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Spring 2020

Painting

Spring 2011

An art history

Worth D. Griffin stepped off the train in Pullman in the fall of 1924 to find Washington State College’s art department barely four years old and with just one other full-time faculty member. Prior to that, the only art instruction offered was painting lessons for students with the pocket money.

But Griffin had come to help teach design and creative composition and build a program. The Indiana native had studied commercial and fine art in Indianapolis and at the Art Institute in Chicago. In addition to working as a magazine illustrator, he trained among American realists, artists focused on rendering unidealized scenes of daily life. … » More …

Winter 2006

An equation for beauty

The painter spends his days on the third floor of an ancient biscuit plant in a seedy section of industrial Ballard. The building, just a block from the Ballard Bridge, houses a collection of artists, mostly ceramicists whose main-floor kiln warms the warehouse through the winter.

But acrylic paint is the medium for Michael Schultheis, 39. A climb up steep wooden stairs, and we’re welcomed by Cesaria Evora’s alto voice singing in Portuguese from a paint-spattered boom box. “Ah, she’s wonderful,” says a similarly paint-spattered Schultheis standing at the door to his bright studio.

He is in the midst of creating paintings for a fall … » More …

Fall 2006

Art and Enterprise: Jordan Swain '00

So I’m riding around Bellevue with this very high-energy 27-year-old painter, and I’m starting to think, “Well, maybe I should take up painting.” That’s how infectious my companion is. She makes it sound like so much fun.

Jordan Swain ’00 offers me a warm diet soda from her emergency stash of supplies she keeps in the back of her car because she often doesn’t have time to stop and eat. We pull into Children’s Village, a safe haven in Renton for women and children who have been homeless, refugees, or victims of domestic violence. Swain and other artists donated their time and talent to brighten … » More …

Spring 2007

Viticultural art

Wine-By-Cougars, the precocious young wine club sponsored by the Washington State University Alumni Association, is adding art to its viticultural appeal. The wine club will offer a special “Artist Expression 2007,” a union of student art and alumni winemaking.

The wine club approached the digital design class taught in Fine Arts and asked students to design a wine label for a special spring release from Woodward Canyon, owned and operated by Rick Small ’69. Design students were instructed to reflect viticulture and the land-grant ideal on their labels. The label chosen is by Annette Ticknor ’07, a communication major and fine art student. (Full disclosure: … » More …