Art Of Our City

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Seattle artist Christopher Montoya says "I choose to live"

Christopher Montoya was a ballet dancer for most of his adult life. His career included a stint with the internationally acclaimed drag company Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo. But even there, Montoya felt like an outsider.

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How dance goes digital in Seattle

If there’s one thing that distinguishes artists, it’s an aptitude for creative problem-solving. They’ve had to be particularly creative this summer. Six months into a pandemic that shuttered theaters, nightclubs and other venues, with no set date to reopen, Seattle area dance companies are pivoting from live performance to producing new digital content for their audiences.

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Nia-Amina Minor finds inspiration in the fight for racial justice

It's been a tough year for Seattle dancer Nia-Amina Minor, but she finds energy and inspiration from the fight racial justice

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Dance is 'close and sweaty,' but Donald Byrd is working to create the art form for the pandemic age.

In early March, Donald Byrd, artistic director at Seattle’s Spectrum Dance Theatre, and his company members were working on a new dance about the intersection of race and climate change. The performance was scheduled to premiere in April, and while coronavirus cases were on the rise here, officials hadn’t yet issued any public gathering restrictions. So Byrd and his dancers continued rehearsals at their studio at Madrona Beach.

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Artist Aramis O. Hamer says her work has one message: Black lives matter. Period.

Seattle police officers cleared the Capitol Hill Organized Protest zone earlier this week, but an indelible reminder of the occupation remains: the colorful Black Lives Matter mural that stretches along Pike Street near Cal Anderson Park. Aramis O. Hamer is one of 17 Seattle artists who collaborated on the mural. Each artist created one of the letters; Hamer painted the “V”.

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'It’s about me getting back to myself.' Seattle artist explores identity in new photo series

Seattle art fans know Dani Tirrell as a dancer and choreographer, a recipient of the 2019 Mayor’s Arts Award, and a beloved teacher at Northwest Tap Connection. So they were surprised earlier this week when Tirrell published a series of self-portraits on Instagram.

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She screamed so loud she scared off a rhino, and other Patti Warashina stories

Patti Warashina is a ceramic artist, but during the pandemic, she’s been drawing a lot; pictures of herself drinking martinis, yelling at news coverage of President Trump, and kicking a giant, spiked coronavirus out of her house. “He’s fleeing away from me,” she says with a laugh, “because I’m worse than he is!”

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As we adjust to life in a long-term pandemic, we could learn a thing or two from this Seattle actor

When Suzy Hunt learned that state health officials had banned public gatherings, her first thoughts were for her friends in Seattle’s theater community. Everyone she knew immediately lost their jobs when performances were cancelled. “There will be more jobs in the future,” Hunt says, “but right now, it’s so unkind.”

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Seattle poet Colleen McElroy weathers out the pandemic with words

At 85, Colleen McElroy leans into her poetry to weather what life throws her way

Creating Black-centric cultural spaces: "We need honest conversations about Blackness"

Last year Elisheba Johnson left her job at the City of Seattle’s Office of Arts and Culture. Although she loved the staff and the work she was doing, she needed a change. “I’d been having conversations with people about what it would mean to work more specifically with my community, the Black community,” Johnson says.