 "It's my belief that history is a wheel. 'Inconstancy is my very essence,' says the wheel. Rise up on my spokes if you like but don't complain when you're cast back down into the depths. Good times pass away, but then so do the bad. Mutability is our tragedy, but it's also our hope. The worst of times, like the best, are always passing away."
Boethius The Consolation of Philosophy
It seems everyone in the blogosphere is summing up 2005 with various lists. It seems that at the end of the year we like to compile and compare disparate events to try and make sense of them. Below is an outline of the year that was in Seattle.
I. Kremlin Watching at SAM
a. Lisa Corrin, curator of modern and contemporary art at the Seattle Art Museum, left this fall to become director of the Williams College Art Museum in the Berkshires in northwestern Massachusetts. Williams College announced it on its Web site before SAM had a chance to make its own announcement of her departure. Corrin's been at SAM since 2001. She joins alumni like Trevor Fairbrother and Patterson Sims as ex-SAM curators.
b.Chiyo Ishikawa, SAM’s Chief Curator of the Collections/Curator of European Painting and Sculpture, became the museum’s new Deputy Director of Art. “We are thrilled that Chiyo is taking the artistic lead for the museum,... Her engaging personality, internationally-acclaimed scholarship and extraordinary leadership on the new installation of the permanent collection galleries for the downtown expansion make her the perfect fit for Deputy Director of Art.”
Mimi Gardner Gates Director SAM
II. Current Available Jobs at SAM
- Associate Museum Educator
- Director of Education
- Facilities Maintenance Engineer
- Modern and Contemporary Art Curator
- Senior Accountant
III. The Stranger vs. The Seattle Weekly
Both of Seattle's Alternative Weeklies lost their Visual Arts Critics this year. Nate Lippens left the Stranger for personal reasons, but hoped to stay in the area writing about visual art. Lippens was art critic at The Stranger for a year, a short time to have much of an impact. The Seattle Weekly announced that art critic Andrew Engelson left his post to devote more time to edit Washington Trails Magazine. Given the very uncertain future of the Weekly, I am sure this was an astute move on Andrew's part. In a related event Tablet ceased publication. The impact on Seattle was minimal.
IV. Awards, Honors and Kudos
a. 2005 Artist Trust/WSAC Fellowship Recipients
- Ross Palmer Beecher
- Jean Hicks
- Allen Moe
- Nancy Worden
- Mark Zirpel
b. 2005 Artist Trust GAP Recipients: Seattle Metro Visual Artists
- Neil Bashor
- Gretchen Bennett
- Francesca Berrini
- Judy Blanco
- Diem Chau
- Julie Custer
- Scott Fife
- Julia Haackt
- Annie Han/Daniel Mihalyo
- Jenny Heishman
- Patrick Holderfield
- Tomiko Jones
- Rich Lehl
- Hugo Ludena
- Jennifer McNeely
- Sequoia Miller
- Yuki Nakamura
- Rosemary Pham
- Margot Quan Knight
- Beb Reynol
- Sally Schuh
- Timea Tihanyi
- Laura Wright
- Robert Yoder
c. Artist Trust announced that painter Fay Jones of Seattle was the fifth recipient of the Twining Humber Award for Lifetime Artistic Achievement.
d. Portland artist Marie Watt was selected as the recipient of the 2005 Betty Bowen Memorial Award administered by SAM.
e. Joseph Park was this years winner of the 2005 Robert E. (Ned) Behnke Award
f. The sculpture/performance/installation trio of SuttonBeresCuller were the 2005 winners of The Stranger "Genius" Award
g. There were other artists who won national and even international recognition, I usually announce them right away on Art Radio Seattle
V. Other Institutions: Notable Exhibitions
VI. The Best Exhibition You Did Not See
Reily Brewster exhibited "Recent Work" for the first two weeks of September at the Jacob Lawrence Gallery on the UW campus. This showing of paintings, drawings, and prints left me unable to write about the work as I have never experienced anything like it in my life. I was and am speechless.
VII. News Broken by Art Radio Seattle
 VIII. Obituraries
In January, Philip Johnson
dies at age 98. The man who said "you cannot not know history'', loomed large in the world of architecture. His signature buildings, The Glass House, The AT & T Building and his late interest in biomorphic forms created controversy and stimulated debate.
In May, Jason Sprinkle
, also known as Sub-Culture Joe passed away. He was part of a group which famously put a ball & chain on the Hammering Man sculpture which stands in front of SAM. He was later involved with an incident in which a sculpture was mistaken for a bomb by local authorities at Westlake Plaza.
In July, Linda Farris lost her battle with cancer. As an art dealer from 1970 to 1995, she was largely responsible for turning Pioneer Square into Seattle's contemporary art center. After she closed the gallery that bore her name, she went on to assemble an international collection of the work of young artists through what she called the Contemporary Art Project [CAP] which was subsequently donated to SAM.
In November the sudden demise of Drake Deknatel
at the Cafe Paloma shocked the Seattle Visual Arts World. Eloquent and articulate, he helped drive the intellectual life of the creative community. He was represented by the Elizabeth Leach Gallery in Portland and the Catherine Person Gallery in Seattle.
2005 is rapidly heading to the bin of history. New Directors were appointed to run both CoCA and ConWorks, major funding gaps remain vis-a-vis the Visual vs. the Performing Arts, Galleries have come and gone, and the one constant will be that things change.
|
My StumbleUpon Page
