In 1920’s Seattle, two young sign painters shared a passion for art. As Japanese immigrants, they were denied U.S. citizenship and segregated from white society, but overcame those barriers to become respected members of Seattle’s fledgling arts community and achieve national recognition as artists. “Painting Seattle: Kamekichi Tokita and Kenjiro Nomura” on view through February [...]
February 19 marks the 70th anniversary of Executive Order 9066. In signing it, President Franklin Roosevelt, riding a wave of post-Pearl Harbor war hysteria and political expediency, ignored the U.S. constitution to arrest and imprison 110,000 U.S. citizens and legal aliens of Japanese descent without evidence or trial. Their three-year confinement in ten desolate rural [...]
In the years before and after World War II, there was a shop on the corner of Sixth and Main in the International District named Sagamiya. In the heart of Nihonmachi (Japantown), it specialized in “wagashi,” palm-sized confections of rice or wheat dough and sweet bean paste. Sagamiya and its homemade wagashi held a [...]
To celebrate his 70th birthday, Shiro Kashiba, the dean of Seattle sushi chefs has written a memoir. “Shiro: Wit, Wisdom and Recipes from a Sushi Pioneer” has something to appeal to everyone. It is the success story of a plucky, ambitious young immigrant making his way in a city with its own ambitions. It is [...]
A casual visitor to “After the Martini Shot” — Mika Tajima’s exhibition at the Seattle Art Museum — might see a room full of slick, edgy works of modern art: video monitors, photographers’ light fixtures on stanchions, sculptures, and paintings — some on the walls — several in a storage rack of unfinished lumber, as [...]
The Wing Luke Museum’s current exhibition, “Dual Nature: Contemporary Glass and Jewelry” sets out to explore the parallel histories of glass and jewelry in the Pacific Northwest through the work of eight emerging and established Asian and API artists. It succeeds in delving deeper than a simple compare-and-contrast of the two media to reveal dualities [...]
The window of James Harris Gallery in Pioneer Square is filled with what looks like a large urn. Once inside the gallery, it turns out to be the larger-than-life ceramic head of a young boy wearing a solemn expression and what might be a translucent yellow bathing cap. He faces into the gallery and down a hallway to a small room where the life-size figures of two more boys wait. Standing at the entrance to that room, the viewer can make eye contact with all three BOYS. This installation by ceramicist and sculptor Akio Takamori is a serious look at childhood innocence.
Many of us dress to express our identity, but who are we kidding when that shirt from the mall, and thousands like it were designed in Italy and sewn in the Philippines from fabric woven in India? This season’s athletic shoes, engineered in the U.S. and assembled in China, are sold in stores throughout North [...]
The work of Korean artist Boo Duck Lee has roots in two widely divergent eras. She makes sculpture of hanji, a paper made by hand in a tradition dating back thousands of years. She designs fabrics that are digitally printed using contemporary computer technology. Both are on display in the gallery at Kobo at Higo, [...]
When you enter “Migration”, artist Stephen Nguyen’s installation at Suyama Space, the first thing you see is a wall painted dark matte gray, almost black, pierced by dozen of holes, as if someone had taken a sledgehammer to it (see image above). Fist-sized and larger, the holes reveal steel studs, smashed wallboard, the gallery beyond, [...]
Last month, a fire in an apartment building in New York’s Chinatown made national headlines. Two people were killed, dozens injured, and some 200 left homeless by the blaze, which also left a trail of accusations of hazardous conditions, building code violations, and neglect. Catastrophes like this grab our attention and beg the question: could [...]
George Suyama’s second career as an art gallery owner began serendipitously, with a vacant room. In 1996, he moved his architectural firm into a century-old building in Belltown. The 1907 concrete structure was a challenging space with multiple levels above and below the street, connected by ramps. Formerly a livery stable that survived the Denny [...]
Over a forty-year career, George Suyama has established himself as one of the masters of Northwest architecture. A Seattle native, his designs are deeply rooted in the culture and environment of this region. He has built a body of work, mostly exquisitely detailed residences that elevate space to art. To further explore that creative ideal, [...]
A group of seven cryptic abstract sculptures make up “To be like that which you have,” the latest collaboration by artists Jason Hirata and Sol Hashemi, currently on view at Greg Kucera Gallery. Pieces of lumber, some raw, some painted white, are balanced at odd angles, held together under tension by bungee cords, rubber tie-downs [...]
Early in this century, Japanese immigrants cultivated the land east of Lake Washington into verdant acres of strawberries and other crops. World War II banished those farmers to internment camps, their fields to be taken over by suburban blocks, then high-rise buildings. This autumn, a strawberry field reappeared like a ghost in downtown Bellevue; in [...]
The Wing Luke Asian Museum offers us a rare firsthand look into the mind of an artist with “Yellow Terror: The Collections and Paintings of Roger Shimomura.” A Seattle native, Shimomura is an internationally acclaimed artist who challenges racial stereotypes through his work in painting, printmaking, installation and performance. He has dedicated his 40-year career [...]
