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Office of Arts & Culture news and events

Emergency planning seminar set for arts orgs.

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Untitled-1The fall arts season is in full swing. So is flu season. And the winter storm season isn’t far behind.  When disaster strikes, many arts and cultural organizations have no plan to help them prepare for, respond to and recover from an emergency.

Being prepared means having a plan BEFORE a crisis hits. Many arts and cultural organizations are busy paying the bills and launching the next show, leaving precious little time to craft an emergency plan.

Sound familiar? If so, take time now to plan for the next disaster. Arts and cultural organizations are invited to a free emergency-preparedness seminar, 2 to 4 p.m., Wednesday, Oct. 21, at Seattle University’s Piggott Auditorium. Get more details and register here.

The seminar is hosted by Seattle University, in partnership with ArtsFund, 4Culture, the Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs and Public Health-Seattle & King County.

Meet emerging artists, see their work

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We bought some art from emerging Northwest artists to add to the city’s Portable Works Collection. Come check out the artworks, meet the artists and enjoy some free eats. We’re hosting an artist reception, 4:30 to 6:30 p.m., Tuesday, Oct. 13, at the Seattle Municipal Tower Gallery.

On display are 25 works by 17 artists—including paintings, prints, photographs, sculpture and mixed media. The featured pieces are part of a larger recent purchase by Seattle City Light totaling 86 works by 56 artists. We’ve divided the purchase up into three shows. This show is the second installment. It closes on Dec. 31. The rest of the artworks will be on display in a third exhibition opening in January. Preview all the artworks online.

Image: Justin Gibbens, Double-headed Redtail (detail), 2008; watercolor, gouache, ink, pencil, tea on paper; 40″ x 26″. Photo by Justin Gibbens.

Listen up: we talked arts ed with school board candidates

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We sat down with the five candidates for Seattle School Board and asked them a series of questions about arts education. Hear what they have to say about the role of the arts in closing the achievement gap and boosting graduation rates, their arts experiences as kids and their views on the value of arts in the classroom.

Listen to the full interview (they run about 15 minutes) with each candidate or hear the candidates’ responses to specific questions.

We recorded the interviews at Youngstown Cultural Arts Center on Sept. 24 and 25. Special thanks to the Youth Media Institute headed by Seattle Arts Commissioner Estevan Muñoz-Howard and to student recording engineer Cham Ba.

Image: Beacon Hill Elementary students delight at an Imani Winds performance. The quintet was in residence at the school as part of the UW World Series Community Connections program. Photo by Lee Talner.

Meet Mayor’s Arts Award winners

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055Watch Miss Melba tap her way into kids’ hearts at her South Seattle dance studio. Learn about the man who helped make Seattle Opera an international sensation. See how one organization helps artists succeed at the business of art. Hear breathtaking music by the country’s largest youth symphony, and meet a painter whose outlook on life is as inspiring as his artwork.

Nearly 400 people joined Mayor Greg Nickels at Seattle Center on Sept. 4 to honor the recipients of the 2009 Mayor’s Arts Awards. If you missed the party, you can  meet this year’s winners on Seattle Channel.

Image: Nancy Guppy, host of Seattle Channel’s Art Zone In Studio, presided over the Mayor’s Arts Awards ceremony at Seattle Center, Sept. 4. Photo by Randy Nichols.

Mayor’s budget: dedicated funding for arts

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image_fundingMayor Greg Nickels today presented to the City Council his proposed 2010 budget, which maintains funding for arts grants and sends 75 percent of city-admission-tax revenues to Seattle’s Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs. For complete details on Mayor Nickels’ 2010 Proposed Budget, visit his homepage.

This is very good news in the wake of a major national recession and underscores the importance of arts and culture in a healthy city.

Read more…

Fremont Bridge to ‘talk back,’ hear it on KPLU

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front-POSTCARDSeattle artist Kristen Ramirez will wrap up her summer artist residency at the Fremont Bridge with a temporary audio installation, Bridge Talks Back. A short version will be broadcast from the bridge’s speakers during daytime bridge openings through April. To hear the full sound composition, including clips of people’s bridge stories, call 1-800-761-9941.

Ramirez talked to KPLU about her time in one of the bridge towers and the sound composition that emerged from her residency there.

The installation opens Saturday, Sept. 26 with a celebratory performance at the bridge from 1 to 4 p.m.

Image: Kristen Ramirez, Bridge Talks Back postcard, 2009. Illustration by Jacques Moitoret.

Meet the Central District signal box decal artist, Sept. 23

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BRUHMANArtist Troy R. Miles will create designs for reflective decals the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) will place on traffic signal control boxes in the Central District neighborhood. Come meet Troy and share with him your ideas of the kinds of images you’d like to represent the Central District. The event is 6 to 7:30 p.m., Wednesday, Sept. 23 at Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center, West Room, 104 17th Ave. S.

The Central District signal box project is part of the SDOT Art Plan and is funded by SDOT 1% for Art dollars. Learn more about the project here.

Image: Troy Miles, Bruhman (detail), 2003, graphic illustration.

Seeking artist for Rainier Beach Community Center project

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Untitled-2Seattle’s Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs, in partnership with Seattle Parks and Recreation, seeks one artist or artist team to develop a three-dimensional, site-specific or site-integrated artwork for the new Rainier Beach Community Center and Pool. Applicants will ideally have skills in designing, fabricating and installing artwork in one or more of the following media: metal, glass, stone, concrete, ceramic, wood, light, new media, surface treatment, sustainable design and environmental design.

Click here to learn more.

Image: Nikki McClure, The Eddy, 2006, Northgate Community Center, Seattle Parks and Recreation Community Centers Levy 1% for Art.

Updated: SuttonBeresCuller set sidewalk aglow

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Untitled-1Commuters crossing the platform at the Seattle Streetcar’s Westlake Hub station are likely to do a double take. SuttonBeresCuller just put the finishing touches on a new public artwork that’s embedded in the sidewalk at the stop at Westlake and Olive Way.

The neon sculpture – titled Sequence/Consequence – is twisted into the form of a double helix and sits just below the sidewalk’s surface. If you look down through the etched glass hatch cover, the animated light sculpture appears to spiral downward into the ground.

The double helix is a befitting symbol for the cluster of biotech and medical research centers in the nearby South Lake Union neighborhood. The artist team of John Sutton, Ben Beres, and Zac Culler—collectively known as SuttonBeresCuller—designed the artwork so that mirrors would “skew the perceptions of depth and size, creating a seemingly endless field of light.” Watch a time-lapse video of the installation in progress.

The artwork was commissioned with Seattle Department of Transportation 1% for Art funds.

Update: We listed the wrong neighborhood for the artwork. It’s  located on the South Lake Union Streetcar line in the downtown retail core.