last words spoken by another. The sculptor created this monumental head of Echo with her eyes closed, seemingly listening or in a state of meditation.

Another work by Jaume Plensa: Crown Fountain, in Chicago

2801 Alaskan Way, Seattle, WA

June 15th, 2018

The way we hammer art

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without a nail

Jonathan Borofsky’s Hammering Man was installed right in front of the Seattle Art Museum, in 1991. Hammering Man is a series of monumental sculptures situated in different cities and was created in honour of the working class women and men of the world.

Daedalus/Upliftment, 2016
Acrylic, gold leaf, spray paint on canvas
Fahamu Pecou

Double Elvis, 1963/1976
Silkscreen in, synthetic polymer paint on canvas
Andy Warhol

Caterpillar Suit 1, 2007
Anodized brass wire
Walter Oltmann

Untitled, 1982
Acrylic, spray paint and oil stick on canvas
Jean-Michel Basquiat

Warhol/Basquiat, NYC August 1986
wowe (Wolfgang Wesener)

Birdcage
Wood, metal, ivoyr
Late Qing dynasty (1644-1991) or Republican period (1850-1920)

Leda and the Swan, probably after 1915 and before 1923
Oil on canvas
John Covert

Morning, probably 1933
Oil on burlap
Morris Graves

Morning is a deeply affecting image of retreat, of the pain of facing the light, of the fear of facing the day.

Catfish clan figure, 19th-20th century
Wood, polycrhome
Melanesian, Papua New Guinea, Guam River Region, probably Breri or Igana people

Seattle Art Museum

June 15th, 2018

The way we dream in the digital age

The Humble Fabulist5 Comments

In Japanese

Red-Eyed Tribe, 2000
Digital ink-jet print
Chiho Aoshima, b. 1974

With no formal training in art, Chiho Aoshima made her debut as an artist with a series of digital prints that were created by her masterful use of Adobe Illustrator. Originally designed as an advertisement for an Issey Miyake fashion show, this work features red-eyed nymphs in a fantasy land. 

”A member of Takashi Murakami’s Kaikai Kiki collective, Chiho Aoshima is part of a group of young Japanese artists whose work investigates-and indeed is fueled by-Japan’s obsession-inducing anime and manga culture. Aoshima uses Macintosh illustration software to produce cartoon-like images that merge traditional elements of Japanese art with the latest computer design techniques. This large digital print appropriates the traditional Japanese handscroll format to create a surreal landscape of biomorphic shapes, flying caterpillars and inverted mountains. Aoshima’s world is inhabited by red-eyed females in contemporary (circa 2000) Japanese fashions, infusing the cult of cuteness with a slightly more sinister subtext.”

The digital print is 19 5/8 x 138 in. (49.8 x 350.5 cm). You can see it in full length here.

Source: SAM Collection

Seattle Art Museum

June 15th, 2018