The opening of the Metropolitan Museum’s exhibition was the first time the visiting Marquesans had seen these representations of their culture.
In conjunction with the opening at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City of Adorning the World: Art of the Marquesas Islands, (May 10, 2005 – January 15, 2006) Carol Ivory, who was the advisor and consultant for the show, lectured on Marquesan art, her research specialty, at the Barr Graduate Center. Attending the lecture were 15 Marquesans, a remarkable fact in that the Marquesas Islands are marvelously remote. To reach the Marquesas, one must first reach the already remote Tahiti, and … » More …
Bringing disparate images together into a unified whole seems to come naturally to ceramic artist Ann Christenson, professor of fine arts at Washington State University. It’s particularly evident in one of her most recent projects-a sundial.
Christenson was one of several artists invited by the University of California, Berkeley, to submit a design for the sundial, as part of the renovation of a courtyard within the Clark Kerr Campus at the university. The limitations imposed upon the design-that part of the area containing the sundial could be flat and that sundial parts be theft proof-led Christenson to choose an analemmatic sundial of tile and bronze … » More …
This fall, Washington State University’s Museum of Art is showing more than 70 works by pop artist Roy Lichtenstein. Entitled Roy Lichtenstein Prints 1956-97, the exhibit offers a comprehensive record of the artist’s evolution. Lichtenstein explored commercial and comic book images and painted them in immense scale, utilizing bright colors, simple lines, and the dot patterns associated with newsprint reproduction. Although his work was controversial in the 1960s, it changed the way America looked at and thought about art.
The exhibit, from the private collection of Jordan D. Schnitzer of Portland, Oregon, continues in Pullman through December 16 before moving to the Henry Art Gallery … » More …
Last fall workers planted a painted bronze heart sculpture by internationally known artist Jim Dine just steps from Stadium Way on one of Washington State University’s busiest intersections.
Painted bright blue, the sculpture stands about 12 feet high and is encrusted with a colorful array of objects-tools, shoes, sculpted heads, and much else.
While the local art community was congratulating itself on the significant Technicolor Heart acquisition, which was made a permanent campus fixture with money from the Washington Arts Commission, a smattering of students were railing against it.
In a letter to the editor at the Daily Evergreen last spring, one pharmacy student suggested … » More …
Many questions remain concerning the contents of the longhouses excavated at Ozette. One of the most intriguing is the nature of its art, which was pervasive. More than 400 artifacts stored at the Makah Cultural Center might be considered art. Although a few pieces, such as the well-known carved whale saddle, are (presumably) ritualistic, most are everyday objects, combs, bowls, clubs, embellished with designs.
Jeff Mauger (PhD ’78), an archaeologist at Peninsula Community College in Port Angeles, earned his doctorate from WSU, analyzing the shed-roof style of the houses at Ozette and their relation to the style throughout the Northwest coast. Since then he … » More …
An episode of the Antiques Road Show television program last winter stirred some memories across the Palouse and brought to mind one of the most influential alumni to graduate from Washington State’s fine arts program.
A woman from California brought in a painting of the Grand Coulee Dam under construction dated 1937. It was by Clyfford Still, an artist who taught at Washington State College from 1933 to 1941 and who earned his master’s of fine arts here in 1935. Still was a product of the West, having spent his childhood in Spokane and on his family’s farm in southern Alberta, Canada. While studying and … » More …
Robert Helm, an acclaimed Northwest artist known for surreal imagery and exquisite craftsmanship, died October 21, 2008. He was 65.
Helm was born in Wallace, Idaho, and attended North Central High School in Spokane, where he met Tamara Kimpel. They married in 1966 and had a daughter, Brenna, and a son, Boone. He earned his M.F.A. degree at WSU in 1969 and taught at the University of Colorado before returning to teach at WSU from 1971-84.
Art, says independent scholar Ellen Dissanayake '57, is "making special." It is an act that gives us a sense of belonging and meaning. It is passed from mother to child. Its origins lie deep in our evolutionary past. It makes us human. » More ...
windows along the north wall look out over Martin Stadium. They offer quite a view, especially on game days, says Powell.
On one wall hang two of his latest pieces, paintings on birch plywood, a medium he says gives him more of a feeling of permanence than canvas.
When starting on a piece, Powell creates a situation for himself and then sets about reducing it. He begins by filling the wood plane with multiple lines and forms with graphite and ink, and then painting over them with a neutral-colored acrylic, sanding it down, tweaking and tuning, finding and isolating forms, until just a few … » More …
Robert Helm’s Iron Ground (1991)