’57 Biscayne presents PLACINESS, August 4-7 at ’57 Biscayne in the Good Arts Building

Open First Thursday, August 4, from 5-8 PM and 12-7 Friday, Saturday; 12-5 Sunday

Artists’ Reception Saturday, August 6 (time TBA)

’57 Biscayne was born out of the much-ballyhooed demise of 619 Western, and in the years since we’ve become a kind of charismatic megafauna in the exploding urban environment of the boom-and-bust city we call home. The image of artists losing their place in the city often functions as a symbol of a larger sense of loss: While the decline of affordable studio space is measurable and undeniable, people also tend to remember places they love as having been in the past more interesting, animated, authentic–placier–than they are in the present. Whether that is actually the case or just the foggy goggles of nostalgia is debatable.

What is often lost in the discussion is what it means to the art. ’57 Biscayne, and other urban studio spaces, are not mere symbols to the artists who work there, but a base from which we observe, interact with, and respond to the city. PLACINESS gathers the visual evidence of what it actually means–from the artists’ points of view–to stay in our neighborhood and in our city: to live and move about and to look at things and people. The show encompasses representational paintings and photographs that directly reference Seattle physically or spiritually or historically; constructions that incorporate materials or found objects endemic to here; and work in a variety of media that is visually inspired by the streets, buildings, history, landscape, and humanscape of Seattle.

PLACINESS will coincide with the Seattle Art Fair, which is presenting sound art by Brendan Fowler downstairs at 108 Cherry.  In keeping with its mission, the Good Arts Building is hosting Art Fair as an Event Partner, as well as providing storefront space to La Sala, presenting La Cocina, a multimedia extravaganza at 702 First Avenue; and the Center on Contemporary Art at 106 Cherry.

Image: Dara Solliday, View from Jane Richlovsky and Drake Deknatel’s Studio at 619 Western I