Frida Kahlo Archives - SAM Stories

Translating the Untranslatable: Emerging Arts Leader Amelia Ossorio Reflects

Seattle Art Museum on Sep 30 2024

National Hispanic Heritage Month is celebrated annually between September 15 and October 15 in recognition of the contributions and influence of Hispanic and Latine Americans to the history, culture, and achievements of the United States. In recognition, we’re sharing this essay from a recent Emerging Arts Leader Intern. Learn more about SAM internships.

In memory of Ayşenur Ezgi Eygi, my UW Middle East Studies classmate who was killed by military on September 6, 2024, while volunteering in the West Bank. May we continue to be inspired by her memory to advocate for justice and a free and interconnected world.

Often, when I share that I am taking advanced Farsi classes or talk about my dedication to Persian-English poetry translation projects, I am met with confused stares. I’m a rising senior at the University of Washington majoring in Middle East Studies, with a concentration in Persian and minoring in Art History. With the mentorship of my professor, Dr. Aria Fani, I am inspired to disprove the myth of “untranslatability”: that art, languages, cultures, and people are irreconcilable and at odds with each other. This was a perspective I wanted to bring to my Emerging Arts Leader Internship in Public Relations and Outreach at the Seattle Art Museum this past spring and summer. Over the course of 20 weeks, I worked closely with Rachel Eggers, SAM’s Associate Director of Public Relations, on efforts to invite local Seattle communities into the museum for the summer exhibition, Poke in the Eye: Art of the West Coast Counterculture.

During my time as an EAL intern, I focused on researching and executing an outreach plan with local contacts and partners, and I gathered insight into cultivating community partnerships between the museum and the public. Towards the end of my internship, my focus shifted to synthesizing my data into a report that can support the museum’s future outreach strategies. As a freelance artist with a following of nearly 60,000 on Instagram and more than 10 million views on my original comics, illustrations, and animations, I am keenly aware of the power of social media as a tool for connecting art with the public, and I wanted to bring this knowledge and creativity to support SAM’s outreach efforts.

Much of my internship inspired me to reflect on the intersections of the art museum as an institution and how it connects to our dynamic lives, passions, and experiences. In addition to my educational experiences, I volunteer with Peyvand Non-Profit Organization, which serves youth arts and cultural programming for Seattle’s Iranian and Afghan families. For the past two years, on behalf of Peyvand, I have designed educational posters about the Persian New Year to be displayed in several King County Library System locations. Peyvand director Shahrzad Shams has been a mentor to me as I develop as an artist and advocate, and my work with the organization has contributed to my understanding of partnership work.

SAM invites all EAL interns to create a gallery tour or presentation to share their contributions to the museum with the public. For my gallery tour, I drew inspiration from a personal connection to artwork on view in the museum. I highlighted two contemporary Mexican artists in SAM’s collection, Diego Rivera and Alfredo Arreguín, and presented a gallery tour on the public outreach plan I created inspired by the artists’ works. I was also inspired by my grandfather, Abel García Ossorio, who was the first Mexican American in the US to earn a PhD in clinical psychology after being rejected from colleges for being Hispanic. Using my time at the institution and access to its artworks by Rivera—two of which are on view in American Art: The Stories We Carry—encouraged me to learn more about the Mexican muralist movement and the hectic period following the Mexican Revolution, as I better my understanding of the history and political and social instability that led to members of my family immigrating to the US from northern Mexico in the 1920s.

As an artist, I often prefer expressing myself and experiences visually through illustrations and comics. So to accompany my reflection, I also completed an illustration inspired by one of the works from my SAM gallery tour, Stalemate (1973) by Alfredo Arreguín (b. Michoacán, Mexico, 1935–2023), a Seattle-based artist who unfortunately passed away last year. The oil painting blends Pacific Northwest flora and fauna with other symbols and familiar images from Arreguín’s upbringing in Michoacán and Mexico City. A new work in SAM’s collection, the painting was on view in Poke in the Eye this summer.

I am drawn to the memory-like, stream-of-consciousness quality to the original painting, and I decided to create my own illustrated interpretation with symbols from my experiences and learnings at SAM this spring and summer. During my SAM internship, I visited Mexico City, which influenced my gallery tour. I represented this with a concha, an iconic Mexican sweet bread pastry; a cafecito; and a book on Frida Kahlo, who had also been a muse for Arreguín throughout his career. My Persian and Iranian studies at the University of Washington also guided me during my internship, and I illustrated a book that my language professor Dr. Fani had lent me for the quarter: Paintings and Designs of Sohrab Sepehri. I paid visual homage to the original painting by incorporating drawings of flowers, fruit, stars, and a mountain, but added my own flair: the flowers in my piece are nasturtiums, my mother’s favorites, and cherries represent the summer fruit of the orchard in my extended family. The mountain, originally a landmark of Mt. Rainier, painted by Arreguín, in my version became inspired by the illustration of a mountain on the cardboard box of Alvand on my tea shelf, named after a mountain range in western Iran, which is also a brand of sugar cubes to mix in hot chai and coffee called qand in Farsi. The cactus entering on the left represents both my heritage connection to Mexico and my online handle (@sensitive.cactus). Instead of flowing branches, I instead wrote in Persian calligraphy two words that are very meaningful to me and frequently appear in poetry: عشق “eshq” (love) and هیچ “heech” (nothing). While the original painting incorporates images of butterflies, which to me represent completion and fulfillment, I opted to draw a caterpillar, representing personal growth and embracing the in-between process.

I would like to thank my friends, family, and SAM staff for their support along the way, which was pivotal to my experience. I am appreciative of SAM staff who made me feel welcomed into the new environment and offered advice and understanding.

– Amelia Ossorio, Emerging Arts Leader Intern in Public Relations and Outreach

Photo: L.Fried. Illustation: Amelia Ossorio.

Remembering Alfredo Arreguín

Seattle Art Museum on May 10 2023

“Art is life. It is a vessel that allows me to express my perception of the world, my sense of beauty and my social concerns–which, I believe, are shared by many other persons around the world.”
– Alfredo Arreguín, in an interview with Artophilia

Everyone at the Seattle Art Museum was very saddened to learn of the recent passing of beloved Seattle painter Alfredo Arreguín at the age of 88. Acclaimed for his lavish, intricately patterned, and highly symbolic canvases, he was one of the Pacific Northwest’s most prominent Chicano artists. Last year, I had the pleasure of meeting Alfredo when the museum purchased his artwork, Four Self-Portraits (1995) for the collection. We were in the midst of checklist development for our major project to reimagine the museum’s American art galleries and were struck by the underrepresentation of Mexican American artists in the museum’s collection—particularly given the breadth of this community in our region. Jake Prendez, owner and co-director of Nepantla Cultural Arts Gallery, a member of our Advisory Circle for American Art: The Stories We Carry, and a wonderful resource on Seattle’s Chicanx community and its artists, invited me to his gallery to view Alfredo’s work. I was hooked. One visit to the artist’s studio later, and we were on our way to acquiring the first of his paintings to enter SAM’s collection.

Alfredo was born in Morelia, Michoacán in 1935, and was encouraged by his grandparents (who raised him) to begin painting at a young age. When he was nine, he enrolled in the Morelia School of Fine Art, eventually moving on to the prestigious Escuela Nacional Preparatoria at the University of Mexico, from which he graduated in 1956. That same year, encouraged by a local family, he came to Seattle and obtained a permanent visa so that he could attend Edison Tech (now Seattle Central College) to study English, earn his US high school diploma, and enroll at the University of Washington to study architecture. When a condition of his visa made him eligible for the draft, he entered the army and was stationed in Korea and Japan. Upon his discharge in 1960, he returned to architectural studies, eventually transitioning to interior design and, finally, the School of Art. While there, he studied alongside celebrated artists Alden Mason, Michael Spafford, and, for a time, Elmer Bischoff. After receiving his MFA in 1969, he settled permanently in Seattle, becoming a force among artists and an integral member of the local Chicanx community.

Alfredo is celebrated for his astonishing signature style: exuberant, mosaic-inflected, all-over compositions comprised of motifs derived from the rainforests and Indigenous cultures of Mexico, the compositions of Hokusai and Hiroshige, and the nature and topography of the Pacific Northwest. His work is closely aligned with American Pattern Painting of the 1970s, yet it is also deeply personal and symbolic. A series of paintings of historical figures Emiliano Zapata and Frida Kahlo, for example, pay homage to activists whose interests resonate with his own, while a body of landscape paintings encode the flora, fauna, and natural beauty that inspire him. For him, painting was a form of therapy, a flow activity to which he returned every day.

Arreguín’s singular—even autobiographical—approach is nowhere more evident than in his large number of self-portraits, of which Four Self-Portraits is perhaps the most extreme and challenging example. A tapestry of tropical flowers, birds, leaves, arabesques, and ancient symbols interlace to camouflage four distinct portraits of Arreguín: two at the top and two more, mirrored, at the bottom—literally merging the artist with the places and cultures of his ancestry. Remembering Alfredo, I find myself seeing this engrossing painting afresh, grateful that SAM now shares in the legacy of this distinguished artist. Its acquisition will shape our collection strategy for years to come, as we amplify our efforts to bring in artworks—both historical and contemporary—by Chicanx and Latinx artists.

– Theresa Papanickolas, SAM Ann M. Barwick Curator of American Art

Photos: Alborz Kamalizad. Four Self-Portraits, 1995, Alfredo Arreguin, Oil on canvas, Painting: 49 3/8 x 42 3/8 in. (125.4 x 107.6 cm) Frame: 55 x 43 in. (139.7 x 109.2 cm), Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Art Acquisition Fund, 2022.13 (c) Alfredo Arreguin.

Muse/News: Imogen’s Influence, Painting Last Meals, and Finding a Dürer

Rachel Eggers on Nov 22 2021

SAM News

Imogen Cunningham: A Retrospective is now on view at SAM! Carrie Dedon, SAM’s Associate Curator of Modern & Contemporary Art, spoke with KUOW’s Kim Malcolm about Cunningham’s life and work. And Crosscut’s Margo Vansynghel on “h ow Seattle’s Imogen Cunningham changed photography forever.” She spoke with six local artists about Cunningham’s influence and legacy.

“Cunningham’s headstrong nature would come to define her long career as a fine arts photographer: She never hesitated to experiment, even if it meant sailing against the wind as a female photographer in a male-dominated industry.”

Jasmine Jamillah Mahmoud for Variable West on “the boundless light of Black children” shining in Barbara Earl Thomas: The Geography of Innocence. Also: Check out the show’s accompanying book, featuring an essay by the artist.

“I want everybody to be a little bit off their rocker, a little bit shocked, a little bit dazzled, a little bit held. That’s what I get to do.” – Barbara Earl Thomas

Local News

“Why they give.” In the spirit of holiday giving, 425 Business checks in with local philanthropists about their charity practice. The Banks family is featured; Dr. Cherry A. Banks is a SAM trustee.

For Thanksgiving, Crosscut once again highlights the bounty of Native art on view in the area, including Duane Linklater: mymothersside at the Frye Art Museum, new public art at Climate Pledge Arena, film screenings, holiday markets, and much more.

“A painterly catalog of the death penalty in America”: The Seattle Times’ David Gutman on Julie Green’s The Last Supper, now on view at the Bellevue Arts Museum.

“You think you’re looking at something that’s very blasé and very familiar and comforting and then it’s something that really jolts you once you actually understand what you’re looking at,” said Lane Eagles, associate curator at the museum. “I think the idea is to sort of lull you into this sense of comfort so that you’re sort of disarmed and that that’s when the reality that every single plate is a dead person hits you.”

Inter/National News

From NPR: “Frida Kahlo’s Diego y yo, a painting of herself with her husband’s image on her forehead, sold for $34.9 million in a Sotheby’s auction… It’s the most money ever paid at auction for a work by a Latin American artist.” Speaking of: Don’t miss Imogen Cunningham’s portrait of Kahlo on view at SAM!

The New York Times reviews The Loft Generation, a memoir by artist Edith Schloss discovered after her death; she brings to life the mid-century New York scene, including Frisson artists such as Franz Kline and Willem de Kooning.

One of Muse/News’ favorite genres: A man purchased a drawing at an estate sale for $30; it may be a Albrecht Dürer worth $50 million.

“On a lark, he bought it for $30. At the very least, it was ‘a wonderfully rendered piece of old art, which justified purchasing it,’ he recalled.”

And Finally

The shaggy appeal of Kurt Vonnegut.

– Rachel Eggers, SAM Associate Director of Public Relations

Photo: L. Fried.

Object of the Week: Focal Point

Traci Timmons on Nov 11 2021

This week’s object is from the SAM Libraries’ collections. The Dorothy Stimson Bullitt Library and McCaw Foundation Library collect book arts such as photobooks, artists’ books, zines, and broadsides. A broadside is a large sheet of paper printed on only one side. Historically, they were ephemeral works plastered onto walls or folded into pamphlets and distributed. Typical broadsides include public decrees and proclamations, event posters, commentaries, or advertisements. Today, broadsides are an important artistic form created via various printmaking and hand-drawn processes which are held by libraries and museums worldwide.

Focal Point [Imogen Cunningham] is a broadside from the Bullitt Library’s collection created by Tacoma artists, Chandler O’Leary and Jessica Spring. The work is part of their limited-edition broadside series entitled Dead Feminists. Originating in 2008, they have released 31 broadsides focused on historical feminists: political figures, activists, environmentalists, scientists, artists, and more. Each broadside is letterpress-printed on a Vandercook Universal One press from hand-drawn lettering and illustrations and includes a quote as well as biographical information about the subject(s).

If you’re familiar with the series, you might notice that unlike the other works printed on white paper, Focal Point [Imogen Cunningham] is one of only two printed on black paper. This decision helped the artists “pull the focus” onto Cunningham’s quote: “The seeing eye is the important thing.” O’Leary and Spring thought it “provided a beautiful backdrop for a tribute to someone who spent her life creating black-and-white images.”¹ Lettering was done with a metallic ink (a recipe that Spring developed) that includes real gold powder. This broadside was printed in an edition of 164 as a nod towards Cunningham being a founding member of Group f/64, a group of photographers devoted to exhibiting and promoting a new direction in photography. F/64 refers to the small aperture setting on the large format camera used by the group’s members.

When asked what drew the artists to Cunningham, Spring said, “The print was made in 2014, and we were definitely feeling the pull of social media, a world full of distractions, and a desire to focus back on our work as artists. As makers ourselves, we recognize the power of observation and the artist’s eye.”² And observe, they did. Every aspect of this work was carefully considered, from the choice of metallic silver filigree that mimics the traditional silver-gelatin photographic process to the pastiche of images drawn from Cunningham’s photographic subjects. If you look closely, you might recognize several images from Cunningham’s work in SAM’s collection—Magnolia Blossom (Magnolia Blossom, Tower of Jewels) (1925, 89.67) and Frida Kahlo, Painter 3 (1931, 89.28).³ Look for these and other images when you visit Imogen Cunningham: A Retrospective, on view at SAM from November 18 through February 6, 2022.

In addition to this single broadside, the Bullitt Library also holds O’Leary and Spring’s book, Dead Feminists: Historic Heroines in Living Color (Sasquatch Books, 2016), which details the entire series in brilliant color and a set of reproduction postcards. Currently, the SAM Libraries are still closed to visitors, but we encourage you to see these items in person when we reopen. In the meantime, the book and the reproduction postcards are available in the SAM Shop during the run of Imogen Cunningham: A Retrospective. The entire Dead Feminists series is also currently on view at the University of Washington Libraries, Special Collections in an exhibition titled, And Then She Said: Voices of Feminists Past and Present.

– Traci Timmons, SAM Senior Librarian

Image: Focal Point [Imogen Cunningham], 2014, Chandler O’Leary and Jessica Spring, Broadside print, 46 x 26 cm, Image courtesy of the artists. Magnolia Blossom (Magnolia Blossom, Tower of Jewels), 1925, Imogen Cunningham, Gelatin silver print, Img/sht: 11 1/4 x 8 1/4 in., Gift of John H. Hauberg, 89.67 © Imogen Cunningham Trust.

1 O’Leary, Chandler and Jessica Spring. “Focal Point.” Dead Feminists blog, March 18, 2014. http://www.deadfeminists.com/focal-point/.

2 Email interview with Jessica Spring and Chandler O’Leary, November 2, 2021.

3 Frida Kahlo became the subject of O’Leary and Spring’s 26th Dead Feminist broadside, Estados Divididos, in 2017.