Articles

On June 12, 150 people gathered at the beloved San Juan Island Museum of Art (SJIMA) to celebrate the opening of “Shapeshifters—Northwest Coast Indigenous Art,” an exhibition detailing four key artistic styles of Indigenous peoples living along the Northwest coast. The large group of attendees included several internationally celebrated artists who are included in the exhibition, alongside locals and museum supporters eager to learn more about Indigenous art through the exhibition. Guest curator Lee Brooks, a local gallerist, centers the exhibition around the story of Raven, a popular figure in Northwest coast art.  Brooks stated that Raven was selected to be a focal point of the exhibition because “He transforms to meet life’s challenges and shapeshifts to create new solutions for today’s dilemmas.” The resulting exhibition both delights and educates visitors by bringing together important artists employing four different styles in an effort to educate and connect.

SJIMA is located about six blocks from the ferry terminal in Friday Harbor on San Juan Island. The museum has exhibited work by Indigenous artists previously and most of its permanent collection is work by Indigenous artists, but this exhibition has a different geographical focus than those previously hosted by the museum. In a conversation soon after the exhibit opened, Assistant 
Director Wendy Smith relayed that “Shapeshifters” has had an incredible impact on members of the local community who are eager to learn more and support the artists included in the show. “Shapeshifters” includes over fifty artworks, eighteen of which come from the museum’s permanent collection, by some of the most renowned Northwest Coast artists. The list includes Susan Point, Dan Friday, Rande Cook, Greg Colfax, and many others.

One impressive element of this exhibition is the scale. Not only the number of artworks, but also the geographic range and size of the artwork. Upon entering the gallery, visitors see a large red cedar sculpture with copper and acrylic paint by Tom Hunt. Titled “Sun,” the sculpture includes a face with seven wooden rays extending outward. Hunt (Kwakwaka’wakw) was born in Victoria, B.C. and trained or apprenticed with many family members, including his father, uncle, and grandfather—certainly maintaining a tradition of familial artistic legacy. Similarly, Susan Point (Musqueam) speaks about learning her art form from her family members as well, and the exhibition includes her beautiful serigraph, “Symphony of Butterflies.” Point is also from British Columbia and has been an influential figure in the Coast Salish artistic community.    

As mentioned, this exhibition explores four artistic styles that are represented in different areas of the Northwest coast region. Moving further south from where Hunt and Point learned their style and methods, “Shapeshifters” brings the work of Greg Colfax, a Makah artist who grew up in Neah Bay, Washington State. Colfax’s red cedar “Canoe Mask” is one of several masks included in the 
exhibition. Colfax is well known for both his large scale and smaller carvings, in addition to conserving older artwork carved by other artists. The red cedar face of “Canoe Mask” is highlighted with cedar bark around the edges to represent hair, and the mouth of the figure is open to evoke action and agency.

The exhibition includes a wide range of materials amongst the many artworks. This article has already mentioned wood carvings and serigraphs, but it is also important to note Dan Friday (Lummi) and his blown glass “Sxwo’le Reefnet Anchor.” Bringing all of these methods, materials, and styles together underscores the fact that Indigenous art includes dynamic conversations on important social issues, observations about environmental concerns, and can include a discussion about traditional styles and contemporary methods.

Throughout the summer, the museum hosts artist talks to further explore the artwork, themes, and messages involved in the exhibition. More information about these events is posted on the museum’s website. The artwork is on display until September 15, so there is plenty of time for visitors to see the show and explore all the beauty that San Juan Island has to offer. If you have never visited the island, it is a ferry ride away from Anacortes, Washington. Since the ferry landing is located in the town, it may not be necessary to bring a vehicle. Summer is the perfect time to enjoy the beauty of the Puget Sound with a ferry ride to Friday Harbor in order to visit this exhibition. 

Chloé Dye Sherpe

Chloé Dye Sherpe is an art professional and curator based in Washington State.

“Shapeshifters” exhibition is on view through September 15 at the San Juan Islands Museum of Art, located at 540 Spring Street in Friday Harbor, Washington. Museum hours are Friday through Monday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information, visit www.sjima.org.

Port Townsend’s Northwind Art brings the celebrated Outsider artist Chuck Iffland right inside its walls this summer—quite a trick! The show consists of biomorphic works in stone, wood, and metal that Iffland creates at his Mad Monkey sculpture park and studio in Chimicum, just south of Port Townsend. The one-man show is called “Echoes, Memories, and Curiosities.” Bring your own curiosity though, because these are layered and enigmatic works.

The term “outsider artist” often seems not simply inadequate (no label is ever adequate) but exactly backwards: artists tagged “outsider” are usually the ones most possessed of an inner vision, a private world. But after chatting with Iffland, who embraces the outsider tag with a mix of pride and shrugging self-acceptance, I can see how the handle makes sense. The “white walls” (his term for art galleries) are fairly distasteful to him; the formalities required to participate in the formal art world exhaust his patience; and don’t get him started on the digitization of every single step required to play the game. He’s no Luddite or recluse, he just prefers his own path, which is to display his artwork outside of officially-sanctioned spaces, literally placing them outside in the open air.

Which brings us to another way the “outsider artist” moniker works: Iffland is often outside gardening on the wooded five-acre spread he owns with his wife, the film-maker Lynn Wegenka. Deer sleep in the fields and tend to their fawns among the strange scarecrows and other sculpted figures—works that Iffland creates in this or that old shed or barn on the property. His pieces are meant to interact with the sun, the rain, the cracking cold. How they become weathered and even disfigured is part of the draw.

Rarely is nature itself Iffland’s inspiration, though. He is more about archeology, history, and adventuresome world travel. If his figurative work seems akin to the carvings and totems of ancient peoples, and somewhat distant from the 21st century (or even the 20th century), it’s because of those passions.

Iffland and Wegenka decamped from Seattle in the 1990s, and bought a small cabin above Chimicum Creek. Their Seattle cohorts explained they were nuts to abandon the city’s thriving arts scene for some remote unheard of outpost. But Iffland could see the bulldozers coming for his studio in an industrial section of town (probably now an Amazon tower). Iffland and Wegenka pursued their visions in the secluded valley, keeping a distance even from Port Townsend’s art circles. The idea of the sculpture park (which he calls his “roadside attraction”) presented occasions to get to know the neighbors and larger community, and to spread the word about what he was up to and capable of. In the surrounding woods, he could find plenty of source materials for his art-making.

Iffland has always admired the Northwind Art space, and he teamed with its new Executive Director Martha Worthley, an artist in her own right, to map out the show. He senses the time is right for “Echoes, Memories, and Curiosities.” When Covid curtailed Iffland’s travel plans his productivity in the studio soared. He let memories of pre-pandemic hikes be his guide. He found himself working at a smaller scale than in the past. He concedes it’s a matter of aging: dealing with slabs of wood, sheets of metal, and unwieldy stone is a younger artist’s game. On the plus side, his newer more modest-sized pieces are easier for the public to bring home—and it is important to Iffland to find the pieces good homes. It’s what artists live for, he says.

A fresh focus is on woodblock and linoleum prints. The printing is all by hand—no press involved. If ink splatters into the space around the image, so be it. He’s aware these marks can turn away certain buyers, but for Iffland they lend individuality to a print in a limited edition. The move from a sketch to a print is just the beginning, though. Iffland also uses the carved blocks to transfer the image into/onto a thin copper sheet. He applies elixirs to the copper (hot sauce—preferably Sriracha—is involved here) until intriguing colors emerge.

Now a final iteration of the image takes place—another echo or memory of the initial drawing. Iffland transfers the image to a steel plate about ¼-inch thick, and uses a plasma-cutter to carve out the negative space within the design.

These prints and their metallic echoes occupy the left side of the gallery space, balancing the “curiosities” along the opposite wall. (In the center sits a small army of figures to confront you as you enter the gallery.) At least a few of the “curiosities” arise from what Iffland calls “walkabouts in the borderlands”—meaning pre-pandemic hikes along the U.S. and Mexico border. In the desert Iffland encountered “signposts” that migrants use for wayfinding in that dangerous terrain. The signals are improvised, coded, and highly adaptive. In that precarious borderland surveilled by hostile forces, knowing how to read these marks and symbols means not just staying on track but staying alive. It is not surprising that Iffland the outsider artist would be engaged by these narratives, but you’ll find the form of expression surprising and curious indeed.

Tom McDonald

Tom McDonald is a writer and musician living on Bainbridge Island, Washington.

“Echoes, Memories, and Curiosities: The Art of Chuck Iffland” is on view Thursday through Monday, from July 10 through August 25 at Northwind Art, located at 701 Water Street in Port Townsend, Washington. For more information, www.northwindart.org.

During the weekend of August 23-24, Iffland’s sculpture park is on the Port Townsend & Surrounding Areas Studio Tour. The Raw Art Collective partners with Northwind Art to host the free, self-guided public tour, and you’ll find details at www.rawartcollective.org.

The 51^st Seattle International Film Festival opened with a bang on May 15 with seats full of local film lovers and visitors from around the world. Inundated with an enthusiastic audience, SIFF reminded all there of the importance of broadening one's Reel Word by seeing films made in other countries.

Seeing movies can be a great way to grow your perspective and understand what is affecting the world around you. SIFF wants to highlight this and encourage you to witness what is happening through all genres, including action, comedy, drama, horror, romance, science fiction, and animation.

The opening night featured Four Mothers, co-written by Irish brothers, Darren and Colin Thornton, and directed by Darren. The film is a wonderful heartfelt comedy about a man, Edward, an up-and-coming novelist, taking care of his elderly mother, and suddenly three more mothers.

We follow Edward through his stressful journey caring for his mother, Alma, whose life we learn mirrors his own. Both of these characters are doing the best they can, with their bravest faces on. It isn’t until they have three surprising house guests that they are thrown out of their comfort zones and forced to be vulnerable in a whole new way.

This is a laugh-out-loud, witty, emotional movie that reminds you of the love for your grandmother, mother, and all of the strong women in your life. While this movie will appeal to all kinds of audiences, queer men and their moms will find its story especially engaging and personally meaningful.

While Four Mothers was shown only for the SIFF Opening Night, this is a film worth following. Colin Thornton, attended the screening and encouraged everyone to review and keep track of the film on Letterboxd and IMDb. This is a must-see film, and deserves to be widely-accessible on all viewing platforms. Spreading the word can help in reaching that goal.

SIFF runs until May 25. There are so many amazing movies in all genres and for all audiences. As you enter SIFF’s Reel World your perspective on life is strengthened. This is an opportunity to come together as a community and see what’s going on outside of Seattle's bubble. Tickets are limited, so please buy your tickets now at https://www.siff.net/festival/passes-and-tickets. Looking forward to seeing you there.

Alden Perrine

Alden Perrine is a recent graduate from Washington State University. She is headed towards Vancouver Film School for their Writing in Film program next year. Alden is passionate about film and cannot wait to get started.

For more information about Seattle International Film Festival, visit https://www.siff.net/festival.

Don’t miss the extraordinary exhibition “Power of the Presses” at Bainbridge Island Museum of Art until June 8. A selection from the Cynthia Sears collection of 3,500 artists’ books (one of the largest in the country) curated by Catherine Alice Michaelis, it features 33 printmaking methods. But it also emphasizes a wide range of content from environmental to political. The role of the press in building community is the main theme. As the curator explained, she chose works that “shared a voice of community or personal, intimate expression — in a way that gathers community. The press as a tool for sharing voice. Pieces had to be personal in some way. I also looked for an example of every printmaking method that was in the glossary.”

Surprisingly, in the center of the gallery, we see an offset printing press. Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr. was there the day I went, printing posters for anyone that stopped by. Behind him a wall of broadsides by a range of artists featured such direct statements as “Stop Voter Suppression,” “Peace,” “Breathe,” “I ain’t afraid to live in a world of trans people I am afraid to live in a world without them,” and “Without Song Each Day Would Be A Century.”

Mare Blocker, a pioneering role model for the artists’ books community, created an “altar/throne” made of books. When I was there she sat in that throne reading excerpts from her stories and from “My Beloved Community Dictionary.” Her focus, as described by the curator, is “how creativity can lead to self-discovery and the healing power that printing offers.”

The multiple prints on one wall engage community through Partners in Print. Collectively called “Words of Courage,” some of these were selected from poems written at Seattle Children’s Hospital through the Seattle Children’s Poet in Residence program. For example, an eleven-year-old patient titled her poem “Cured.” In the last verse she says, “I hope to close the door on being bald and self-conscious. I hope to open the door to having soft hazel curls hiding my ears and neck.”

The pages in Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr.’s poem book “Riddle ma riddle as I suppose: riddles from the Sea Islands of South Carolina” unfold one by one in different directions, ultimately forming large squares. The artist told me the riddles are based on local secrets and lore so we can’t answer them.

Shana Agid’s letterpress print book features text pointing at various places in Manhattan with the provocative title “Call a Wrecking Ball to Make a Window.” The map plots the intersections of Agid’s own history with that of the famous activist/artist/writer David Wojnarowicz, who died of AIDS in 1992. Agid is making sure that queer voices persist in the face of ongoing threats.

Another approach to the book is Ben Blount’s “Africans in America: A Short History.” The book features many blank pages and then we come to a date in which something significant happened for African Americans. The book is open to 1964, the year the Civil Rights Act was passed “prohibiting discrimination of all kinds based on race, color, religion, or national origins.”

Delita Martin uses multiple techniques to create “This Side of Night,” a huge book with lavish images and text: “My black woman body created a world under the moon…where black birds gather, their bodies shimmer a blue black, wings moving to the ancient rhythms of time, over and over, all at once around me, their bodies weight, stretched long on this side of night.”

Martin is both magical and vividly present on these large pages.

Another sizable book that uses multiple techniques is by Robbin Ami Silverberg and Kim Berman, “RE—A Tale of Two Cities,” the cities being New York and Johannesburg, with text like “reclaim, retrieve, recover, reuse, recycle…”

“Ten Years in Uzbekistan,” originally designed by Alexander Rodchenko, was discovered in an archive. David King, a historian of Russian photography, found it with the faces blacked out as people fell out of favor. David King and Ken Campbell re-presented the book with letterpress printed over half-tone photographs. The result is a haunting way to honor these people, whose names and biographies remain present in the text.

The pioneering role of Cynthia Sears in collecting artists’ books, combined with the diverse selection by curator Catherine Alice Michaelis, highlights the museum’s inclusive approach to acquisition, and its openness to a wide range of printing techniques, subject matters, and formats, from simple broadsides to books that unfold. This exhibit is an exciting revelation of the democratic and community-building power of print.

Susan Noyes Platt
Susan Noyes Platt writes for local, national, and international publications and her website, www.artandpoliticsnow.com.

“Power of the Presses” is on view through June 8 at Bainbridge Island Museum of Art, located at 550 Winslow Way East, on Bainbridge Island, Washington. Museum is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. For further information, visit www.biartmuseum.org.

Art generates a particular kind of alchemy. Artists wrangle ideas and materials into a gesture, object, or image that transcends language to make sense of an unruly world. Viewers, the people who witness or experience art, expand this transformative act when they add their points of view, amplifying or challenging the artist’s meaning. Art is conveyed both through and to us.

It seems fitting that at this moment, when little makes sense in our wobbling and punch-drunk world, an antidote is offered in the work of Holly Ballard Martz. Her show, “Past Perfect Future Tense,” runs through May 17, 2025 at Greg Kucera Gallery in Pioneer Square.

Upon entry to the gallery, one is virtually surrounded by punching bags suspended in mid-air and cocooned inside coverings of antique quilts. Navigating around the torso-sized bags reveals texts on each side; with the deft wordplay that Martz is known for, the texts explore the tension that women face between unwanted attention and the equally-undesirable devaluation and invisibility that comes with age. In “(Dis)missed,” the word appears on one side, broken into a vertical stack three letters wide and three lines high. On the other side, the letters “XX” allude to the chromosome pair associated with the female gender, but also to total obliteration. Martz extends this tension through her wall-mounted quilt pieces, where misogynist and ageist labels appear. The artist reclaims these slurs using encrusted seed beads stitched to the damaged and visibly-stained fabric; “hag,” “CRONE,” and “Witch” are fastidiously camouflaged to match the quaint calico patterns of the quilt squares.

Framing the perimeter of the gallery are sinuous and glittering wall pieces displayed in a variety of clusters; some are fully exposed and some are enclosed in bespoke frames and vitrines. Allusions to the transience of life weave through each piece. Certain pieces taken from the body, such as the solitary gray braid of “Faded Glory.” Mounted on an oval frame—like Victorian-era hairwork meant to preserve the memory of a loved one—the braid hangs from under a lead tire weight. The hair succumbs to and illustrates gravity, a force echoed in the artist’s other works that point to the slow and inevitable fall to earth.

In this world where bodily autonomy is threatened in the same measure that commonly-held notions of unattainable and generic beauty are proffered, Martz’s work celebrates and accepts alternatives. Her pieces, smartly constructed both in form and concept, transform what might otherwise be unwelcome or discarded into glittering and enduring truths.

Another kind of magic is at work in the densely-populated new paintings of Anthony White. His pieces travel in time, moving fluidly back to the lush still lifes of the 17th century Dutch Golden Age, recalling sensuously rendered images full of symbols and coded visual language. In that era, overblown flowers, candles, and skulls were coded depictions of human mortality, while luxury trade goods such as porcelain, silk, and tea cataloged the emergent wealth of early-stage capitalism.

White deploys these conventions of abundance and symbolism as well, but even with recognizable historical references, his works are undeniably contemporary. He paints not with pigment suspended in oil, but with thin strands of melted, richly-colored plastic called polylactic acid (PLA), a product commonly used for 3D model drawing. As a result, his finely rendered images emerge out of an exquisite web of tiny raised lines, shimmering textured surfaces on panel.

His subject matter is front-loaded chaos, a world within a world of superabundance, an image-saturated field of media, communication, pleasure, and status suggesting a shelf is stacked to an improbable density. In the center of the image, we see a luxury-brand gift basket containing candy and bottles of tawny liquid, a small sculpture of bronze-colored clasped hands, a computer-mounted camera eye for video calls, a digital clock, a half-eaten sandwich, and a “real” hand reaching in from the right and holding a disk with a fish rendered in Coast Salish formline style. And wait, there’s more: a spray of stickers, logos, glimpses of words and icons appearing and receding in apparently strategic locations. Are they interruptions from the virtual world in what is rendered as an almost tangibly real space, or are they pointing us to find deeper meaning?

White’s work layers reference upon reference, from everyday items to the largest cultural narratives. The density within the picture plane invites all kinds of looking, and all kinds of finding. Engaging this work is like pulling a Tarot card: the dense jumbled imagery presents a world open to myriad interpretations, and the magic emerges when we pick one and respond.

Kristin Tollefson
Kristin L. Tollefson is an artist and educator based in Tacoma, Washington.

Greg Kucera Gallery presents Holly Ballard Martz’s exhibit “Past Perfect Future Tense” through May 17. Anthony White’s exhibit runs from May 22-June 28 with a reception Thursday, June 5, 6-8 p.m. and a public artist talk on Saturday, June 7 at 12 p.m. Located at located at 212 - 3rd Avenue South in Seattle, Washington, the gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. For information, visit www.gregkucera.com.

The Heron Rookery

There’s a rookery on Bainbridge island that is hardly a secret, but I’m not going to say where it is. I like to imagine there are still hidden places where birds can nest without our interference.    

It’s amazing how many people have never heard of a rookery, or don’t know the meaning of the word. I didn’t know before I moved here, and my sister thought I was talking about a kitchen appliance. But once I stood beneath one, it was like giving myself up to a breathtaking privilege—such an incredible feeling.

So when I heard the heron rookery is for sale, I felt nothing but fear for the herons. My god, can’t we leave anything alone? I thought about all the promises that could, and likely would, be made between the owners and buyers and agents to allay the conservationists, only to be broken later.

I wondered. I asked around. I waited.    

I tried not to think of what could happen. But I was worried. Because I know, of course. I know, construction could win out.

I also know that I am such a hypocrite.

Because I live in a condo development—a controversial one—that rose to command four acres directly north of the ferry terminal, where people used to walk so that the horse chestnut trees could nurture them though long wet winters and lend shade in summer. I don’t remember how the subject of my address came up in T&C one day, but a woman with gorgeous grey hair waved a hand at me and turned away leaving me dejected among the bulk food bins. Even now, when I tell certain people where I live, I can see it in their eyes: that my home is the first housing project that changed the character of the island for good. Never mind the new round-abouts that made my friend Grace say, “We all need something to roll our eyes at.”      

I took another walk to the rookery. I stood underneath taking in the sound of wingbeats and scraping toes, the elaborate nests built to shelter against windstorms and rain and eagles and ospreys and rodent predators. I watched two herons aim harsh squawks at each other. This went on for a while.

When I finally find the nerve, I call the real estate agent who listed the rookery property. She hasn’t called back, but even before I know what she’ll say, I know what she’ll say: It’s private land with a view of the harbor. It will eventually sell. If not this year, then next.

I know this world will always be plundered apart and rejoined together, but I am always stunned by how fast the plunder and how slow the rejoin. I can’t bear to think what the herons will do if their trees are felled to make room for another luxury home. If I do let myself think about it, I see stunned versions of herons frantically searching for a new stand of trees.

All I can think to say is that maybe there is something good about this terrible feeling—that it’s never bad to remember what really matters.  

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I am so happy to say that since writing this piece, I have received the most wonderful news—the Bainbridge Island Land Trust received enough donations to save the heron rookery!

Mary Lou Sanelli

Mary Lou Sanelli’s latest title is In So Many Words. She works as a writer, speaker, and master dance teacher. For more information visit www.marylousanelli.com.

   In memory of Clemens Starck, 1937-2024

Who can say the old way’s dead and gone,
these days when who says anything for sure?
Feet dangling out the boxcar’s toothless maw
here sit a couple throwbacks drinking in the view,
snaking through the Siskiyous this balmy afternoon.
 
Both have beards, and both have scraggly hair.
In the air there is a touch of spring. One with
his Red Sox ballcap screwed down tight could be
the ghost of Clem Starck on a ramble,
heading east and south, a free ride caught
to look for work, really a footloose excuse,
a lark and nothing more. But here they sit,
their boots laced up, their knapsacks full of apples,
socks, potatoes, and a couple cans of beans.
One tells the other Siskiyou is Chinook slang
for a bob-tailed horse. We know who that must be.
On this four percent grade the engine labors,
and along for the ride climbing slow they take
a while to pass. As they are turned about to go
into the dark again they think to wave at us.


Paul Hunter

Paul Hunter is a Seattle poet who has won the Washington State Book Award for his farming poems, and is currently working on a series of contemporary cowboy novels that wrestle with how we might savor nature more fully and accommodate ourselves to climate change. The first cowhand book won a Will Rogers Medallion. His last book was Untaming the Valley, and the next to appear soon in 2025 is Desert Crossing.  

What goes up does not always come down. Especially if it’s Ginny Ruffner. If you think that maxim sounds slightly off, like it’s been reversed, reimagined, and turned upside down, you would be correct. But that’s what Ginny Ruffner did to whatever so-called obstacles she encountered. She was naturally buoyant. She modified, reimagined, and transformed everything to suit her purpose.  Like death, for instance.

The first time death came for her, in the form of an oncoming car, she turned it upside down, shook it until its pockets rained stars, and walked—admittedly, with a cane and a limp — away from a two-month coma, alive and well, and better than ever. That was in December of 1991. Against all odds, she stayed alive and thrived for another incredibly productive 34 years until she passed away a few weeks ago, quietly, quickly, gracefully, and on her own terms, in the home and studio that was one of her most astonishing works of art.

You would struggle to find evidence of that epic struggle with death in her work. It might be lurking in the twisted and tortured metal forms of her large glass and stainless-steel sculptures that are both beautiful and menacing. But her optimism is always there too, although it’s not the least bit sentimental or cloying. Optimism was simply her assumption about the nature of the world as she saw it. She insisted that beauty was always there, waiting for those who had the wit and courage to lure it out and wrestle with it. And of course she’s right about that. What kind of fool would question the assumptions of someone who has bested death?

Plenty of things made her angry — complacency, mediocrity, banality — but nothing seemed to frighten Ginny. She worried about mundane things like getting to the airport on time, but never about the big terrifying things like what her next act would be. She had second, third, fourth, and many more acts, constantly surprising everyone by taking up a new medium once she had conquered the previous one, moving from painting to glass, mixed-media sculpture, collage, pixels, and augmented reality. As far as anyone who knew her knew, she worked most of the day, every day, never stopping, and always thinking about her next move.

She once told me she didn’t understand writer’s block. How could you not know what to do next, she wondered. How could your art paralyze you? A couple of months later, when she was hopelessly stuck in the middle of an essay she  was writing for a catalogue of one of her shows, she called me and said, “Okay, I get it.”

I laughed, delighted and vindicated. The mighty Ginny had struck out. My malicious glee was short-lived. She called again the next day and said, “I’ve figured it out. I’m going to write a crappy first draft and you’re going to edit it.”

“Okay, Gin. You win again.”

Ginny was interested in a wide swath of subjects that included mathematics, philosophy, botany, genetics, normal science, weird science, space exploration, and world-building. She worked with an impressive array of eminent thinkers and inventors who became friends and enthusiastic collaborators in her quest to unleash beauty on an unsuspecting world. Her work was and is important. Although she’s gone, it is still here in museums, public spaces, and prestigious private collections. But she left behind many friends, followers, and fans here in Seattle, and all over the world, who have been gathering informally for the past weeks to remember and celebrate her as a person as well as a public figure. Her passing left a deep hole in the lives of everyone who was close to her and anyone who loved her art.

So, the story of death and Ginny Ruffner has ended in a tie. She would have laughed at that idea. She laughed at everything. She found it especially funny whenever anyone described her as a glass artist, because it made her sound like she was made of glass. But Ginny wasn’t made of glass. She was made of steel.

To find out more about Ginny, her work and her life, watch the excellent feature-length documentary about her, A Not So Still Life. It was directed by filmmaker Karen Stanton and produced by David Skinner and his company, ShadowCatcher Entertainment, who have generously made the film available for streaming online at https://player.vimeo.com/video/1002140337?h=0d9b3177db. For a comprehensive look at her work, visit www.ginnyruffner.com which was created in collaboration with her friend and colleague, Michael Hilliard.

Kathleen Cain

Kathleen Cain was a journalist and a creative director at the legendary Heckler Associates for many years before starting her own communications consulting firm. Find her writings at www.postalley.org.