Roq La Rue remains our favorite local gallery, still going strong after 10 years in business. They were closed all last month after their anniversary show, undergoing some remodeling and giving owner Kirsten Anderson time to relax (and travel to Amsterdam). Tomorrow, though, the gallery reopens with a new show: the return of Roq regular Brian Despain and the debut of Victor Castillo. In honor of the occasion, we interviewed her (again) about lessons learned and what's new. more ›

Kulture Lab Art Gallery Party 05 by Seattlest Flickr group contributor michael_a_goldberg. Thanks for sharing. more ›

One of our 43 Favorite Things about Wallingford is closing up shop over the next few days. Music & toy store, art gallery, and occasional show space Electric Heavyland is closing for good on January 1st. Rather than the standard "rising rents" storyline that you're used to, the Electric Heavyland folks are closing the shop so they can focus on their record label, enterruption. Since they're closing to focus on music, it would seem that the Wooden Octopus Music Pfest is still on, but we suppose we'll see next year. The store's closing out with a big sale: more ›

Seattlest's wife used to work with Warren Dykeman before he moved to a less corporate position. So we had an early sneak preview at his style, having seen a couple of pieces he hung in their office. more ›

BLVD is adding another art form to its repertoire: film. This Friday night, they're kicking off the Uniplex film series:

An evening of films by, about, and featuring the best of the Urban Contemporary art movement. Uniplex is an effort to bring a greater understanding to the general public of what has become the most influential global art movement of the 21st century, Urban/Street art . The first installment in the series features two short films, Fish Tales and Barnstormers 360, and the feature film Quality of Life.

Seattlest is a bit of a wino. We can't help it, we love the red stuff. Living in Seattle has only fed our addiction, considering Washington State is the second-biggest producer of wine in the country (after California, of course). So recently, we decided to head east to see where that wine comes from, besides a brown paper bag. Walla Walla ho! more ›

Friday night Seattle gets a new art gallery -- BLVD, dedicated to urban contemporary art. (Note to the uninitiated: that's "boulevard," not "beloved.") We talked with gallerist Kirsten Anderson, who also owns Roq La Rue, the neighboring lowbrow/pop surrealism gallery, about urban contemporary art and what to expect from BLVD. more ›

It seems that everyone in town is buzzing about Maya Lin's new exhibition at the Henry Art Gallery. Personally, we only really know Lin through her premiere memorial in DC, and, really, there is no denying the power and simplicity of that work. There is, however, great scope to her work. The Vietnam Memorial launched her career, but she is also responsible for another simple, powerful monument--the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama. Creating works which inspire reflection and hope without trivializing the events they commemorate is a difficult line to walk. With the amount of criticism she endured from her first project, her own resilience has also become a subtext of her work. In fact, the 1995 Academy Award winner for best documentary, A Strong Clear Vision, revealed that resilience and exposed the sensitive soul that accompanies it. more ›

Tucked away through an easy to miss doorway, the skyspace appears, from just outside, to be a goofy, oddly painted kind of storage room. "Is this it?" we said to the bored UW student posing as a security guard, but she was too busy staring at the floor to respond. Inside, the exceptionally bright and clean walls and hand carved wood benches are precisely shaped to mess with the viewers sense of space: the room feels small and large at the same time, drawing you in to figure out why (We stopped to review what substances might have been in that post-lunch brownie, but confirmed the sensations were created entirely by the space itself). more ›

Transplanted from the other coast, Maki Morinoue and husband Geoffrey Grauer's mission is to reinivigorate people's attitude toward art. This showing, along with an upcoming dance performance in July by Esse Aficionado are sure to do just that. more ›

Let's say you're on an airplane, sitting next to someone completely unfamiliar with Pop Surrealism or Lowbrow, but who's curious about what you do. Without using any visual aids, how do you explain the movements to her -- in such a way that the Lowbrow fan sitting across the aisle learns something, too? more ›

It was just a single line in the weekly newsletter from the Northwest Film Forum, but it set Seattlest's heart a-flutter: more ›