Muse/News: Ikat Stories, Arreguín’s Legacy, and Smith’s America

SAM News

“A stunning visual experience”: Susan Kunimatsu reviews Ikat: A World of Compelling Cloth at the Seattle Art Museum for International Examiner. You’ve got one month left to see the exhibition before it closes Monday, May 29. 

“…Take the time to immerse yourself in the individual artworks and they will reveal their stories: how, why and by whom they were made.”

Local News

Seattle-based critic and memoirist Claire Dederer is interviewed in Esquire about her new book about what to do with problematic art.

Seattle’s Child lays out “14 fun and pretty spots for a family picnic in Seattle or the Eastside,” including our favorite: Volunteer Park, the stunning setting of the Seattle Asian Art Museum. 

Sad news via The Seattle Times’ Margo Vansynghel: “Influential Northwest artist Alfredo Arreguín dies at 88.”

“With his distinct blend of Pacific Northwest iconography, and Mexican and Asian influences, Arreguín became a key figure in Pacific Northwest art history and paved the way for a generation of artists of Latin American descent.”

Inter/National News

Ted Loos of The New York Times reports on the gift of art and funds made to museums and causes across the country by Jack Shear, the widower of the artist Ellsworth Kelly. The expansive gift honors the centenary of Kelly’s birth. SAM is among the recipients of $50,000, which will support the museum’s mission. 

“Making it happen was no picnic”: Emily Anthes for The New York Times on the American Museum of Natural History’s new exhibit of leafcutter ants (yes, there are pictures).

“Redefines what ‘American’ means”: The New York Times’ Jillian Steinhauer on Memory Map, the overdue retrospective of Jaune Quick-To-See Smith that just opened at the Whitney Museum of American Art and travels to SAM in 2024.

“But if the current wave of attention has opened up new possibilities for Indigenous artists, particularly younger ones, credit is due less to the institutions than to Smith and others of her generation for the tireless work they did to ‘break the buckskin ceiling,’ in her words. The Whitney retrospective makes that clear.”

And Finally

“The Harry Belafonte Speech That Changed My Life” by Charles M. Blow.

– Rachel Eggers, SAM Associate Director of Public Relations

Photo: Alborz Kamalizad.

Muse/News: Inside SAM, Sondheim’s Tempos, and Halsey’s Monument

SAM News

Seattle’s Child shares “The Definitive Guide to Inside Activities With Kids,” including a visit to the Seattle Art Museum.

Local News

The 20th annual Seattle Black Film Festival (SBFF) is now playing at Langston Hughes Art Center through April 30; South Seattle Emerald has the details on what’s screening

Are you keeping up with Nancy Guppy of Art Zone? In the latest episode, she visits the Frye Art Museum’s exhibition of Katherine Bradford paintings, on view through May 14. 

Misha Berson for Crosscut on how performers manage to “survive” Sondheim’s dizzying tempos in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, now playing at the 5th Avenue Theatre. 

“‘If you saw my score, which I always keep close at hand, you’d see I’ve written breathe! Breathe! Breathe! all over it,’ says [Anne] Allgood, who has studied and now teaches singing technique. ‘I use the inhalations as a chance to relax, reset, refuel, even if they are very quick.’”

Inter/National News

Have a listen to The Week in Art, The Art Newspaper’s podcast; this edition, they talk about Hilma af Klint and Piet Mondrian: Forms of Life at the Tate Modern, a reconstructed Roman gateway, and Jaune Quick-to-See Smith: Memory Map, which just opened at the Whitney Museum of American Art and heads to SAM in 2024. 

“We Need More Nuance When Talking About Repatriation”: Patricia Marroquin Norby pens an opinion piece for Hyperallergic reflecting on her last three years as the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s first-ever curator of Native American art.

LA-based artist Lauren Halsey has debuted a new monument on the roof garden of the Met. Halsey was the winner of SAM’s 2021 Gwendolyn Knight and Jacob Lawrence Prize and the museum acquired her Untitled (2022), a work of hand-carved gypsum that resembles the new monument.

“Where the ancient Egyptians covered the walls of their tombs and shrines with illustrations from the Book of the Dead, Halsey and her team of artists and artisans have created an immersive Book of Everyday Life, one focused on, but by no means restricted to, contemporary Black urban existence, evoked and preserved in words and images carved into hundreds of concrete panels.”

And Finally

The Seattle Times’ Moira Macdonald guides you through Seattle Independent Bookstore Day on April 29. 

– Rachel Eggers, SAM Associate Director of Public Relations

Photo: Chloe Collyer.

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