Cozy SAM

 

3/15/26 Mountains, Alexander Calder, Seattle Art Museum

On a chilly morning following our freaky snowfall, I was more than happy to spend a few hours with USk inside the cozy Seattle Art Museum. Since my white pencil with black paper have been serving me well at art museums, both SAM and the Asian Museum, I gave them a shot on Calder’s work, Mountains, which I hadn’t seen before. All black, the sheet-metal sculpture stands with the dark elevators behind it on one side, so I walked around it to find an angle with a lighter-colored background (above). That’s when I discovered the round hole in the center – such a beautiful counterpoint to all the sharp angles.

That took longer than I wanted; by the time I was done, I was ready for lunch. As Kate and I chatted over our lunches at the SAM café, I caught a sideview of the whimsical Little Cloud Sky, an installation hanging over the lobby (the front view I sketched several months ago shows the clouds’ smiling faces).

SAM cafe and lobby

I had time for one more sketch before the throwdown. I went back upstairs where a horse had caught my eye earlier. By contemporary artist Deborah Butterfield, life-size Pascal is made of steel and iron (below).

Pascal, Deborah Butterfield