Visual Arts

Sam Vernon Hidden characters and imaginary spirits appear through stark black-and-white graphics. Olympic Sculpture Park, 2901 Western Ave., Seattle, WA 98121 Free Ongoing through Sunday, March 6, 2016

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Monday, December 21, 2015

Bootsy Holler One of our favorite contributing photographers to Seattle Weekly, now based in L.A., Holler includes four different photo series in her show Nuclear Family. One component consists of annotated snapshots from her own family history, in which she Photoshops herself into the frame. Artist talk and reception, 5:30 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 22. Hours by appointment. Ends Dec. 22. Wall Space Gallery, 509 Dexter Ave. N. Free Monday, December 21, 2015

• 

Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Monday, December 21, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Monday, December 21, 2015

• 

DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Monday, December 21, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Monday, December 21, 2015

• 

George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Monday, December 21, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Monday, December 21, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Monday, December 21, 2015

• 

Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Monday, December 21, 2015

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Monday, December 21, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Monday, December 21, 2015

• 

Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Monday, December 21, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Monday, December 21, 2015

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Monday, December 21, 2015, 7am – 7pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Monday, December 21, 2015, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Monday, December 21, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Gregg Laananen He paints Northwest landscapes and nature scenes in The Road to Boiling Rock. Also on view, Terry Furchgott’s The Moroccan Paintings. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Dec. 30. Lisa Harris Gallery, 1922 Pike Place, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Monday, December 21, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Monday, December 21, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Monday, December 21, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Monday, December 21, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Monday, December 21, 2015, 11am – 7pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Monday, December 21, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Monday, December 21, 2015, 11am – 6pm

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Bootsy Holler One of our favorite contributing photographers to Seattle Weekly, now based in L.A., Holler includes four different photo series in her show Nuclear Family. One component consists of annotated snapshots from her own family history, in which she Photoshops herself into the frame. Artist talk and reception, 5:30 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 22. Hours by appointment. Ends Dec. 22. Wall Space Gallery, 509 Dexter Ave. N. Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015

• 

Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Tuesday, December 22, 2015

• 

DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015

• 

George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015

• 

Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Tuesday, December 22, 2015

• 

Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Tuesday, December 22, 2015

• 

Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 7am – 7pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Gregg Laananen He paints Northwest landscapes and nature scenes in The Road to Boiling Rock. Also on view, Terry Furchgott’s The Moroccan Paintings. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Dec. 30. Lisa Harris Gallery, 1922 Pike Place, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Mark Rediske The veteran local painter shows new abstracted landscape scenes in Distillation. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. Foster/White Gallery, 220 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Susan Jameson She shows small English nature scenes on paper. Also on view, woodblock prints from local artist Charles Spitzack. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. Davidson Galleries, 313 Occidental Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is the inspiration for this group show. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Roby King Gallery, 176 Winslow Way E., Bainbridge Island Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Annual Group Exhibition Some two dozen gallery artists help ring out the year. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Gallery IMA, 123 S Jackson St., Seattle WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Roger Shimomura & William Kentridge Two great artists need little introduction. The Seattle-raised Shimomura presents Pop-infused new works in Great American Muse, with traces of Disney, Hokusai, and Warhol. The South African Kentridge, subject of the Henry’s knockout 2009 show, has recent linocuts on offer (depicting typewriters, cats, birds, and such). Then there’s an additional treat during the First Thursday opening reception: Photographer Alice Wheeler will be signing her new book, Outcasts and Innocents: Photographs of the Northwest, featuring many music icons of the grunge era. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. Greg Kucera Gallery, 212 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 11am – 7pm

Remember to Come Back Diaspora and emmigration are the themes considered by ruby onyinyechi amanze, Clay Apenouvon, Mwangi Hutter, Delio Jasse, and Zohra Opoku. First Thursday opening reception. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 23. Mariane Ibrahim Gallery, 608 Second Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 11am – 5pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 11am – 6pm

SylC & Gerard Cambon Two French artists offer surrealist paintings and found-object sculptures, respectively. First Friday opening reception. 1 a.m.-8 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 31. Hall Spassov Gallery, 319 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 22, 2015, 11am – 8pm

Tori Karpenko His tribute to Beat poet Gary Snyder, called The Lookout, includes both paintings of the North Cascades-where Snyder worked two summers in a fire lookout during the early ‘50s-and a full-size wooden re-creation of one of those structures, from which you can view the art. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Fri., 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Sat. Ends Dec. 23. Traver Gallery, 110 Union St., #200, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Tuesday, December 22, 10pm – Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 6am

Seattle Seen You know what? It’s fine to buy art as a gift. Not as an investment, not for the prestige, not as a statement of your own good taste, not for the sheer transporting quality of the artist’s vision. Sometimes a friend or a family member simply needs something nice to hang on their walls. That’s the beauty of a group show, and this all-local lineup features 14 artists contemplating our fast-changing city. Most of this group are painters, like Daphne Minkoff, who often depicts crumbling old strutures, scenes of colorful urban decay, buildings that are forlorn and forgotten. (She also has an eye for graffiti tags.) Meanwhile, Fred Holcomb is better known for serene landscapes and nature scenes, but his new work will feature vistas of South Lake Union-which is growing almost too fast to paint. And all the other downtown galleries are open late tonight for First Thursday, so by no means restrict your shopping to just here. BRIAN MILLER Opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 3. Open 10:30 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. BRIAN MILLER Linda Hodges Gallery, 316 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 22, 10:30pm – Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 4:30am

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Wednesday, December 23, 2015

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Wednesday, December 23, 2015

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Wednesday, December 23, 2015

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Wednesday, December 23, 2015

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 7am – 7pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue

Seattle, WA 98121 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Gregg Laananen He paints Northwest landscapes and nature scenes in The Road to Boiling Rock. Also on view, Terry Furchgott’s The Moroccan Paintings. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Dec. 30. Lisa Harris Gallery, 1922 Pike Place, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Mark Rediske The veteran local painter shows new abstracted landscape scenes in Distillation. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. Foster/White Gallery, 220 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Susan Jameson She shows small English nature scenes on paper. Also on view, woodblock prints from local artist Charles Spitzack. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. Davidson Galleries, 313 Occidental Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is the inspiration for this group show. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Roby King Gallery, 176 Winslow Way E., Bainbridge Island Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Annual Group Exhibition Some two dozen gallery artists help ring out the year. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Gallery IMA, 123 S Jackson St., Seattle WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Roger Shimomura & William Kentridge Two great artists need little introduction. The Seattle-raised Shimomura presents Pop-infused new works in Great American Muse, with traces of Disney, Hokusai, and Warhol. The South African Kentridge, subject of the Henry’s knockout 2009 show, has recent linocuts on offer (depicting typewriters, cats, birds, and such). Then there’s an additional treat during the First Thursday opening reception: Photographer Alice Wheeler will be signing her new book, Outcasts and Innocents: Photographs of the Northwest, featuring many music icons of the grunge era. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. Greg Kucera Gallery, 212 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Byron Birdsall He paints Mt. Rainier and other familiar alpine landscapes, some with climbers in the frame, in a tradition recalling Dee Molenaar. Also on view, wooden bowls from Dian Friend. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Dec. 27. Kirsten Gallery, 5320 Roosevelt Way N.E. Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 7pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 7pm

Remember to Come Back Diaspora and emmigration are the themes considered by ruby onyinyechi amanze, Clay Apenouvon, Mwangi Hutter, Delio Jasse, and Zohra Opoku. First Thursday opening reception. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 23. Mariane Ibrahim Gallery, 608 Second Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 5pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 6pm

SylC & Gerard Cambon Two French artists offer surrealist paintings and found-object sculptures, respectively. First Friday opening reception. 1 a.m.-8 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 31. Hall Spassov Gallery, 319 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 8pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Wednesday, December 23, 2015, 12 – 5pm

Tori Karpenko His tribute to Beat poet Gary Snyder, called The Lookout, includes both paintings of the North Cascades-where Snyder worked two summers in a fire lookout during the early ‘50s-and a full-size wooden re-creation of one of those structures, from which you can view the art. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Fri., 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Sat. Ends Dec. 23. Traver Gallery, 110 Union St., #200, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Wednesday, December 23, 10pm – Thursday, December 24, 2015, 6am

Seattle Seen You know what? It’s fine to buy art as a gift. Not as an investment, not for the prestige, not as a statement of your own good taste, not for the sheer transporting quality of the artist’s vision. Sometimes a friend or a family member simply needs something nice to hang on their walls. That’s the beauty of a group show, and this all-local lineup features 14 artists contemplating our fast-changing city. Most of this group are painters, like Daphne Minkoff, who often depicts crumbling old strutures, scenes of colorful urban decay, buildings that are forlorn and forgotten. (She also has an eye for graffiti tags.) Meanwhile, Fred Holcomb is better known for serene landscapes and nature scenes, but his new work will feature vistas of South Lake Union-which is growing almost too fast to paint. And all the other downtown galleries are open late tonight for First Thursday, so by no means restrict your shopping to just here. BRIAN MILLER Opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 3. Open 10:30 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. BRIAN MILLER Linda Hodges Gallery, 316 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 23, 10:30pm – Thursday, December 24, 2015, 4:30am

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Thursday, December 24, 2015

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Thursday, December 24, 2015

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Thursday, December 24, 2015

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Thursday, December 24, 2015

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Thursday, December 24, 2015

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Thursday, December 24, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Thursday, December 24, 2015

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Thursday, December 24, 2015

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Thursday, December 24, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Thursday, December 24, 2015

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Thursday, December 24, 2015

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Thursday, December 24, 2015

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Thursday, December 24, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 7am – 7pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Gregg Laananen He paints Northwest landscapes and nature scenes in The Road to Boiling Rock. Also on view, Terry Furchgott’s The Moroccan Paintings. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Dec. 30. Lisa Harris Gallery, 1922 Pike Place, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Mark Rediske The veteran local painter shows new abstracted landscape scenes in Distillation. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. Foster/White Gallery, 220 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Susan Jameson She shows small English nature scenes on paper. Also on view, woodblock prints from local artist Charles Spitzack. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. Davidson Galleries, 313 Occidental Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Thursday, December 24, 2015, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Thursday, December 24, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is the inspiration for this group show. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Roby King Gallery, 176 Winslow Way E., Bainbridge Island Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Annual Group Exhibition Some two dozen gallery artists help ring out the year. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Gallery IMA, 123 S Jackson St., Seattle WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Roger Shimomura & William Kentridge Two great artists need little introduction. The Seattle-raised Shimomura presents Pop-infused new works in Great American Muse, with traces of Disney, Hokusai, and Warhol. The South African Kentridge, subject of the Henry’s knockout 2009 show, has recent linocuts on offer (depicting typewriters, cats, birds, and such). Then there’s an additional treat during the First Thursday opening reception: Photographer Alice Wheeler will be signing her new book, Outcasts and Innocents: Photographs of the Northwest, featuring many music icons of the grunge era. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. Greg Kucera Gallery, 212 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Byron Birdsall He paints Mt. Rainier and other familiar alpine landscapes, some with climbers in the frame, in a tradition recalling Dee Molenaar. Also on view, wooden bowls from Dian Friend. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Dec. 27. Kirsten Gallery, 5320 Roosevelt Way N.E. Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 7pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 7pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 6pm

SylC & Gerard Cambon Two French artists offer surrealist paintings and found-object sculptures, respectively. First Friday opening reception. 1 a.m.-8 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 31. Hall Spassov Gallery, 319 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 8pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Thursday, December 24, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 12 – 5pm

Mary Coss Her sculpture show Trace includes disparate materials like old wedding dresses and wire to explore “a narrative around artifacts, the cultural remnants of life, using the form of a human bone as a relic to tell this story.” First Thursday opening reception. Noon-5 p.m. Fri.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. METHOD Gallery, 106 3rd Avenue SSeattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 24, 2015, 12 – 5pm

Seattle Seen You know what? It’s fine to buy art as a gift. Not as an investment, not for the prestige, not as a statement of your own good taste, not for the sheer transporting quality of the artist’s vision. Sometimes a friend or a family member simply needs something nice to hang on their walls. That’s the beauty of a group show, and this all-local lineup features 14 artists contemplating our fast-changing city. Most of this group are painters, like Daphne Minkoff, who often depicts crumbling old strutures, scenes of colorful urban decay, buildings that are forlorn and forgotten. (She also has an eye for graffiti tags.) Meanwhile, Fred Holcomb is better known for serene landscapes and nature scenes, but his new work will feature vistas of South Lake Union-which is growing almost too fast to paint. And all the other downtown galleries are open late tonight for First Thursday, so by no means restrict your shopping to just here. BRIAN MILLER Opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 3. Open 10:30 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 24. BRIAN MILLER Linda Hodges Gallery, 316 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 24, 10:30pm – Friday, December 25, 2015, 4:30am

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Friday, December 25, 2015

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Friday, December 25, 2015

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Friday, December 25, 2015

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Friday, December 25, 2015

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Friday, December 25, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Friday, December 25, 2015

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Friday, December 25, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Friday, December 25, 2015

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Friday, December 25, 2015

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Friday, December 25, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Friday, December 25, 2015

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Friday, December 25, 2015

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Friday, December 25, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Friday, December 25, 2015

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Friday, December 25, 2015

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Friday, December 25, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Friday, December 25, 2015

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Friday, December 25, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Friday, December 25, 2015

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 7am – 7pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Gregg Laananen He paints Northwest landscapes and nature scenes in The Road to Boiling Rock. Also on view, Terry Furchgott’s The Moroccan Paintings. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Dec. 30. Lisa Harris Gallery, 1922 Pike Place, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Friday, December 25, 2015, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Friday, December 25, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is the inspiration for this group show. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Roby King Gallery, 176 Winslow Way E., Bainbridge Island Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Annual Group Exhibition Some two dozen gallery artists help ring out the year. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Gallery IMA, 123 S Jackson St., Seattle WA 98104 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Byron Birdsall He paints Mt. Rainier and other familiar alpine landscapes, some with climbers in the frame, in a tradition recalling Dee Molenaar. Also on view, wooden bowls from Dian Friend. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Dec. 27. Kirsten Gallery, 5320 Roosevelt Way N.E. Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 7pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 7pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 6pm

SylC & Gerard Cambon Two French artists offer surrealist paintings and found-object sculptures, respectively. First Friday opening reception. 1 a.m.-8 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 31. Hall Spassov Gallery, 319 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 8pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts Street

Seattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Friday, December 25, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 12 – 5pm

Mary Coss Her sculpture show Trace includes disparate materials like old wedding dresses and wire to explore “a narrative around artifacts, the cultural remnants of life, using the form of a human bone as a relic to tell this story.” First Thursday opening reception. Noon-5 p.m. Fri.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. METHOD Gallery, 106 3rd Avenue SSeattle, WA 98104 Free Friday, December 25, 2015, 12 – 5pm

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Saturday, December 26, 2015

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Saturday, December 26, 2015

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Saturday, December 26, 2015

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Saturday, December 26, 2015

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Saturday, December 26, 2015

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Saturday, December 26, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Saturday, December 26, 2015

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Saturday, December 26, 2015

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Saturday, December 26, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Saturday, December 26, 2015

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Saturday, December 26, 2015

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Saturday, December 26, 2015

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Saturday, December 26, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Gregg Laananen He paints Northwest landscapes and nature scenes in The Road to Boiling Rock. Also on view, Terry Furchgott’s The Moroccan Paintings. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Dec. 30. Lisa Harris Gallery, 1922 Pike Place, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Saturday, December 26, 2015, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Saturday, December 26, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is the inspiration for this group show. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Roby King Gallery, 176 Winslow Way E., Bainbridge Island Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Annual Group Exhibition Some two dozen gallery artists help ring out the year. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Gallery IMA, 123 S Jackson St., Seattle WA 98104 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Byron Birdsall He paints Mt. Rainier and other familiar alpine landscapes, some with climbers in the frame, in a tradition recalling Dee Molenaar. Also on view, wooden bowls from Dian Friend. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Dec. 27. Kirsten Gallery, 5320 Roosevelt Way N.E. Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 7pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 7pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 6pm

SylC & Gerard Cambon Two French artists offer surrealist paintings and found-object sculptures, respectively. First Friday opening reception. 1 a.m.-8 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 31. Hall Spassov Gallery, 319 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 8pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Saturday, December 26, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 12 – 5pm

Everyone’s In A salon-style group show, with small works priced for the holidays, draws inspiration from Jayson Musson’s Itsa Small, Small World. Opening reception, 6-9 p.m. Sat., Dec. 12. Noon-5 p.m. Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The Alice, 6007 12th Ave. S. Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 12 – 5pm

Mary Coss Her sculpture show Trace includes disparate materials like old wedding dresses and wire to explore “a narrative around artifacts, the cultural remnants of life, using the form of a human bone as a relic to tell this story.” First Thursday opening reception. Noon-5 p.m. Fri.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. METHOD Gallery, 106 3rd Avenue SSeattle, WA 98104 Free Saturday, December 26, 2015, 12 – 5pm

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Sunday, December 27, 2015

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Sunday, December 27, 2015

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Sunday, December 27, 2015

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Sunday, December 27, 2015

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Sunday, December 27, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Sunday, December 27, 2015

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Sunday, December 27, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Sunday, December 27, 2015

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Sunday, December 27, 2015

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Sunday, December 27, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Sunday, December 27, 2015

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Sunday, December 27, 2015

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Sunday, December 27, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Sunday, December 27, 2015

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Sunday, December 27, 2015

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Sunday, December 27, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Sunday, December 27, 2015

• 

Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Sunday, December 27, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Sunday, December 27, 2015

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Sunday, December 27, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Sunday, December 27, 2015, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Sunday, December 27, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Sunday, December 27, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Byron Birdsall He paints Mt. Rainier and other familiar alpine landscapes, some with climbers in the frame, in a tradition recalling Dee Molenaar. Also on view, wooden bowls from Dian Friend. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Dec. 27. Kirsten Gallery, 5320 Roosevelt Way N.E. Free Sunday, December 27, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Sunday, December 27, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Sunday, December 27, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Sunday, December 27, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Sunday, December 27, 2015, 11am – 7pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Sunday, December 27, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Sunday, December 27, 2015, 11am – 6pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Sunday, December 27, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Sunday, December 27, 2015, 12 – 5pm

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Monday, December 28, 2015

• 

Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Monday, December 28, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Monday, December 28, 2015

• 

DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Monday, December 28, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Monday, December 28, 2015

• 

George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Monday, December 28, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Monday, December 28, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Monday, December 28, 2015

• 

Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Monday, December 28, 2015

• 

Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Monday, December 28, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Monday, December 28, 2015

• 

Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Monday, December 28, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Monday, December 28, 2015

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Monday, December 28, 2015, 7am – 7pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Monday, December 28, 2015, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Monday, December 28, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Gregg Laananen He paints Northwest landscapes and nature scenes in The Road to Boiling Rock. Also on view, Terry Furchgott’s The Moroccan Paintings. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Dec. 30. Lisa Harris Gallery, 1922 Pike Place, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Monday, December 28, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Monday, December 28, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Monday, December 28, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Monday, December 28, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Monday, December 28, 2015, 11am – 7pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Monday, December 28, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Monday, December 28, 2015, 11am – 6pm

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015

• 

Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Tuesday, December 29, 2015

• 

DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015

• 

George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Tuesday, December 29, 2015

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Tuesday, December 29, 2015

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 7am – 7pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Gregg Laananen He paints Northwest landscapes and nature scenes in The Road to Boiling Rock. Also on view, Terry Furchgott’s The Moroccan Paintings. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Dec. 30. Lisa Harris Gallery, 1922 Pike Place, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is the inspiration for this group show. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Roby King Gallery, 176 Winslow Way E., Bainbridge Island Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Annual Group Exhibition Some two dozen gallery artists help ring out the year. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Gallery IMA, 123 S Jackson St., Seattle WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 11am – 7pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 11am – 6pm

SylC & Gerard Cambon Two French artists offer surrealist paintings and found-object sculptures, respectively. First Friday opening reception. 1 a.m.-8 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 31. Hall Spassov Gallery, 319 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Tuesday, December 29, 2015, 11am – 8pm

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Wednesday, December 30, 2015

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Wednesday, December 30, 2015

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Wednesday, December 30, 2015

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Wednesday, December 30, 2015

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 7am – 7pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Gregg Laananen He paints Northwest landscapes and nature scenes in The Road to Boiling Rock. Also on view, Terry Furchgott’s The Moroccan Paintings. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Dec. 30. Lisa Harris Gallery, 1922 Pike Place, Seattle, WA 98101 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is the inspiration for this group show. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Roby King Gallery, 176 Winslow Way E., Bainbridge Island Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Annual Group Exhibition Some two dozen gallery artists help ring out the year. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Gallery IMA, 123 S Jackson St., Seattle WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 7pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 7pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 6pm

SylC & Gerard Cambon Two French artists offer surrealist paintings and found-object sculptures, respectively. First Friday opening reception. 1 a.m.-8 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 31. Hall Spassov Gallery, 319 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 8pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 12 – 5pm

(Butter)fly on the Wall Locals Wynia, Ron Reeder, and Thomas Schworer show new works in photography, glass, and collage. Opening reception, 1 p.m. Sun., Oct. 18. Stacya Silverman, 614 W. McGraw St., Free Thursday, December 31, 2015

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Thursday, December 31, 2015

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Thursday, December 31, 2015

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Thursday, December 31, 2015

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Thursday, December 31, 2015

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Thursday, December 31, 2015

Neighborhoods Urban change is the theme for Elizabeth Gahan, Kate Protage, and Kellie Talbot. (The gallery spans the SAM book shop and Taste.) Hours vary. End date TBD. SAM Gallery, 1300 First Ave. Free Thursday, December 31, 2015

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Thursday, December 31, 2015

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Thursday, December 31, 2015

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Thursday, December 31, 2015

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Thursday, December 31, 2015

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Thursday, December 31, 2015

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Thursday, December 31, 2015

Wearable Art Show Over a dozen locals offer their frocks and fashions for the gift-giving season. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Call for hours. Ends Dec. 31. The Island Gallery, 400 Winslow Way E, #120Bainbridge Island, WA 98110 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 7am – 7pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Thursday, December 31, 2015, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Thursday, December 31, 2015, 10am – 6pm

Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is the inspiration for this group show. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Roby King Gallery, 176 Winslow Way E., Bainbridge Island Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 10am – 5pm

Annual Group Exhibition Some two dozen gallery artists help ring out the year. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Gallery IMA, 123 S Jackson St., Seattle WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Annual Group Exhibition Over 30 artists are represented, working in a variety of media. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sun. Ends Dec. 31. Patricia Rovzar, 1225 Second AveSeattle, WA 98101 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 7pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 7pm

SimpleCup Invitational Over 200 small ceramic vessels go on view. 11 a.m-6 p.m. daily. Ends Dec. 31. KOBO Gallery, 604 S. Jackson St., Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 6pm

SylC & Gerard Cambon Two French artists offer surrealist paintings and found-object sculptures, respectively. First Friday opening reception. 1 a.m.-8 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Dec. 31. Hall Spassov Gallery, 319 Third Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 8pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Thursday, December 31, 2015, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 12 – 5pm

Mary Coss Her sculpture show Trace includes disparate materials like old wedding dresses and wire to explore “a narrative around artifacts, the cultural remnants of life, using the form of a human bone as a relic to tell this story.” First Thursday opening reception. Noon-5 p.m. Fri.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. METHOD Gallery, 106 3rd Avenue SSeattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, December 31, 2015, 12 – 5pm

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Friday, January 1, 2016

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Friday, January 1, 2016

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Friday, January 1, 2016

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Friday, January 1, 2016

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Friday, January 1, 2016

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Friday, January 1, 2016

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Friday, January 1, 2016

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Friday, January 1, 2016

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Friday, January 1, 2016

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Friday, January 1, 2016

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Friday, January 1, 2016

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Friday, January 1, 2016

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Friday, January 1, 2016

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Friday, January 1, 2016

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Friday, January 1, 2016

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Friday, January 1, 2016

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 7am – 7pm

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Friday, January 1, 2016, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Friday, January 1, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is the inspiration for this group show. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Roby King Gallery, 176 Winslow Way E., Bainbridge Island Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 10am – 5pm

Annual Group Exhibition Some two dozen gallery artists help ring out the year. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Gallery IMA, 123 S Jackson St., Seattle WA 98104 Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 7pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 7pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 6pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Friday, January 1, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 12 – 5pm

Mary Coss Her sculpture show Trace includes disparate materials like old wedding dresses and wire to explore “a narrative around artifacts, the cultural remnants of life, using the form of a human bone as a relic to tell this story.” First Thursday opening reception. Noon-5 p.m. Fri.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. METHOD Gallery, 106 3rd Avenue SSeattle, WA 98104 Free Friday, January 1, 2016, 12 – 5pm

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Saturday, January 2, 2016

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Saturday, January 2, 2016

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Saturday, January 2, 2016

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Saturday, January 2, 2016

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Saturday, January 2, 2016

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Saturday, January 2, 2016

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Saturday, January 2, 2016

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Saturday, January 2, 2016

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Saturday, January 2, 2016

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Saturday, January 2, 2016

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Saturday, January 2, 2016

Dr. Seuss The legendary children’s illustrator is represented with a series of prints, called Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E. (Bellevue), 425-283-0461, gunnarnordstrom.com. 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Mon.-Sat., Noon-5 p.m. Sun. Ends Jan. 2. Gunnar Nordstrom, 800 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 9:30am – 7:30pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue

Seattle, WA 98121 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Saturday, January 2, 2016, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Saturday, January 2, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is the inspiration for this group show. First Friday opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Roby King Gallery, 176 Winslow Way E., Bainbridge Island Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 10am – 5pm

Annual Group Exhibition Some two dozen gallery artists help ring out the year. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Gallery IMA, 123 S Jackson St., Seattle WA 98104 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 10:30am – 5:30pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Erika Sanada She shows small ceramic animal figures in Balancing Act. Also on view, works by Calvin Ma. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. Abmeyer + Wood, 210 Second Ave. Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 7pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 7pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 6pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Saturday, January 2, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 12 – 5pm

Everyone’s In A salon-style group show, with small works priced for the holidays, draws inspiration from Jayson Musson’s Itsa Small, Small World. Opening reception, 6-9 p.m. Sat., Dec. 12. Noon-5 p.m. Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The Alice, 6007 12th Ave. S. Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 12 – 5pm

Mary Coss Her sculpture show Trace includes disparate materials like old wedding dresses and wire to explore “a narrative around artifacts, the cultural remnants of life, using the form of a human bone as a relic to tell this story.” First Thursday opening reception. Noon-5 p.m. Fri.-Sat. Ends Jan. 2. METHOD Gallery, 106 3rd Avenue SSeattle, WA 98104 Free Saturday, January 2, 2016, 12 – 5pm

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Sunday, January 3, 2016

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Sunday, January 3, 2016

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Sunday, January 3, 2016

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Sunday, January 3, 2016

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Sunday, January 3, 2016

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Sunday, January 3, 2016

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Sunday, January 3, 2016

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It??s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Sunday, January 3, 2016

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Sunday, January 3, 2016

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Sunday, January 3, 2016

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Sunday, January 3, 2016

Sam Birchman He shows new figurative paintings. Opening reception, 7-9 p.m. Wed., Oct. 7. Form/Space Atelier, 98 Clay St. Free Sunday, January 3, 2016

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Sunday, January 3, 2016

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Sunday, January 3, 2016

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Sunday, January 3, 2016

• 

Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Sunday, January 3, 2016

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Sunday, January 3, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Sunday, January 3, 2016, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Sunday, January 3, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Sunday, January 3, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Sunday, January 3, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Sunday, January 3, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Sunday, January 3, 2016, 11am – 7pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Sunday, January 3, 2016, 11am – 6pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Sunday, January 3, 2016, 11am – 5pm

• 

Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Monday, January 4, 2016

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Monday, January 4, 2016

• 

DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Monday, January 4, 2016

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd Avenue

Seattle, WA 98121 Free Monday, January 4, 2016

• 

George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Monday, January 4, 2016

• 

Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Monday, January 4, 2016

• 

Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Monday, January 4, 2016

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Monday, January 4, 2016

• 

Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Monday, January 4, 2016

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Monday, January 4, 2016, 7am – 7pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Monday, January 4, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Monday, January 4, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Monday, January 4, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Monday, January 4, 2016, 11am – 6pm

• 

Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Tuesday, January 5, 2016

• 

DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016

• 

George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016

• 

Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Tuesday, January 5, 2016

• 

Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Tuesday, January 5, 2016

• 

Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016, 7am – 7pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Tuesday, January 5, 2016, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Tuesday, January 5, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Tuesday, January 5, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Tuesday, January 5, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Tuesday, January 5, 2016, 11am – 6pm

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Wednesday, January 6, 2016

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Wednesday, January 6, 2016

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Wednesday, January 6, 2016

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Wednesday, January 6, 2016

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Wednesday, January 6, 2016

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 7am – 7pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 11am – 7pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 11am – 6pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Wednesday, January 6, 2016, 12 – 5pm

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Thursday, January 7, 2016

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Thursday, January 7, 2016

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Thursday, January 7, 2016

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Thursday, January 7, 2016

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016

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First Thursday Art Walk Beginning around 5 p.m. and often lasting to 9 p.m., the monthly art celebration includes venues like the Tashiro Kaplan Building, Roq La Rue, James Harris, Greg Kucera, and all the other Pioneer Square galleries. Occidental Park will also be full of artists and vendors. Occidental Park, S. Main St. & Occidental Ave. S. Free Thursday, January 7, 2016

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Thursday, January 7, 2016

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Thursday, January 7, 2016

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Thursday, January 7, 2016

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Thursday, January 7, 2016

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Thursday, January 7, 2016

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Thursday, January 7, 2016

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 7am – 7pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Thursday, January 7, 2016, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Thursday, January 7, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Thursday, January 7, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Thursday, January 7, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 11am – 7pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 11am – 6pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Thursday, January 7, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Thursday, January 7, 2016, 12 – 5pm

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Friday, January 8, 2016

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Friday, January 8, 2016

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Friday, January 8, 2016

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Changing Form The most popular viewpoint in the city is often a bore for kids. Whenever I walk up to Kerry Park, on the south prow of Queen Anne Hill, shutterbugs, wedding parties, and sightseers are intent on the panoramic view. Watch what the children do, however, when they squirm free of parental grasp or out of the camera’s frame. Installed in 1971 as a bequest from the same family that gave us the priceless strip park, Changing Form is one of those large Henry Moore-influenced abstract steel sculptures that don’t always wear their age so well. There’s nothing fun or frivolous about the two stacked cutout forms, pure geometry, yet kids flock to the 15-foot-high structure. It’s shaped a bit like building blocks from childhood, and the lower portion forms an eminently climbable cradle. Not many visitors bother to read the brass plaque identifying the artist. Would you be surprised to learn it’s a woman? Very little public art in Seattle-or at least that from the pure commission, pre-public-funding era-comes from female hands. Born here, Doris Totten Chase (1923-2008) studied architecture at the UW, then turned to painting in the late ‘40s. By that time she was a wife and mother of two kids-not some kind of beatnik, not an outrageous headline-grabber like the celebrated (male) artists of the day. An early-’70s divorce freed her to move to Manhattan, where she worked in film and video and lived a thoroughly avant-garde life at the Chelsea Hotel. Sometimes you gotta leave Seattle to find bohemia. Just don’t tell that to your kids while they’re playing. BRIAN MILLER Kerry Park, 211 W. Highland Drive, Seattle, WA 98119 Free Friday, January 8, 2016

Dale Chihuly The Tacoma native and glass artist has donated several works to TAM, now on permanent display. See museum website for hours. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $8-$10 Friday, January 8, 2016

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DuPen Fountain Seattle Center is in transition, yet again. Memorial Stadium is crumbling. The Fun Forest has closed. The Sonics may come back (briefly) to KeyArena, but then what? But in certain quiet corners of the civic campus, things are working just fine. Though briefly endangered by a skateboard park last summer, located northwest of the Key in a concrete box canyon, one such enduring element from the original 1962 World’s Fair design is DuPen Fountain. A UW professor and sculptor, Everett DuPen (1912-2005) worked in concert with prominent modernist architect Paul Thiry, who designed the old Seattle Center Coliseum and other Center sites, to establish the water garden (sometimes also called the Fountain of Creation). Local tots and moms use it as a wading pool in summer. When the splashing subsides in autumn, it’s a place for calm contemplation. The bronze forms within do suggest creation; poised over the waters and boulders, there’s a sense of nature struggling to take shape, emerging as if from tide pools. Unlike the Garden of Eden, life isn’t raised by a single divine touch. The inchoate organic and the human form are here linked together. In the fountain’s comparatively short history, two generations of mothers and children have waded in these waters. Those life cycles echo the longer path of evolution, perhaps giving hope for the grounds outside the fountain. BRIAN MILLER Seattle Center, 305 Harrison St., Seattle, WA 98109 Free Friday, January 8, 2016

Ernesto Ybarra

Between Worlds, his first local show, combines Catholic and Aztec/Mayan themes. Opening reception, 6:30 p.m. Fri., Dec. 4. Hours by appointment. End date TBD. 2312 Gallery, 2312 2nd AvenueSeattle, WA 98121 Free Friday, January 8, 2016

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George Tsutakawa: Fountain of Wisdom Years have passed, and the downtown library designed by Rem Koolhaas has agreeably woven itself into the urban fabric. You may not like the ramps or shelving or noise inside, but tourists love to photograph the glassy, faceted exterior, and most architectural critics agree on its modernist merit. Still, walking past, I sometimes miss the small, rather cheap, but more intimate old International Style stack of boxes. Built in 1960, demolished in 2001, the prior library had a reader-friendly scale-nooks and crannies, and a courtyard containing Fountain of Wisdom by sculptor George Tsutakawa. The late local artist (1910-1997) didn’t live long enough to see his work-the city’s first public art commission of note-relocated to the corner of Fourth and Madison, where it now sits next to the new library entrance. But where is the plaque? The abstract bronze flanged structure developed from a series Tsutakawa modeled on the obo-in Japanese, a pile or cairn of rounded stones left by travelers-a shape you’ll find echoed in his many other subsequent fountains designed around the Northwest. But Fountain of Wisdom also rests in the postwar visual vocabulary of Brancusi and Jim Flora. It’s not just traditional; there’s something a little Jetsons about it-like a metal flower on a distant planet. It’s all wrong for the aesthetic of Koolhaas, who probably hates flowers or anything curved and organic that defies his rigid geometry. For that reason, I like the plucky little footnote to the big new building looming over it. Now about that plaque… BRIAN MILLER Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 Free Friday, January 8, 2016

Intimate Impressionism Out come the big guns in SAM’s fall behemoth: Manet, Renoir, Monet, Cezanne, Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, van Gogh, and more. Traveling from the National Gallery, the 68 works have a net worth approaching that of Bill Gates. Ends Jan. 10. $12-$19 Friday, January 8, 2016

Pae White The Los Angeles artist uses colorful graphics and yarn to create Command-Shift-4, intended to be “a three-dimensional drawing for visitors to both visually and physically navigate.” The installation has its formal opening during the Henry Open House: 7:30-10 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 29 ($12-$15), which also includes food, beer, music, dancing, and Halloween costumes. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wed., Sat. & Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Thurs. & Sat. Ends Jan. 24. Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Friday, January 8, 2016

Paradox of Place Contemporary Korean art is the focus to this group show, which features six artists: Jung Yeondoo, Lim Minouk, Yee Sookyung, Lee Yongbaek, Noh Suntag, and Yang Haegue. Their work spans video to photography, painting to new media. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed. & Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs. Ends March 13. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $5-$9 Friday, January 8, 2016

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Skyspace James Turrell’s Skyspace stands on two concrete pillars in the Henry’s erstwhile sculpture courtyard. On the exterior, thousands of LED fixtures under the structure’s frosted glass skin create slowly shifting colors, making the pavilion a spectacular piece of public art every night. Inside, the ellipse of sky seen through the chamber’s ceiling suddenly appears to be very, very close, a thin membrane bulging into the room. Wispy bits of cirrus clouds passing by appear to be features on the slowly rotating surface of a luminous, egg-shaped blue planet suspended just overhead. Emerging from the Skyspace, I find the night wind and the light in the clouds come to me through freshly awakened senses. A dreamy, happy feeling follows me home like the moon outside my car window. (Weds., Sat., Sun., 11 a.m.-4 p.m.; Thurs., Fri., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) DAVID STOESZ Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle, WA 98195 $6-$10 Friday, January 8, 2016

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Stronghold The original UW campus downtown was once covered with old-growth timber, as was its present location when the school moved north in 1895. Now, as that institution continues its inexorable sprawl south of Pacific Street toward Portage Bay, New York artist Brian Tolle reminds us of that arboreal past with his recently installed Stronghold. It is at first glance nothing more than a stump on a manicured lawn. Walk closer (sprinklers permitting) and you’ll see it’s a constructed stump, an invented artifact made of inexpensive cedar slats. Measuring about 23 feet in diameter-with a seating area within, possibly for picnics-Stronghold suggests the enormous tree trunks that once drove this region’s economy, that helped establish the city and our state’s first university (founded in 1861). But such towering cedars and firs are all gone, of course, and Tolle’s materials are of the size and grade you could buy at any lumberyard. This neo-stump stands next to a new UW bioengineering building (near 15th Avenue Northeast and Pacific)-appropriate, since technology is the new timber of the Northwest. In shape, the irregular ring also echoes our skyline of ancient, crumbling volcanoes (Mount St. Helens in particular) that were formed in violence. The installation recreates local history before it met the crosscut saw. BRIAN MILLER University of Washington Campus, 15th Ave. N.E. and N.E. 41st St., Seattle,WA 98105 Free Friday, January 8, 2016

Water Mover Unbuilt lots, even sloped blackberry patches sitting on unstable soil, are fast disappearing in Seattle. Particularly in Fremont, where townhouses sprout like mushrooms, any real-estate resistance is appreciated. Sitting next to the Fremont Branch Library, A.B. Ernst Park was completed four years ago with a spiral ramp and stair maze leading down to the alley behind the old P.C.C. Designed by Bend, Oregon landscape architect J.T. Atkins, it seemed a perfect place to sit and read in the south-facing light, but-D’oh!-a guard rail was deemed necessary to keep kids and other visitors from toppling off the textured concrete seats and into the sage. Thus, Seattle sculptor Jenny Heishman was commissioned by the city and Fremont Neighborhood Council to build a fence that didn’t look like a fence. Water Mover is anything but. Its scalloped orange half-pipes are like an aquaduct to nowhere. The broken ring of solid yet irregularly situated water chutes playfully suggests some irrigation scheme where none is needed (the plants are all indigenous). Here the runoff is simply directed into a bucket, or onto the porous concrete and into the ground. Summer may be the best time to enjoy the park, but to better appreciate Heishman’s contribution, take your umbrella during a November downpour and see how the contraption works. BRIAN MILLER Ernst Park, 723 N. 35th St., Seattle, WA 98103 FREE Friday, January 8, 2016

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Wawona At the center of the atrium at MOHAI, newly relocated to the Naval Reserve Armory in South Lake Union, is a permanent new sculptural installation that helps anchor the museum to our maritime past. From 1897 into the ‘40s, the schooner Wawona carried cargo on Puget Sound. Then it was moored for decades, rotting, near the Center for Wooden Boats (now MOHAI’s neighbor). The upkeep wasn’t worth it, and the hull was dry-docked for salvage four years ago. That’s where artist John Grade comes in. As part of MOHAI’s $60 million renovation, Grade was commissioned to create something from the old Douglas fir timbers that had been preserved below the waterline. They’ve been dried and sanded, carefully drilled with little round fissures (suggesting both ship’s portals and worm holes), then bolted and hung from the ceiling in a hollow, tapered tower that recalls both a ship’s mast and a tree. The five-and-a-half-ton Wawona is intended to be kinetic, Grade told me at its unveiling: “I want kids to bang on it.” Enter the enclosure at its base, and you can push and sway the whole structure, the loose metal fittings creaking like a ship rocking in its berth. Look up through the 65-foot tower, and it pierces the roof. Below (viewed through a Plexiglas window), it almost touches the water. Both ends are intended to decay over time, says Grade: “I’m interested in how things change. Nothing’s permanent.” The fate of the old Wawona bears him out, yet this recycled new Wawona is a prime example of regionally sourced art. “It’s about as local as you can do it,” Grade adds. “It’s definitely my most ambitious piece.” BRIAN MILLER Museum of History and Industry, 860 Terry Ave. N., Seattle WA 98109 $12-$14 Friday, January 8, 2016

Susan Ringstad Emery The local artist, of Inupiaq Scandinavian descent, shows paintings rooted in both cultural traditions.  Ethnic Heritage Art Gallery, Seattle Municipal Tower, Third Floor, 700 Fifth Ave. Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 7am – 7pm

Box and Container Show Shopping season begins soon, so what will you give? And where will you put your gifts? This is the gallery’s 36th annual show. Opening reception, 4-6 p.m. Sun,. Nov. 8. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily. End date TBD. Northwest Woodworkers Gallery, 2111 First Avenue Seattle, WA 98121 Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Resurgence: Rivers of the Northwest Over a half dozen Native American artists, from Alaska southward, explore indigenous and natural themes. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. (weekends vary). Ends January, closing date TBD. Stonington Gallery, 125 S. Jackson St. Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Tatau/Tattoo A history of ink and skin, beginning in the ancient cultures of the Pacific Islands and leading to modern hipster bars and sorority ankles. First Thursday opening reception. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Oct. 9, 2016. The Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, 719 S. King St., Seattle, WA, 98104 $10-$15 Friday, January 8, 2016, 10am – 5pm

The Figure in Process In a prominent new space to open Saturday, Dec. 5, with its future suddenly in doubt, some of patron Paul Allen’s private collection will be on view in a show subtitled “de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015.” Other artists will include Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney, Barry X. Ball, Alberto Giacometti, Anish Kapoor, Jonas Burgert, Lita Cabellut, and Ruben Pang. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. (to 8 p.m. Thurs.) Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter. Ends Feb. 28. Pivot Art + Culture, 609 Westlake Ave. N., Free through Dec. 13, $5 thereafter Friday, January 8, 2016, 10am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Andrea Geyer Using film, drawing, and photography in Travels on a Slender Thread, she explores the histories of collector/benefactor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and the Whitney Museum. Offsite artist talk, 6:30 p.m. Mon., Oct. 26 at Seattle U’s Wyckoff Auditorium. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Wed., Oct. 28. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. The New Foundation, 312 Second Ave. S. Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Cable Griffith He continues to explore videogame imagery and digital culture in Sightings. Also on view, Maija Fiebig’s embroidered textiles. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 16. G. Gibson Gallery, 300 S. Washington St. (Tashiro Kaplan Building), Seattle, WA 98104 Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Camp Fires BAM goes totally gay with this queer art tribute to Leopold L. Foulem, Paul Mathieu, and Richard Milette. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Feb. 14. Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Friday, January 8, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Counter-Couture Far from the bands and crowds of Bumbershoot, there’s a different kind of festival going on-also with a strong musical influence. Curated by the UW’s Michael Cepress, an artist who studies and works with fiber, textiles, and fashion, the exhibit bears the subtitle “Fashioning Identity in the American Counterculture.” In other words, hippies! Cepress is exploring the ecstatic ‘60s and ‘70s spirit via the bell-bottoms, macrame, embroidered vests, miniskirts, headbands, granny glasses, customized jeans, peasant blouses, Huarache sandals, and tie-dye-always the tie-dye!-that defined that era. Some museumgoers will remember wearing such fashions during the Summer of Love, while younger visitors have lately been reviving the look (sometimes directly from their parents’ closets). Besides the groovy garments, there will be jewelry, supporting materials (Hendrix photos included), accessories, and ephemera from the psychedelic-to-disco era. Back then, the revolution was something you could wear, along with the flowers in your hair. (Opens Sept. 4, runs through Jan. 10.) BRIAN MILLER Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way N.E., Bellevue, WA 98004 $5-$10 Friday, January 8, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Dennis Warshal Near the site of his family’s old business, Warshal’s Sporting Goods (now the Hotel 1000), the artist has a pop-up gallery showcasing his floral forms rendered in metal. The show is called Leaves of Change. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. Ends Jan. 12. Hotel 1000, 1201 Second Ave. Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Local Gems Over a dozen Seattle artists are featured, including Tina Albro , Matthew Behrend, Kathryn Booze, Elinor Maroney, Sarah Parent, and Juliette Ripley-Dunkelberger. Opening reception 5-8 p.m. Sat., Nov. 21. 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Wed.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10. Columbia City Gallery, 4864 Rainier Ave, S., Seattle, WA 98118 Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 11am – 7pm

Slash & Burn Celeste Cooning, Joy Hagen, Deborah Kapoor, Brenda Mallory, Naoko Morisawa, June Sekiguchi, Suze Woolf, and Ellen Ziegler make use of fire, soot, charcoal, and scorch marks. Opening reception, 6 p.m. Fri., Dec. 11. (Artist demos to follow at 6 p.m. Thurs., Jan. 7 and 28.) 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Kirkland Arts Center, 620 Market St., Kirkland, WA 98033 Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 11am – 6pm

Small Works This holiday show includes the likes of Jacob Lawrence, Guy Anderson, and George Tsutakawa. Opening reception, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 10. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tues.-Sat. Ends Jan. 8. Woodside Braseth Gallery, 1201 Western Avenue, Seattle WA 98101 Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 11am – 6pm

The Atomic Frontier: Black Life at Hanford Southern Blacks not only moved north to Chicago and the Midwest to work in the nation’s factories; during WWII, the secret atomic-bomb program in Eastern Washington also depended on such labor. This exhibit includes photographs, documents, and supporting materials to help commemorate those efforts in the 60th anniversary year of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Opens Sat., Oct. 31. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun. (Open to 7 p.m. Thurs.) Ends March 6. Northwest African American Museum, 2300 South Massachusetts StreetSeattle, WA 98144 $5-$7 Friday, January 8, 2016, 11am – 5pm

Charismatic Megafauna Fanciful beasts and altered natural forms, from artists including Adam Doyle, Brad Woodfin, and Michael Alm, Peter Ferguson, Peter Gronquist, Scott Musgrove. Noon-5 p.m. Wed.-Sat. Ends Jan. 30. Roq La Rue Gallery, 532 First Ave. S., Seattle, WA, 98104 Free Friday, January 8, 2016, 12 – 5pm

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Ai Weiwei’s Colored Vases Ai has a contentious relationship with traditional ceramics, having famously-or infamously, depending on your perspective-dropped and shattered a 2,000-year-old Han Dynasty urn for a 1995 photo series. It was a shocking and still controversial act, a rupture and repudiation of officially sanctioned history and taste, a slap at the canon and an insistence on the value of the new. (Look what we’re doing now, Ai is saying; new and important Chinese art is being made today.) These vases aren’t inherently precious. They’re old, yes, but Ai was able to buy these earthenware vessels in bulk because there are so many of them, because China has so much history. Our nine vases were sloppily dipped in various bright shades of inexpensive industrial paint. The new has been crudely overlaid upon the old; history is erased, and the action forces you to consider what exactly was there to begin with. Ai’s concealing is also revealing, a kind of emperor-has-no-clothes provocation. How many ordinary Chinese factory workers would want such an old, unpainted urn? And how many Chinese billionaires, plus rich Western collectors abroad, would want one of Ai’s signature works? Ever the shrewd appropriator of found materials, Ai is the one setting the price on objects both new and old. (10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wed.-Sun., 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thurs.) BRIAN MILLER Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E. Prospect St. (Volunteer Park), Seattle, WA 98112 $7-$10 Saturday, January 9, 2016

Art AIDS America An exhibit chronicling 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic, with works by David Wojnarowicz, Shimon Attie, Bill Jacobson, and dozens more (many of them sadly deceased). Opens Sat. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Sun. Ends Jan. 10, 2016. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, WA 98402 $12-$14 Saturday, January 9, 2016

Brenna Youngblood Winner of the biannual Gwendolyn Knight | Jacob Lawrence Prize, the young Los Angeles artist shows paintings and collage works. Wed.-Sun. Ends April 17. Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 $12-$19 Saturday, January 9, 2016