ArtSEA: For Independence Day, gather at Seattle group shows

Earlier this week I visited MadArt Studio to bid the South Lake Union showroom a fond farewell. As mentioned in a previous newsletter, the innovative space is closing up shop after 15 years of supporting large-scale works by visual artists. “It’s not financial, not COVID-related, there’s no hidden agenda,” founder Alison Milliman told me, back in November. “It’s just time.”

The current and final exhibit, MAD STUDIO (through July 13), is a convivial retrospective featuring 50 pieces by 55 of the 84 artists who have created and contributed art over the years. If, like me, you’ve been a MadArt regular, seeing this show is like sifting through a box of old photos — glimpsing work that sends your mind back to the original sensory experience. But the dynamic mix makes for a treat even if you’ve never been before. 

See: George Rodriguez’s enormous ceramic guardians, Clayton Binkley’s swirling cedar light, Ellen Ziegler’s massive “Book of Knowledge,” Julie Alpert’s festive “Party Tassels,” W. Scott Trimble’s massive and masterfully suspended wooden “curio,” and an appropriately titled mural by Nikita Ares, “The Last Taste of Forever.” 

Also in great local group shows: Wild Life (through July 28) at new downtown venue Base Camp 2 (in the revamped Bergman Luggage building). On a recent visit I was especially blown away by several large stoneware works by local artist Bonnie Barker, a UW MFA student who is showing a highly realistic snake, intriguingly entwined black swans and a terrifyingly toothy eel. See also the lovely and less scary watercolors of birds by Madison Mayfield, and captivating underwater sketches (drawn while scuba diving) by Preston Graves.

But wait, there are more ways to get your group on!

The inaugural edition of the Tarboo: Pacific Northwest Music Fest (July 4-6) is happening at the Quilcene Lantern. Set amid 53 acres of farm fields on the Olympic Peninsula, the eclectic local lineup includes Tomo Nakayama, the Black Ends, Kate Davis, Pure Bathing Culture and the Wayne Horvitz Electric Circus.

Collide-O-Scope Seattle — dedicated to digging up found film footage and video reels from weird commercials to random B rolls — has a new screening celebrating the city’s past (July 8-9, in the Here-After space at the Crocodile in Belltown). In partnership with Vanishing Seattle, this curated collection of clips will inspire nostalgia for long-gone local gems, a wash of memories and maybe a lament or two regarding the olden days.

And tonight (June 27), Seattle dance collective Malacarne is performing a free, durational work that runs from 5-10 p.m. It’s called the sky is the same color everywhere or on the rapture of being alive and takes place in the 2+U Courtyard (1201 Second Ave. downtown). To answer your first question: No, you do not have to stay the whole time! Drop in and drop out and enjoy the strangely compelling sight of dancers in matching jumpsuits performing clustered formations on and around a public workplace.