Muse/News: Captivating at SAM, Art vs. Tech, and Poignant Flags

SAM News

“Why you should see Seattle Art Museum’s new Giacometti show”: Gayle Clemans for the Seattle Times on the “captivating” Alberto Giacometti: Toward the Ultimate Figure, now on view at SAM.

“…Giacometti’s subject matter was actually the matter of subjectivity: How each one of us, as an individual, relates to the world around us and acts within it. For decades, Giacometti focused on rendering the human body in order to reveal—or discover—something about the human condition, very often his own.”

Robert Rutherford, Manager of Public Engagement, was interviewed on KING5 morning TV about Summer at SAM at the Olympic Sculpture Park. And our neighbors at South Sound Magazine also recommend the free, family-friendly series.

Hey, have you explored Visit Seattle’s most recent Official Visitors Guide? You can “flip” through (or request an actual physical copy) of this fantastic resource for both visitors and locals. SAM happenings across our three locations are well represented. 

Local News

That’s a wrap! This past weekend saw the return of the Seattle Art Fair. SAM director Amada Cruz is quoted in this Cultured preview and Crosscut’s Brangien Davis and Margo Vansynghel reported on the “sights and sounds” of the first day. Jas Keimig of The Stranger and Gayle Clemans for the Seattle Times both reported on the fair’s satellite event, Forest for the Trees. 

The Seattle Times’ Erik Lacitis on “the turbulent, poignant legacy of Peter Bevis”; the sculptor most associated with his doomed quest to save the Kalakala ferry has died at the age of 69.

In addition to the whirlwind tour of the Seattle Art Fair and winning a Rabkin Foundation Award, Crosscut’s Margo Vansynghel also reported on the controversy surrounding a curatorial proposal put forward—and later taken back—by the Museum of Museums for a show featuring art solely by employees of Amazon or Microsoft. 

“The call for art and its cancellation have spawned so many responses and comments elsewhere on the social media app—both in support of and against—that it can be dizzying to track. The comments reveal the pain of a struggling art community, as well as deep fissures in how artists and art advocates think the sector should engage with criticism, tech and philanthropy.”

Inter/National News

“Turned the mundane into the monumental”: Pop artist Claes Oldenburg has died at the age of 93. SAM is proud to have many of his works in the collection

Tiffany Midge for the New Yorker on the “Indigenous gaze” of Apsáalooke artist Wendy Red Star. SAM will soon debut a new work by the artist in October as part of its reinstalled American art galleries, American Art: The Stories We Carry

Tlingit and Unangax̂ artist Nicholas Galanin is also creating a new work for American Art: The Stories We Carry that will debut in 2023 at SAM; here’s his recent New York gallery show reviewed by the New York Times

“‘I would stand up for that flag,’ an artist commented on a social media post featuring a photo of Nicholas Galanin’s ‘White Flag’ (2022), a sculpture with a polar bear rug mounted on a rough wooden staff. At a time when flags representing nations and political causes feel particularly fraught, ‘White Flag,’ in Galanin’s exhibition ‘It Flows Through’ at Peter Blum, feels poignant.”

And Finally

From the farm to the Tonight Show.

– Rachel Eggers, SAM Associate Director of Public Relations

Image: Chloe Collyer.

Object of the Week: Slow Cooker

With these works, we have created art pieces that serve as cultural and historical artifacts that value and document the experiences, struggles, and achievements of those who have found their way, often through migration and exceptional sacrifice, to new places where they now work to contribute meaningfully within their communities.

  – Margarita Cabrera

Soft vinyl covers the customary porcelain, metal, and glass of this trusty kitchen crockpot. While the clear lid is left exposed, plush fabric replaces the sturdy handles and appliance parts. Red stitching adds a playful contrast against the sky blue base, and the remaining long, loose threads speak to homemade craftsmanship.

Slow Cooker is part of artist Margarita Cabrera’s soft sculpture series, which reimagines commercial objects from bicycles and cars to household tools and cleaning supplies. Cabrera was a featured artist in Pop Departures, a 2014 exhibition at SAM that explored contemporary artists who look to Pop Art for artistic inspiration or critique. The malleable and everyday forms of Cabrera’s sculptures draw on stylistic elements of works by Pop artist Claes Oldenburg.

Cabrera is an artist, activist, and community organizer. She infuses her art with socio-political and personal reflection as a Mexican American. Topics of cultural identity, migration, violence, inclusivity, labor, and empowerment—with a focus on US-Mexico border issues—are at the forefront of Cabrera’s art practice.[1] In her transformative justice initiatives, Cabrera organizes artistic collaborations in local communities. For her 2010 outreach project, Space in Between, Cabrera partnered with Latinx immigrants from Mexico and Central America to create sculptures of Southwestern US desert plants.[2] Using fabric from the uniforms of Border Patrol forces, the soft sculptures recall embroidery techniques from Los Tenangos, Hidalgo, Mexico and traditions of Otomi Indigenous communities. The workshops empowered the participants to share their journeys of tremendous danger and sacrifice, crafting dialogues of unity, healing, and resistance.

Playful and interactive, the collapsible textures of Slow Cooker invite touch and public engagement. The bold, bright colors are illustrative of traditional woven Mexican designs. Slow Cooker provokes us, and perhaps teases us, as consumers and viewers, to reconsider these unassuming objects and the hands that made them. Cabrera shatters the invisibility of immigrant laborers in factory, farm, and service jobs—engaging the need for active listening and policy change at the ground level, igniting a political conversation that remains urgent and necessary.

Rachel Kim, SAM Curatorial Intern

[1] “Margarita Cabrera.” © Margarita Cabrera, https://www.margaritacabrera.com/sample-page/
[2]“Margarita Cabrera: Space in Between. February 10 – June 10, 2018.” Ruth and Elmer Wellin Museum of Art, Hamilton College, https://www.hamilton.edu/wellin/exhibitions/detail/margarita-cabrera-space-in-between-1-1-1-1-1-1-1
Image: Slow Cooker, 2003, Margarita Cabrera, vinyl, thread, and appliance parts, 13 × 8 × 10 in., Modern Art Acquisition Fund and General Acquisition Fund, 2015.7.2 © Artist or Artist’s Estate
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