Our show Earth Matters runs through December 10 and includes the work of Portland artist Kelly Neidig. Long into the planning, neither Neidig nor the Tacoma Art Museum had any idea that the pieces in SAM Gallery’s show would also be selected for the prestigious Biennial. You can...
Hattie Branch, Blakemore Intern, returns to SAMart with an entry on the golden screens of the Kanō School. During the Momoyama Period (1573-1603), drastic change came to Japanese art from an unusual source: Western firearms. As warlords vied for control of the country, Portuguese traders...
In seventeenth-century Europe, many artists drained their paintings of bright colors, creating drama instead through strong contrasts of light and dark. This is striking in the ceremonial gravity of Saint Irene Tending the Wounded Saint Sebastian, attributed to the French artist Georges de La Tour...
I sit right next to Joshua Gosovich every morning at the reception desk in the administrative offices of the museum. We talk a lot. We are always updating each other on the most recent movies we’ve watched. We share ideas on how to cook unusual...
Since the opening of Luminous: The Art of Asia at SAM Downtown, we have been asking you to give your perspective on selected objects that are on display in the exhibition. A few weeks ago, we asked you to write about the Gyodo mask of...
Writing SAMart this week is Hattie Branch, Blakemore Intern for Japanese Art. This is her second entry in a series focusing on LUMINOUS: The Art of Asia. Employing vivid colors and energetic, abstract designs, Oribe ware is the most dynamic type of Japanese tea ware....
In the wake of recent un-natural disasters like the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, the Japanese nuclear catastrophe and the sinking of a barge in our very own Puget Sound last month, Exhibitions Director Barbara Shaiman has enlisted nine northwest based artists whose work addresses the...
Sometime in the 16th century, a ship was carefully loaded with tens of thousands of Vietnamese ceramics and set sail across the South China Sea. It never reached its destination—off Cham Island, near the port of Hoi An, the ship and its cargo sank. This...
Earth Hour is this Saturday night, March 23 from 8:30–9:30 pm. What is...
Before moving to Seattle to start my fall internship at the Seattle...
Cheryl Colopy discusses her book, Dirty, Sacred Rivers: Confronting South Asia’s Water Crisis,...