Art Event this Sunday

We know you have your Saturday plans covered with all the REVERBfest fun you’ll be having, but here’s a good hangover-friendly thing to do on Sunday. The Anne Bonny, that awesome junk shop/art gallery on Capitol Hill is hosting an art show of the late, Elena Steuber’s, unfinished project, Tragedy Brought Me Up. Her friends and family helped complete her vision and turned the unveiling into a party with food, cocktails, a raffle, and tons of crafts for sale. There will also be a silent auction of the art pieces with all the proceeds benefiting the Elena Steuber Memorial Fund at the Rock and Roll Camp for Girls in Portland, an amazing organization Steuber loved. Drop by, it should be a fun party. The Anne Bonny, 1355 E. Olive Way, 4-9 p.m.

Topics: Art Event

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Tonight: Political T-Shirts by Artists, An Obama Fundraiser at Catherine Person Gallery

Image: Fay Jones

We Seattleites live in a political bubble. Even though just about everyone we know is as in love with Barack Obama as we are, the poll numbers for this presidential race, nation-wide, are closer than we'd like to believe.

Catherine Person Gallery hosts a fundraising event tonight, Fired Up, Ready to Wear, featuring artist-designed T-shirts for sale. Organized by artist Fay Jones, with Pam Keely (an Obama Delegate to the Democratic National Convention in Denver, CO), the event will feature T-shirts made by more than 40 Northwest artists, on sale for $25 each. All funds raised go to the Barack Obama Campaign for Change.

Participating artists include Fay Jones, Pam Kelly, Linda Davidson, Karen Ganz, Juan Alonso, Gail Grinnell, Kay Rood, Saya Moriyasu, Juliana Heyne, Ruth Tomlinson, Elizabeth Sandvig, Claudia Fitch, Marian Webb, and Robert Jones.

Not a slogan T-shirt wearer? One of these works just might hang nicely on your wall.

Thursday, September 25 from 6-8 p.m.
Catherine Person Gallery
The event is free and open to the public.

See Aimee Curl's take, here, in this week's Wire.

Topics: Art Event and Dress For Success

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On Not Reviewing Shrek: Ethics and Greed

Personally I think it's a bit ridiculous that we in the press have some kind of ethical "understanding" with restaurants/theaters that we will give them time before reviewing them. They're charging the public (full price in many cases), the public's going to say what they think online and elsewhere, so why don't we just go ahead and have our say as well? We can always go back and revise our opinion as necessary.

But as is being demonstrated in the case of Shrek The Musical (which "opened" but not really last night), the public is invited to spend their money, the Space Needle flag flies, press attention is invited, but critics are expected to hold off. I asked Longenbaugh to weigh in. (His profile of Shrek star Sutton Foster is in the paper this week.) His thoughts are after the jump.

Continue reading "On Not Reviewing Shrek: Ethics and Greed"

Topics: Art Event and News

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Reminder For Tonight: Susan Robb At Lawrimore

Reminder for tonight: Susan Robb, whose mug was on the cover of our Spring Arts issue, will be unveiling The Challenge Nature Provides, a collection of photography and installations at Lawrimore Project.

For anyone who read our profile on Robb, this show will feature the much-much-anticipated installation piece she designed to be powered by her dealer's poop (or, as my boss-man Mark Fefer dubbed it: Crap Power). Prepare your mind...

Topics: Art Event

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Slideshow: Classic Crumb, From Mr. Natural to Janis Joplin

Click here for a slideshow, featuring some Crumb classics.

From The Weekly Wire:

"R. Crumb's Underground"
Where: Frye Art Museum, 704 Terry Ave., 622-9250, www.fryeart.org
When: Saturday through April 27
Cost: Free

I could never get into my brother�s comic books, with all those rippling, shaded muscles and dark backstories. Yet the 1960s cartoon caricatures of Robert Crumb, which did appeal to me�I even named my cat Fritz�had way more depth than all the shading in the world could have afforded my brother�s superheroes. With characters based on American archetypes�Flakey Foont, Angelfood McSpade, Devil Girl, Mr. Natural, Fritz the Cat�Crumb explored the complexities of the human condition. Of course, I didn�t entirely grasp all that when I was 10. The Frye�s "R. Crumb�s Underground" exhibit will be more than just comics, though; there�s a dark backstory to boot. �I was quite miserable for a good chunk of my youth,� Crumb told the San Francisco Chronicle. �I was chronically depressed between the ages of 17 and 25. Suicidal depressed � I felt like an invisible ghost moving but not able to affect anything around me � I lived those years on paper.�
— JEN HARPER

Topics: Art Event

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Wednesday, and Everyday: Giant Squid!

I'd like to to apologize to the hardworking people over at the downtown artspace McLeod Residence for incorrectly printing in this week's Wire that the reception for their current exhibit—artist Cassandra Nguyen's Giant Squid, along with Sami Khoury's "Glimpses of China" photographs—will be tonight. In fact, folks recited squid poetry and drank squid ink cocktails last Friday, an event I unfortunately missed due to Jersey Boys (post on that in a minute!).

The shows will be up through December 29. Once more, here's the poem by Tennyson, "The Kraken," that was printed as a preview.

"Below the thunders of the upper deep,
Far, far beneath in the abysmal sea,
His ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep
The Kraken sleepeth: faintest sunlights flee
About his shadowy sides; above him swell
Huge sponges of millennial growth and height;
And far away into the sickly light,
From many a wondrous and secret cell
Unnumber'd and enormous polypi
Winnow with giant arms the lumbering green.
There hath he lain for ages, and will lie
Battening upon huge sea-worms in his sleep,
Until the latter fire shall heat the deep;
Then once by man and angels to be seen,
In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die."

Now, if someone has the exact recipe of a squid ink cocktail, and a description of how said beverage tastes, my curiosity is raging!

Topics: Art Event

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TONIGHT: A Talk with PDL about Confessions

Jason Puccinelli, Jed Dunkerley, and Greg Lundgren, (A.K.A. PDL) staged "Portable Confession Units" this past summer at Bumbershoot. I for one, had a pretty fantastic (blind) conversation in one of their booths. Tonight these three artists visit CHAC as part of John Boylan's ongoing series of conversations about art.

Tonight's topic: Confessions
Monday, December 10, 7-9 p.m.
Capitol Hill Arts Center
Capitol Hill Arts Center (CHAC), 1621 12th Avenue
Free.

Topics: Art Event

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