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Spring 2023

Fine Arts

Fall 2005

Heart Trouble

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 …

Ozette Art and the Makah Canoe

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 …

Summer 2009

Art Still at Large

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 …

Spring 2009

Robert Helm, 65 – Acclaimed Northwest artist, teacher

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.

After leaving WSU, Helm and Tamara continued to live and work in their studios in their beloved wheat fields between Pullman and Moscow. From there, his art went … » More …

Spring 2006

Growing as an Artist

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 …

Spring 2006

The Clothesline Project

Haunting and colorful, the Clothesline Project usually stops students in their tracks as they head across the Glenn Terrell Mall to class. It’s a display of several hundred t-shirts made by people connected to Washington State University with messages about how violence, particularly against women, can affect individuals, families, and communities. For a week last October, the campus community had a chance to read the words of victim/survivors and their friends.

Spring 2006

Growing as an Artist

Isaac Powell, a graduate student in the Department of Fine Arts, recently won national attention for his work when a piece took grand prize in a juried competition for young artists with disabilities. The competition winners are now part of a traveling exhibit that opened at the Smithsonian last fall. Photo by Robert Hubner.

It’s an artist’s dream to be recognized by experts and curators and to have your work shown by an internationally known museum.

Isaac Powell, a 26-year-old fine arts student at Washington State University, realized that dream last fall when his painting won a spot in a traveling exhibit that opened at … » More …