Art and Adventure
I’ve been down to the Ancestral Modern: Australian Aboriginal Art from the Kaplan & Levi Collection exhibition a few times now. I find the paintings spellbinding and mysterious. They remind me of those Magic Eye images from the 1990s—those 2D images that if you blurred your eyes and stared long enough, a secret 3 dimensional world would magically appear to the patient viewer. Like that art of yore, I find myself mesmerized by the paintings in the SAM exhibition, trying to see the story or the place or the songlines the artist is representing.
Traci departing from Golden Gardens, Seattle.
Recently, a colleague at SAM set off on a walkabout, of sorts, of her own. SAM’s Web Programmer/Software Engineer, Traci, and her friend—also Tracy—have set off on an epic journey up the inside passage. They are kayaking from Seattle to Ketchikan. They are carrying most of their food and supplies in their kayaks—50 days worth in 50 gallons (you can imagine what kind of culling that might entail). And they will only supplement and refill whenever there is a town close enough to the water to do so.
View Inside Passage 2012 in a larger map
They’ve mapped out a tentative route (yellow pins), plus some optional campsites as recommended by other paddlers (blue and pink pins). As Traci says, “I didn’t think I’d find the charts so mesmerizing, especially as I’ve spent time on Google Maps, charting applications, and smaller book-sized charts, but having big table-size maps to wander in is strangely compelling.”
The Tracies also have a blog and a SPOT Connect Satellite Communicator that allows those of us at home, to track their journey. They set off on June 24th and have been on the road, erm, open water, for 47 days now—and I learned that they reached their destination, just this morning! I’ve been keeping tabs on them and following their progression and as I look at the map with their path on it I can’t help but be reminded of the paintings in the Ancestral Modern exhibition. All the undulating lines of the British Columbia coastline and organic shapes are evocative of the similarly undulating and vibrating paintings of place by the aboriginal artists. But not only that, both the map and the paintings evoke place, journey, story and adventure.
“Mountain Devil Lizard Dreaming”, 1996, Kathleen Petyarr, Australian Aboriginal, Anmatyerr people, Utopia, Central Desert, Northern Territory, born ca. 1940, synthetic polymer paint on canvas, 48 1/16 x 48 1/16 inches, Seattle Art Museum, Promised gift of Margaret Levi and Robert Kaplan. © Kathleen Petyarr, photo: iocolor, Seattle.
In drawing the connection between the map and the paintings, the Australian paintings seemed to snap into focus for me. Like those Magic Eye paintings of yore, something in my brain needed to switch and now I feel like I can zoom in and out (like a Google Map) and I can see what is being represented. All at once I can see the lizard skin, footsteps in the sand and the cracks in the desert sand simultaneously. If you haven’t already, drop by the Ancestral Modern exhibition, on view through September 2nd. And maybe like me you’ll be transported to Australia or into some fantastical story.
Follow the Tracies as they navigate the wild blue yonder.
Liz Stone, Digital Media Support Specialist