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THERE'S ART AND THEN THERE'S ART >>> There's art, and there's A-R-T art with capital letters. Or maybe I should say there's art and there's an art. How many times have you heard someone says cooking is an art or fly tying is an art or there's an art to ...
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BRING IT TACOMA ART MUSEUM >>> CBS Sunday Morning did a segment on the Chinese artist Ai Weiwei. I had never before heard of him, although I had seen some of his work without realizing whose work it was. Among other things, he collaborated on the design of the 2008 Summer
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ART ANALYSIS >>> I met painter William Quinn at an art opening and we talked a lot about art. Quinn is 83 years old. He's been around the block a time or two and knows of what he speaks. It's nice to talk to a painter about painting - a painter
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IT'S HAPPENING THIS WEEK >>> I would like to take this opportunity to personally invite my readers to see if I can walk the walk. You already know I talk the talk. Seven of my paintings will be included in a show called Azul at B2 Fine Art Gallery, which opens Thursday
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SOUTH SOUND ART SCENE >>> I don't remember the exact dates but I know that for two or three years the Kenneth J Minnaert Center for the Arts Gallery at South Puget Sound Community College was by far the best art gallery in the South Sound. Their annual juried shows featured
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LATE CHRISTMAS BOOK >>> If I had planned on recommending a book for art lovers for Christmas I would recommend the one that was given to me: Jackson Pollock: Works from the Museum of Modern Art, New York, and from European Collections by Volkmar Essers. If you're a Pollock fan you're probably
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INVENTING ABSTRACTION >>> New York City is the art capital of the world. I know that's disappointing; you thought Tacoma was, but it's not. The Museum of Modern Art located in said city, staid institution that I is, is the end-all and be-all authority on modern art - and in particular the
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A TOURIST GUIDE OF A DIFFERENT COLOR >>> By all appearances Sean Alexander is obsessed with drawing. He was a Foundation of Art Award nominee in 2008 and again in 2011. He is the former owner of the Helm Gallery. His work has been shown in many venues from galleries to
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A FACEBOOK GROUP TO JOIN >>> Mian Carvin is a painter and a writer and a filmmaker from Olympia. She lives on a farm just out of town with goats and chickens and cats and her life partner of many years. Her abstract paintings, which I happen to like very much,
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RUNNING HORSES AND TROMPE L'OEIL PAINTINGS >>> A friend posted a photo on Facebook this morning. It was a sculpture of two horses mounted on the wall in such a way to create the impression that they were coming out of the wall in a powerful burst of motion. The form
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HERE COME THE SHOWS >>> This past summer Oliver Doriss was named winner of the 2012 Foundation of Art Award. It's a long-overdue award considering Doriss' contributions to Tacoma's art community both as a practicing glass artist, a DJ and as a gallery owner. And how fitting considering that a large
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UP CLOSE & PERSONAL >>> As with the Andy Warhol exhibition at Tacoma Art Museum, there is much more to say about the Ray Turner exhibition at Museum of Glass than I can say in a single column. There are a number of principles that I have often written about which are
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BRILLO BOX HEADSLAP >>> Viewing and reviewing the Andy Warhol exhibition at Tacoma Art Museum brought back memories of fun times and heated arguments in college art departments in the '60s and '70s. The consensus opinion was that Warhol was not really so much an artist as he was a
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KNOW WHAT YOU'RE BUYING >>> Years ago my wife and I stopped in a Gig Harbor gallery where I saw photo-reproductions of paintings printed on canvas and sold as original art. You can find the same kind of thing in big art sales set up in parking lots or at places
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FUTURE THINGS ARE COMING >>> There's a special relationship between the late great Andy Warhol and the City of Tacoma - a relationship that may not make T-town look too good, but we're making up for it. In 1982, we had a shot at a Warhol flower design on the roof of
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The next art exhibit at Flow is a special in honor of Mary Shizuka Bottomley, co-founder of Puget Sound Sumi Aartists who recently passed away. "We all have such a special place in our hearts for her and I wanted to celebrate her work," says Flow owner Andrea Erickson. "She was
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I love award shows and best-of stories. Thumbing through the recent Best of Tacoma special issue of the Weekly Volcano was a lot of fun. Such competitive lists and awards allow us to see if other people agree with our choices of the best of whatever, and don't
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Tacoma Art Place is closing but not entirely going away. For four and a half years TAP has been offering art classes, exhibitions and equipment to mostly underserved Tacomans. A victim of the recession, TAP now finds itself short of operating funds and is being forced to close the doors
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The Percival Landing Plinth Project is a good idea that so far hasn't panned out too well. When the city rebuilt a large section of Percival Landing they included 15 plinths (sculpture stands) designed by project artist Elizabeth Conner with the idea of filling the plinths with art. The plan was
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Congratulations to Oliver Doriss, this year's recipient of The Greater Tacoma Community Foundation fifth annual Foundation of Art Award. Doriss is well known in Tacoma as both an outstanding glass artist and as the founder of Fulcrum Art Gallery. "Oliver is deeply committed to art in Tacoma, both as an artist