INTROVERTIDO
March 10th, 5-10pm
In a space and time where seclusion is contemptuous, what does it feel like to embrace the stillness? What awaits the wallflower who surrenders to their intrinsic nature, might it be colorful? There is prolific beauty found only in solitude. Introvertido lives in the hollows of this anonymity and vulnerability.
As an introvert, in a society that rewards sociability, my images amplify the enchantment of introversion—a trait that compels great silence. The series reflects an evolution over a period of two years, captures the subtle discretion of those life changes and challenges the world’s view of solitary.
Subjects were relieved to learn they did not have to reveal their faces. The motif of facelessness speaks to a societal fear that should we uncover, we risk the chance of truly being seen. Introvertido collects the nuances of this narrative— only to conclude as long we remain introspective, we’re never truly alone.
Paco Macias O
Fire, Pandemic, and Other Things
August 12th, 5-10pm
Alex Siniscalchi debuts new work in his show Fire, Pandemic, and Other Things. In this exhibition, you will experience each stage in which the canvas was painted. Starting with the evolution from the internal fight for freedom to expressing himself through fire. Breaking chains and crossing borders leading him to emigrate, not only physically, but spiritually, represented through movement and brushstrokes of him. Mutating from grayscale to full color, going through masks of different personalities to knowing oneself in the middle of a pandemic. All this, culminating until this very moment, pulling all these artworks together, is a testament of passion, color, and painting from love over hopelessness. This is “Fire, Pandemic, and Other Things” Join us next Thursday from 5:00 to 10:00pm!
HARD WOOD
June 10th, 5-10pm
The Factory presents HARD WOOD, a solo exhibition and first post-graduate show for Lionel Vance, featuring works for Seattle’s Queer art walk. The exhibition explores ideas of comfort and newfound queerness that many of us form with companionship. Each piece works to showcase self portraiture, unity, and highlight the importance and contrast between items like a shared t-shirt with a partner, down to the most expendable crumb or carpet thread.
Lionel Vance is a Seattle-based artist who attended Cornish College of the Arts where he received a BFA in 2020. His work focuses predominantly in painting, using aspects of collage, text, and pattern to create vibrant scenes. The conception of his work starts with an interest in the composite, memory, and familial relationships.
Opening to the public in The Kitchen at MoM on June 10th, from 5 - 10 pm and on view for museum guests through June 13th.
Threesome
May 13th, 5-10pm
Alexander Vincini thinks and paints in terms of threes: the chimerical intersection of three colors, three shapes, three as a loose and ever-shifting concept. In his first Seattle solo exhibition, Threesome, the artist debuts multiple triptychs that both indulge and examine this concept. With each series of three, the artist explores new styles, color schemes, and stories.
Vincini’s studied play with color channels the technicality of Josef Albers while dabbling in the ethereal essence of Op Art. The overlays create a Venn diagram playground where colors interchange, transport, hypnotize, and create a vortex of stark yet intoxicating energy. Some offer up quick magic: the blink of an eye might shift the colors of the room you are in. The light and shadows bouncing from pink to blue to green will leave the viewer visually entangled and pacing amongst each trio, ultimately ensorcelled by the artist’s dexterous sleight of hand.
Opening to the public in The Kitchen at MoM on May 13th, from 5 - 10 pm and on view for museum guests through May 16th.
For purchase inquiries, or to schedule a private tour of the show, please e-mail factoryseattle@gmail.com
miss u
April 8th, 5-10pm
The Factory presents “miss u” a solo exhibition showcasing new works by Nikita Ares made in the time of the pandemic. The show intends to tap into the magic of our energies, and to experience the loudness and vibrance of life, as the world opens up again. “miss u” is a manifestation of the artist’s desire to reconnect (and party).
Artist Bio
Nikita Ares is a Seattle-based painter originally from Cagayan de Oro, Philippines. She received her BFA from Cornish College of the Arts in 2018. Her works consist primarily of drawing and painting that includes movement, energy and consciousness. Previously she has shown exhibitions at Glassbox, Studio E, Party Hat, Cloud Gallery, Specialist, among others.
NO COUNTRY FOR OLD CLOWNS
November 12th, 5-10pm
No Country for Old Clowns is a new art installation by Janelle Abbott (JRAT), conceived entirely from cast off and unwanted material--clothing, textiles, yoga mats, found chairs, and more. The exhibition will feature wearable rugs and furniture, tapestry, paintings, and poetry by the artist—along with photography from Heather Reese, Melissa Kagerer, Hannah Baumhofer, Diana Jean Oliphant, and Marie-Elaine Gagne.
The hypocrisy of American idealism has been recklessly on display since the arrival of European explorers and settlers--and exponentially reverberating after Westward expansion was encouraged in the 19th century. This collection of artworks cast the “brave white frontiersman” as a clown, buffooning his way through the unknown with an illegitimate sense of confidence and ownership. Unfortunately in this Covid era, the wearable pieces are not accessible to visitors, yet they still present the contemplation of how one can get stuck in place—held down by external forces that can be simultaneously comforting and insidious.
20% of every piece sold will be donated to Real Rent Duwamish and King County Equity Now.
Please join us on Thursday, November 12, from 5:00 to 10:00pm for a reduced capacity and socially distant regulated art opening, masks required. The Factory will hold monthly public receptions every second Thursday in conjunction with Capitol Hill Art Walk, and remain on display throughout the weekend on the first floor of Museum of Museums, located at 903 Broadway, Seattle, WA, 98104
YULES & MULES
December 12th, 6-10pm
The Factory presents the only gift shop you’ll need this year: give your loved ones (and yourself) the art you actually want and need in your life, from lacquered White Claws of Genevieve St Charles to the glittery perverse of Brittany Kusa. You’ve been so nice and not at all naughty and you deserve this.
Stuck on what to get mom for the holidays? Perhaps a trophy by Colleen Louise Barry, awarding her for birthing a miracle child. Know someone who loves to guzzle down beer after beer to get through family dinner? Mary Anne Carter has custom beer can sculptures that will brighten any bookshelf. We all have someone we know who needs to ditch their basic Ikea art and upgrade to one of Brandon Vosika’s charming paintings. You should help them with that.
The star on top of the tree of this event… you get to shop around while drinking copious amounts of Moscow Mules, getting you just tipsy enough to splurge on something to wrap up and address to yourself.
BOUNDARIES
November 14th, 6-11pm
Boundaries is an exhibition of Claire Brandt’s paintings and a performance of States of Being Traced, her interactive drawing project. Brandt’s work is about embodiment—what it feels like and what it means to be in a body. Boundaries explores this in terms of movement (time and space), singularity, and community. Brandt believes that what we are in one moment is different, and the same, from moment to moment. We are multitudes and we are one.
Brandt creates her paintings working from life and from photographs, but not photoshop. As a painting progresses, it develops its own internal logic, telling the artist what it needs. The end result is always a surprise to her.
States of Being Traced is a collaborative work made with volunteer models. Each model strikes a pose for a minute while the artist makes a whole body trace of him/her/them. The tracings layer on top of each other, creating an accumulation of figures and a whole, abstract drawing that captures a community's fleeting form and movement.
MARY ANNE CARTER IS TOOO MUCH
October 10th, 6-11pm
Closing Reception: November 7th, 7-11pm
Mary Anne Carter is an artist, designer, creative strategist, curator, educator, and generally speaking, too much. In her upcoming installation, Tooo Much, Carter explores the messiness of being someone best described as a sum of too many parts. Equal parts ambitious and hilarious, Carter gives viewers an intimate view of her life through no less than 20 mediums, ranging from sound sculpture to metal work to performance art. But fear not if you are neither an artist, nor familiar with Carter’s past work—Tooo Much may call itself a self portrait, but immersing yourself within it quickly becomes an exercise in self acceptance and common connection.
THE TROPHY ROOM
September 12th, 6-11pm
Here at The Trophy Room it is our Mission™ to help you CELEBRATE ACHIEVEMENT™ ACCOMPLISH SUCCESS™ TRIUMPH™ and WIN™ !
Feel like a winner AND a loser living in an absurd reality ~ inside ***The Trophy Room*** ~ a site-specific installation that includes sculpture, poetry, and painting by Colleen Louise Barry.
The show features a poem in the form of trophies you can take home, with one line from the poem written on each of the 80 trophies around the room, making an infinitely rearrangeable text-sculpture.
In line with Barry's work at Mount Analogue and elsewhere, the goal of the installation is total transformation, creating an immersive and ephemeral experience.
OPENING: Thursday, September 12th • Capitol Hill Art Walk 6-11pm • Featuring DJ sets and some other surprises :)
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Colleen Louise Barry is an artist and writer. She runs the interdisciplinary project Mount Analogue and her work has been published and exhibited widely. @colleenlouisebarry / @themountanalogue / www.mount-analogue.com
A Breach of Peace
August 8th, 6-11pm
More than an artist, Chelsie Kirkey is a story teller. More than the urge to paint, Kirkey has the urge to tell her stories. She paints in small series, using self-portraiture to essentially tell autobiographical short stories.
Kirkey writes about the work: “The paintings in ‘A Breach of Peace’, tell a story of an unexpected hardship. A dark storm that knocked my heart out in one blow, hurled my soul across the sky and sent my spirit whirling through a space where time did not exist. I have muddled through other storms where I could trace their place of origin back to my own heart, but this was different. I felt as if an outside force was waging war within me, working strenuously to tie me down and tape my spiritual eyes closed. The peace that God had bestowed so generously to me had been breached and I experienced sorrow like I had never experienced it before.
But you can’t see the light unless you stand in darkness, and it wasn’t long before grace swooped in like a flashlight, reminding me that no matter how awful this felt, that nothing could ever steal my peace - that it was simply hidden in the shadows, and that nothing could ever separate me from the love of God. This was a defining moment in my lifelong process of spiritual growth. It was in this moment that I realized that faith is beyond powerful, and with it, nothing could ever bring me down.”
Artist Bio:
Chelsie Kirkey (b. 1987) is an American artist living and working in Brooklyn, NY. Figurative and made with careful composition, her paintings, often self-portraits, invite the viewer to witness captured, intimate moments of home life, and offer personal reflections of both body and spirit. Employing photography as a reference for many of her paintings, her process to create is thought-out and meticulous. Recurring motifs in her work include floral and woven patterns, fine details, and rich colors that evoke a sense of romanticism and time and place.
Offerte
July 11th, 6-11pm
Steven Miller’s photographs in Offerte (offerings in Italian) are simple enough: the series documents gay porn magazine pages from the 70s through 90s burning in a backyard fire pit. But the combination of nakedness, desire, and all-consuming fire creeping across the images conjures up metaphors for love and loss through the AIDS years, and a timely reminder that pleasure, like knowledge, is a profound form of power. Miller writes about the work, "The scenes of unabashed lust and longing in Offerte aren't hell. Perhaps the photographs look superfically Catholic and recriminatory in their imagery, but there's no suffering here—only pleasure. These moments of desire and flames exist in a sort of purgatory, a cleansing by fire to finally sit by the side of the Gods."
Queer Art Walk at The Factory
June 13th, 6-11pm
For Pride, The Factory is filling every available space with queer art showcasing three unique shows:
Rest Your Head on My Shoulder
In his solo exhibition debut in Seattle, Kade Marsili's work features large scale portraits of queer youth, composed comfortably into environments designed around them, and explores concepts of personal belonging and identity. Drawing inspiration from classical and contemporary portraiture, as well as fashion photography, and interior design, Marsili captures these realistic – yet stylized figures in fields of colors, surrounded by house plants, trendy furniture, and pattern.
These interiors are personal, creating a connection between the figure and the viewer. Viewers recognize the interiors as comfortable and intimate places. Marsili introduces conflicts through the use of body language, color, symbolism, and shadow. By deliberately placing the figure in a non-confrontational, passive pose, where eye contact is not established, the artist is alluding to a moment that this person is caught up in. This figure is experiencing something, and the viewer is being allowed access to study and empathize for these figures in this moment.
Marsili's identity and struggles fall into his work, in way of the depiction of young, attractive, queer men, placed in these spaces that evoke an intimate softness, warmth, and tenderness. Breaking from common conceptions of masculinity, his paintings handle the male figure in a fragile caring manner. This concept of care is vitally important in his work. People crave care and affection from others, be this platonic or romantically, and people desire to care for others. The figures in these paintings feel as we do, and have the same needs as we do.
Through the LooQing Glass
Through the LooQing Glass is an overabundance of queer artists' perspectives on queer bodies. A gallery filled floor-to-ceiling with portraitures of the self or others, each piece alone, but together a community. Featuring stained-glass odalisques, steel and rubber genitalia, elegant watercolor nudes, illustrated transmasculine erotica, and mustachioed Madonnas.
Featuring:
Matthew-Mary Caruchet
Mischa Ally
Mahogany LaPiranHa
Bird Lindsay
Dev McCauley
OctoEyes
James Prost
Grego Rachko
Darby Rages
Panic Volkushka
Timothy White Eagle and Adrain Chesser
Curated by Matthew-Mary Caruchet.
Sponsored by a King County 4Culture grant.
Our Father Who Art in Hell - JAF 6:13
Growing up as a young gay man in the suburbs of St. Paul Minnesota, JAF documented many misfortunes in life via coloring, drawing and painting with silly paint kits bought by his mother. But due to the dark content of the material, JAF always hid and disposed of most anything that would have raised questions. This was the beginning of his fear to share anything creative with anyone.
After breaking the chains of self doubt, religious abuse, and truly reconnecting with his creative self. He started to create heavily in 2003 after relocating to Seattle, with Polaroids and paint. It quickly escalated to photography, painting and mixed media.
This is the start of a creative journey, that's unfurling itself in a backwards motion.
As a survivor of sexual abuse under the banner of religion, and feeling the strength of the #metoo movement. JAF lashes out by creating a series of images and mixed media pieces, that draw attention to the symbols of hypocrisy within religion. This is his middle finger to the perpetrator's who abuse in the name of god.
1977
May 9th, 6-11 pm
In the spring of 2017, Greg Lundgren came across a vintage kaleidoscope at a Georgetown swap meet. A part of him was starved for art that brought genuine happiness and a sense of magic into his life. So he bought the 40-year old toy and shared it with everyone he crossed paths with.
Being a little embarrassed by his growing obsession with this ‘hippie art’ and knowing it didn’t fit neatly within the world of contemporary art, he carried on anyways. He bought costume jewelry at Goodwill and vibrant sheets of art glass at Northwest Art Glass. He bought faceted cut glass jewels off the internet. He chopped it up, mixed it up and experimented with a few mirrors and a little sunshine.
After a year of experimenting, Lundgren’s kaleidoscopes were producing rich imagery that far eclipsed this first antique. He started creating object chambers to make more intentional designs and photographing the vibrant patterns they made. Soon he stopped looking at kaleidoscopes as a toy, and more of a tool to make complex patterns.
In the fall of 2018, he started sending kaleidoscope fabric samples to Gucci and Givenchy and other fashion designers who he thought would be excited about the process and potential of kaleidoscope driven patterns. So far no one has written back, but through a collaboration with local designer Jordan Christianson, Lundgren commissioned his first satin kaleidoscope dresses. When people say no, it just means you are supposed to do it yourself.
This exploration is far from over, but Lundgren wanted to share his kaleidoscopes and the journey that this little toy inspired.
Please join us on Thursday, May 9th from 6:00 to 11:00 to witness a little magic, a little joy and the opportunity to make your own kaleidoscopic patterns.
HONEY
April 11th, 6-11 pm
The Factory Presents: HONEY, a solo-exhibition by Mari Nagaoka from April 11, 2019 to May 2, 2019. HONEY features large-scale portraits of queer folx within their community who were asked to pose with culturally-significant objects to them. Nagaoka works with just a ballpoint pen, tediously layering tar-like strokes of ink across canvas or paper to create intricate, massive drawings. Their meditative, process-based practice seeks to pose questions about legitimacy and cultural hierarchies, while acting as a reclamation of imagery that is often overlooked.
Mari Nagaoka (b.1996) is a Seattle-based multimedia artist and draughtsman originally from Watsonville, California. A recent graduate from Cornish College of the Arts, their work largely concerns eroticism, queerness, and aspects of cultural diaspora. Through the lens of erotic symbolism and various taboo subcultures, they construct representational works that hold significance to their personal exploration and narrative.
QUINLYN JOHNSON’S CLUTTER
March 14th, 6-11 pm
Do you keep things when you maybe shouldn’t?
Does it bring you joy?
Do you shove it all in a drawer in case you might need it later?
It’s called CLUTTER. It fills cabinets, corners and crevices. Seattle based sculptor, Quinlyn Johnson immortalizes our half empty, broken, and all together unused things. CLUTTER, is a series of sculptural works replicating all that stuff that is just a little too nice to throw away.
LOVE IS A FOUR LETTER WORD
February 14th, 6-11 pm
Do you like love?
Do you hate it?
Do you think that love is an abstract concept that leaves you feeling numb?
IF U ANSWERED YES THEN THIS IS THE EVENT FOR YOU. A one stop shop of art about love, heartbreak, bananas, ponies… YOU NAME IT. Starring the very talented and influential Brandon Vosika, Brittany Kusa, Genevieve St. Charles, and Ralph Houser!
NON-STOP EROTIC CAFETERIA
January 10th, 6-11 pm
World-renowned visionaries Anouk Rawkson and Tara Thomas bring you “Non-Stop Erotic Cafeteria.” Imagine an orgy at Burger King, a buffet at the museum, and art installations made completely of blow-up dolls.
Erotically charged, highly collectible artistic pieces that will add value to your collection. They promise a smorgasbord of creativity, food, and porn.
Featuring guilty pleasures by: Lamby, Corey J Brewer, Doug Newman, Jason Gertsen, Kelly O, DK Pan, Curtis Bathurst, John Criscitello, Travis Ritter, Jordan Christianson, Dennis Turner, Marley Grey, Dan Paulus, Harlen Munson, Coco Troll, Catherine Bressner, and Cathrine Bressner.
WITH SPIRITS
December 13th, 6-11 pm
The Factory Presents: With Spirits, a solo exhibition by Jean Nagai from December 13, 2018 to January 5, 2019. For his first solo exhibition in Seattle since 2016, the Los Angeles painter will be showcasing new and beautifully hypnotic large scale paintings, as well as a collection of works from his ongoing ‘100 paintings/100 days’ project. This dedicated venture involves creating a new painting each day, for 100 days, those varying in size. Jean is a first generation Japanese American Artist who connects cultural beauties and supernatural occurances to pose his questions in metamorphic paintings. The works captive any viewer because of the repetitive gestures that create buoyant land and atmospheric scapes, ones that move with slow and gentle grace. Jean makes the complex systems and intricacy behind his work look effortless. Please join us for the opening reception on December 13th, from 6-11pm at The Factory (1216 10th Ave, Seattle, WA 98122). This show is guest curated by Anthony White.
Jean Nagai is a artist/muralist (b.1979 Seattle, WA) and currently living in Los Angeles. He received a BA from The Evergreen State College and his work has been shown in the Pacific Northwest and other places across the US. By engaging in a meditative process by which the sum of many individual dots accumulate to form a larger synergic whole, Jean’s work both creates and explores a spiritual microcosm and macrocosm that shifts between the physical, digital and political landscape.
instagram.com/thefactoryseattle
instagram.com/jean_nagai
instagram.com/culturalcrisis
(Un)Pleasant
November 8th, 6-11 pm
(Un)Pleasant, featuring the work of Coco Spadoni and Krista Brand, is an exhibition of contemporary ceramic sculpture, painting, and found objects. Together, the artists focus on celebrating and assigning new visual meanings to the unsightly, ugly and unlovely. Brand’s floor installations of found objects, litter, and ceramic structures subvert modes of traditional gallery viewing, asking the viewer to confront the floor space (and the objects themselves) on an intimate level. These installations are in conversation with painted compositions that reflect a fragmentation and collapsing of space from a looking-down vantage point. Spadoni’s ceramic sculptures and wall installations use a library of abstracted symbols that reference the bodily to embrace deflated dreams, tributes to failed love, and re-imaginings of queerness.
KODAK TO CANVAS
November 8th, 6-11 pm
Using his grandfather’s personal photo archive, and the skills he gleaned from his grandmother, also a painter, Robbie Riley brings candid snapshots of the past to life. By amplifying these keep-sake's, scaling up the size of vintage photographs to colossal portraits, Riley brings them into the contemporary world. The large scale recreations of his Northwest family from the 1940s-1980’s, track the history of the area, as well maintain the tales of this single family. With this ancestral history and knowledge, and Riley’s process of using layers of washes on acrylic, this combination honor’s the stories of the past with a familiar nostalgic beauty.
CONTOUR BY JAKE MILLETT
October 11th, 6-11 pm
“Contour” is a series of abstracted landscapes and compositions created with layers of paint and repetitive line work. Viewers are invited to explore and navigate an abstracted world, inspired by images, scenes and feelings of permanence and change.
About the artist:
Jake Millett was born in 1988, and raised in the Columbia City neighborhood of South Seattle. Jake studied art at the University of California Santa Cruz, with a focus in printmaking. His greatest inspiration comes from nature and its fantastic array of patterns, shapes, and textures. Jake has a studio on Beacon Hill, and currently works as the fabricator and studio assistant to his father, Peter Millett.
Photo by: Bruce Clayton Tom
I REMEMBER / THE HOLLOW FEATURES OF WHAT REMAINS
September 13th, 6-11 pm
Ben Zamora’s I REMEMBER / THE HOLLOW FEATURES OF WHAT REMAINS is an intense, immersive light installation consisting of dozens of suspended fluorescent tubes organized in a labyrinth-like pattern. The installation focuses on memory, time, and perception, plunging the viewer into a constantly shifting world of light and space. Fluorescent tubes are arranged in a composition which is simultaneously transparent and solid, suggesting a shape but never complete. With defining elements removed, we are left with fragments and memories that are echoes of a space that is no longer there.
The tubes are programed to shift on and off, expanding and contracting, creating larger and smaller spaces and new dynamic relationships. With moments of extreme darkness and fleeting sparks of intensity, we are left to process each programmed event comparing what we think we saw, what actually occurred, and how our mind compensates and alters reality.
This work will be Zamora’s first piece in Seattle since 2015. Intended to be a fully immersive experience, viewers are invited to walk around and through the installation. Composer, Plastiq Phantom (Berlin) provide’s an audio track to accompany the installation.
This project was supported, in part, by 4Culture/King County Lodging Tax.
ABOUT THE ARTIST:
Ben Zamora is an American artist, whose work is primarily based in light. Zamora has developed an impressive body of work that creates a dialogue between the viewer and their environment, while addressing universal themes of life, transformation, and transcendence. He has created large-scale installations and sculptures for the Park Avenue Armory in New York, The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, Art Basel/Design Miami, Kunsthalle Krems in Austria, The Frye Art Museum, Holland Festival, Vienna Festival, as well as numerous other galleries, museums, private art collections, and public art projects.
Zamora’s work moves seamlessly between performance and visual art, where he creates light-based sculptures and art installations for performance-based work, including projects with Kronos Quartet, the Berlin Philharmonic, the Barbican, Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles. His artistic collaborators have included Bill Viola, Gronk, Peter Sellars, Steve Reich and Beryl Korot, Olson Kundig Architects, Casey Curren, and Saint Genet.
SORRY, I'VE MISSED YOU
August 9th, 6-11 pm
A self-exploration of love and loss, this body of work reflects Lena Joy Whittle's struggle with depression, anxiety, and the human condition. These text-based works which include pillows hand-embroidered with poems written by the artist are “things you can hold onto”, unlike the fleeting emotions and failed relationships we all experience.
The artist likens the embroidery process to one’s personal journey. If a person’s life is a line, or a thread, as it moves through space and time it both pierces and damages the surface, yet this results in decoration so complex that the holes are no longer visible. Isn’t that kind of what life is?
ONE NIGHT SNACK
July 12th, 6-11 pm
ONE NIGHT SNACK: A collection of sexy high-calorie gut bombs for your eyes
Come hang out at the Factory for the opening reception of this new solo show from artist Genevieve St. Charles, taking place during the Capitol Hill art walk on July 12 from 6-11pm!
Genevieve's new series focuses on items with which we have fleeting, indulgent, or indecent relationships. Her work includes large-scale cutout wood panels featuring paintings of gooey, glistening food items as well as renditions of iconic items from pop culture.
City Arts says, “Genevieve St. Charles is an art factory, churning out flattened facsimiles of iconic fast food stuff: brightly painted gooey hamburgers, drippy hotdogs, Pop-Tarts oozing with erotic appeal. Often her objects relish in the cult status of iconic, trendy consumables like LaCroix and other commonplace booze and beers. All that fetish glossiness plays around with paying tribute to (maybe taking jabs at) the seduction of American junk food culture, with St. Charles’ unique and unrelenting eye-popping nastiness." - Amanda Manitach
HATE PISSING ALONE
June 14th, 6-11 pm
Anthony White’s creative practice explores the components of nostalgia, childhood, young love, and memories that form his personality and build his artistic identity. He is influenced by the exponential growth of technology and the result it has on contemporary youth romance, taboo issues and social hierarchies; ones that live on opposite ends of familiarity.
His most recent body of work clashes two tiers of status by placing accoutrements of low value in extremely grandiose luxurious environments. His process requires laborious acts of repetition and detail oriented craftsmanship to recreate patterns and textures of historical trade skills, all out of plastic.
Anthony’s work has been presented in galleries across the U.S. and internationally, and in 2017 spent five months working and exhibiting at The New York Studio Residency Program. Most recently he started curating While Supplies Last, his community-building project at the Amandine Bakeshop during Capitol Hill Art Walk.
KIDS/NO KIDS
May 10th, 6-11 pm
To have kids or not to have kids? That is the question.
Artists, musicians, dancers, and writers reflect on the decision whether or not to have kids, as well as when that decision doesn’t go as planned. Half of the visual artists and performers in this show have kids, and half do not. They will be joined by a visiting artist from Toronto, Shelia Heti, who writes uncategorizable novels. Her latest, Motherhood, is about whether making art can substitute for making human beings.
Performances by: Christi Cruz, Christopher Frizzelle, Angela Garbes, Sheila Heti, Ken Jarvey, Rachel Kessler, Sarah Paul Ocampo, OK SWEETHEART, Lisa Prank, Anastacia Reneé, Sarah Rudinoff, and Uh-Oh.
Visual art by: John Atkins, Aaron Bagley, Jessixa Bagley, Ben Beres, Michael Colasurdo, Jeff Gardner, Marie Hausauer, Rachel Kessler, Craig Kundiff, Brittany Kusa, Amanda Manitach, Timothy Rysdyke, Tara Thomas, Joey Veltkamp, and Jennifer Zwick.
Hosted by Kyle Bain.
Oh... You STILL Work There?
April 12th, 6-11 pm
One time Lelah Maupin had a dream that there was an art show about the service industry, composed of art by the people who work in it. In the dream it was wildly successful. This dream is coming true at The Factory and we hope you join us for this special night. Oh… you STILL work there? is an art show about working in the service industry opening on April 12th, 2018.
Featuring work by: Alex Llapitan, Anthony White, Barrett White, Brandon Vosika, Brittany Kusa, Craig Cundiff, Darren Dewse, David Chatt, Emily Nokes, Genevieve St. Charles, Gia Valente, Jon Garaizar, Jessica Marie Mercy, Kelly O, Lelah Maupin, Marie Hausauer, Mary Anne Carter, Nathan Hein, Rebecca Jones, Ruben David Rodriguez, Stephanie Lowe, Steve Gilbert, Tara Zumpano, Timothy Rysdyke, Tonya Dean, Ursula Rose, Victor Devlin, and more to be announced.
Cover image: Tara Zumpano
IN WHAT WORLD DO YOU LIVE?
March 8th, 6-11 pm
We all exist in a chosen reality that is uniquely our own. What choices have you made to create your own exceptional world? How is your world different from others? Do you ever yearn to escape to a different universe, and if so, what would you do to belong there? Explore these themes and ideas with new works by Brittany Kusa. Look forward to challenging your reality. In what world do you live?
“Brittany Kusa makes work that gushes, glitters and vomits an inimitable humor that’s as gross as it is sexy. It also harbors a distinctively scathing and unapologetic feminist bent. Or just a Brittany-gives-zero-fucks bent. In addition to making commissioned illustrations and fine art (her paintings are sometimes actually lacquered with glitter that scintillates under patterns of pink or purple cartoon breasts), she is a regular contributor to the over-the-top newsprint illustrated serial The Intruder.“ -Amanda Manitach for City Arts Magazine
BABY BOOMER
February 8th, 6-11 pm
Marie Hausauer's new ink work illustrates one family's 35 mm slides from the mid sixties. After last years SLIDESHOW at The Factory, Marie was gifted with a little kodak box full of father figures on dirt bikes, Mom's with their hair jacked up to Jesus and children that look too happy among the serious adults looming over them. Come out and watch Marie continue to project all over someone else's family.
CUSTOMS, FORMS, AND CUSTOMS FORMS
January 11th, 6-11 pm
John Atkins’ intimate paintings show people with faces melting into drips and watery smudge, like ghosts half-evaporated into ether. His wet-on-wet style of putting pigment on paper offers whispers of images that come off as fragile and ethereal, but also show off a splashy ease with an unforgiving medium.
SIGNS OF OUR TIMES
December 14th, 6-11 pm
"Signs of our times" is a project gleaning our modern culture for its unspoken language. From hands caressing to a dangling noose, real meaning is projected from these gestures and icons. These meanings are able to capture and express a whole thought, rather than a single word. The original emoji.
Wire is particularly captivating for this project with its indirect artistic and elusive nature. It's partly sculptural, partly line drawing, fragile, yet made of steel, delicate and industrial. Each piece is one of a kind yet re-create-able.
Both wire art and iconic language are naturally willing to share their souls. Their meanings seem to come to us both intuitively and immediately.
PAINTINGS I PAINTED
November 9th, 6-11 pm
For fans of spooky stuff like ghosts, paintings of ceramic horses, words written in cursive, old statues and the color black.
MORE INFO:
Lucas from miss Applebee’s 3rd grade class was kind enough to write up Brandon Vosika’s upcoming show at The Factory:
“In his latest one man show ‘Paintings I Painted,’ Vosika dives deep into the soul of an idea: what it is to look at a painting that someone else painted sometime, or even paint a painting you did it!? What is a painting? How long does it take? Most important I think, how does make you feel?
We asked Brandon about real life as a artist: “I like to try to find mystery in the world and that is cool” he says, and you can definitely see in this new collection of over 40-45 paintings or more. Look, When people look at painting’s it’s not uncommon for one to be flooded with emotions, can be happy or bad or just anything but you will be guaranteed to feel them all with ‘Paintings I Painted,’ It’s a guarantee! Please join us and Brandon for this really a special evening.”
Thanks Lucas!
HIDDEN GARDENS
October 12th, 6-11 pm
For 'Hidden Gardens' surrealist painter, Sarah Hammel-Vick showcases a series of work exploring the female form while placing her figures in spiritual and emotional spaces.
Using bold forms, vibrant colors, and dark undertones, she transports you to another world - a place once described as the bible on acid.
STRUGGLES
September 14th, 6-11 pm
The neurosis of Struggles the Clown and the attempt at self care through a lunar and Saturn return. A retrospect of work by Alyssa Putnam featuring new and old paintings, sculptures, & other treasures.
GLORY HOLES; CIRCLE JERKS AND HAPPY ENDINGS
August 10th, 6-11 pm
Queer Seattle artist Clyde Petersen presents a new series of work at the Factory for August 2017.
Protest posters, manifestos, Seeking ads, still life drawings, large scale comics and the occasional Glory Hole.
BLOW UP
July 13th, 6-11 pm
Mount Analogue and The Factory are excited to present BLOW UP, a show about coming apart / coming together / the joy of inflatables / the playfulness of reality / and all of our eventual ends ~
FEATURING the work of these beautiful souls :
Amanda James Parker
Peter Dodds
Trevor Dykstra & the Seattle Design Nerds
Guy Merrill
Y'all really don't want to miss the chance to run through a custom-made large-scale inflatable tunnel to greet some handmade balloons while a million colors get projected around you and a soundscape explodes in your ear -- then you can grab a blow pop and chill in one of our blow-up chairs ~
IN OUR SPACE
June 8th, 6-11 pm
Within the queer community it is necessary to work with one another, to strengthen and support each other, so that all can succeed. The connections we make are integral to who we are and how we see the world. This has shaped how Jessica Marie Mercy creates. It has pushed her to produce art that serves the queer community, and has drawn her to the spaces we inhabit.
By immortalizing the spaces where we gather safely, Jessica Marie Mercy invite’s others to treat them with the reverence they deserve, and so rarely receive. “In Our Space” brings visibility to queer spaces and allows for detailed examinations of the physical, emotional, and spiritual spaces we thrive in.
Within her prints, she attempts to bridge the gap between her printmaking and queer communities, to create accessible fine art, and begin a dialogue around identifying safe spaces.
BOROUGH BODY
May 11th, 6-11 pm
A collaboration between painter Douglas Degges and writer Chelsea Werner-Jatzke inspired by their separate lives in New York City. This is a collection of two maps of the New York City Subway system—one visual, one textual, both inspired by specific abstraction. Degges' collection of low relief carvings investigate how abstraction can render specific and autobiographical content anonymous, including five paintings created from Werner-Jatzke's photos and in conjunction with her writing which shifts between the personal and general, bringing details into view to challenge the memory, and the identity constructed, of them.
Degges' work calls attention to the tension between the image—the thing that we can hold in our mind—and the object that holds or supports it. Werner-Jatzke's writing churns through a physical space that is both a subterranean city and a human body.
This exhibition gives Degges and Werner-Jatzke's "Borough Body" physical form for the first time. Their collaborative project was previously published online, as part of Territory's Issue II: Underworlds. You can find the project here: http://themapisnot.com/issue-ii-douglas-degges-chelsea-wernerjatzke. This exhibition includes wall texts by Werner-Jatzke and paintings by Degges.
Douglas Degges is a visual artist and educator living in Chattanooga, TN where he teaches at the University of Tennessee. His work has recently been exhibited at The Shed Space in Brooklyn, NY, mild climate and Zeitgeist Gallery in Nashville, TN, and the Athens Institute for Contemporary Art in Athens, GA.
Chelsea Werner-Jatzke is the author of Adventures in Property Management (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2017) and Thunder Lizard(H_NGM_N, 2016). She is outreach coordinator at Conium Review and co-founder of Till, a literary organization offering an annual residency. Read her in Bodega, Hobart, H_NGM_N, Sonora Review, Monkeybicycle, Everyday Genius, and Tupelo Quarterly, among others.
PAINTINGS, OR IT DIDN'T HAPPEN!
April 13th, 7-11 pm
The Factory presents new work by Mike Force, Kelly Bjork, and Aidan Fitzgerald.
This show has it all: intimate paintings of humans in interiors, paintings of internet memes, even paintings of paintings. You’ll just have to see it to believe it!
DON'T WASH THIS OFF
March 9th, 7-11 pm
"I am a young black man dealing with new emotional and moral challenges daily, constantly ready to engage or evade problematic situations. Because this is how I exist it is also how I create, when painting there is no planning, sketching, or second tries. When I start working on a piece it all comes together in that moment.” - Roache the muralist
Join Roache the muralist on Thursday, March 9th as he creates a live mural in and around The Factory. This unpredictable painting performance will cover the walls, as well as objects placed inside the gallery including canvas, chairs, and even nude bodies.
Roache's artistic practice is one based of symbolism and icons. He uses playful characters and objects to convey much bigger and controversial concepts including race, sex, and politics.
HOUSE PARTY
February 9th, 6-11 pm
Napoleon Do and Landon Gauthier exhibit 35mm film photography in their collective show, House Party.
Landon takes pictures of houses, capturing them in the soft light of the setting sun, shrouded in shadows of trees cast onto their pastel painted panels. Pictures of the porches where cigarettes are shared on warm summer nights, and of roofs where late night stragglers climb to watch the sun rise.
Napoleon takes pictures of parties, shooting the nights filled with 24-packs, red solo cups, and the smiling faces of the blissfully drunk. He perfectly captures the exuberant round of shots taken at last call to the indulgent moments of after-hours that are otherwise only remembered as a blur.
Join us on Thursday, February 9th to peer into the windows of House Party.
SLIDE SHOW
January 12th, 6-11 pm
In this new series of paintings, Marie Hausauer uses a discarded stockpile of 35mm family portraits as her muse. Recovered from antique stores, these photos from the sixties serve as a reflection of her own dread about family, routine, and the conventional.
Marie Hausauer is a cartoonist living in Seattle. She self publishes comics as well as contributing to Thick as Thieves, Intruder and Seattle Weekly.
ABOUT ONE THIRD OF ORGASMS
December 8th, 6-11 pm
Ethan Folk and Ty Wardwell
Present the second installment of their "cute & nonthreatening" trilogy.
Part 2:
"about one third of orgasms"
Capitol Hill art walk
december 8
the factory
1216 10th ave
6-10pm (*free*)
With:
Ink and butter washes.
Live no-hands painting with a paintbrush from the butcher shop.
POV “action” films.
Never-before-seen 25 minute single take of the performance that became “breakfast in bed,” a prize-winning film at HUMP! 2016.
OUT OF LINE: EXPLORATIONS IN MATERIAL, TEXTURE, FORM
November 10th, 6-11 pm
Born out of thread, wire, brass and stone, the work of Shaana Hatamian, Hannah Eberts and Shirley Hendrickson is driven by the possibilities of line and shape that emerge instinctually from their chosen mediums.
Their highly tactile pieces grab the eye with graphic compositions and rich, layered detail, united by a common, improvisational approach.
Shaana Hatamian – textiles
http://shaanahatamian.com/
Hannah Eberts – textiles
http://hannaheberts.tumblr.com/
Shirley Hendrickson – wall hangings
http://shirleykhendrickson.com/
ART IS MAGIC. MAGIC IS ART. ZAP!
October 13th, 6-11 pm
Magic is not a dysphemism for the unbelievable; it is a sacred title for the otherwise inexpressible.
Jamie Christene Petersen's paintings transform the mystical realm into a tangible visual artifact that is both active and decorative, filled with traditional and folk symbols of nature, grace, beauty and mortality. It is inspired by alchemy and the mystical forces that engage and entwine our visual world to our inner landscape.
In this show Peterson creates imagery that evokes the earth as they would like to experience it: another, warmer & more inviting world.
UNDEVELOPED
September 8, 6-11 pm
Have you ever reached under your bed and found a roll of film languishing in obscurity amid your watermelon Bubblicious wrappers? What tragedy is this? How many of these are there and what untold secrets might they bestow on us if only given the chance? If a letter is never mailed is it still a letter? What if it’s only an envelope of sand?
UNDEVELOPED is a show in which we unearth these expired, warped, and corroded moments of life and bring them into the light of day to be seen and heard before they are once again lost to the sands of time. Join us in this empty pool, on the edge of a secret beach, inside the intimate cabana of The Factory, as we shall all bathe for one evening in the same bizarre collective, wonderful, beautiful, trash strewn seaside memory of a childhood that never was.
ARTISTS:
Efraín
Sandy Wittenhagen
Tommy Nease
Lauren Segarra
Lauren Max
Timothy Rysdyke
BE THE YOU YOU WANT TO SEE IN YOURSELF
August 11, 6-11 pm
Have you ever reached deep into a bag of Flaming Hot Cheetos and come up with nothing but a handful of glitter and glass? Welcome to Brittany Kusa’s world; a Hidden Valley™ filled with grotesque, gluttonous beauty. Hop on your bike and explore her land of vaginal mountains, butts, and naked women seductively coddling oversized bottles of ranch, all set amongst a Lisa Frank colored sunset.
In Kusa's work, nature gives birth to things typically considered beautiful. However, upon closer inspection, we discover a world of oozing chaotic majesty, where she presents the uncomfortable truths of daily existence in a humorous way.
Brittany Kusa has previously shown at various galleries throughout Seattle, such as Vermillion, Derek Erdman’s International House of Paintings and Fantagraphics Bookstore. She was most recently a regular contributor to Intruder, and has published illustrations with the Stranger and Seattle Weekly.
——
"Brittany Kusa makes work that gushes, glitters and vomits an inimitable humor that’s as gross as it is sexy. It also harbors a distinctively scathing and unapologetic feminist bent. Or just a Brittany-gives-zero-fucks bent.” --Amanda Manitach for City Arts
FOOLS OUT FOR SUMMER
July 14, 6-11 pm
Los Angeles based visual artist David Kaul combines a world of repetitive monikers, colorful pop art, and summertime randomness in this one night solo show opening at The Factory, Thursday, July 14th.
David's paintings are bright, hand painted patterns with subtle imperfections making each shape unique in itself.
Fools Out for Summer is a dedicated collection of work paying homage to how perfect Northwest summers can be.
www.adsstudio.co | www.instagram.com/artdesignsurface/
QUEER FEELINGS
June 9, 6-11 pm
Adrien Leavitt’s “Queer Feelings” is a photographic exploration of queerness and our intimate, complex relationship with our bodies, both physically and emotionally. It is an exploration of vulnerability, blurring the space between private and public, possessing a new reality where our desire, mutability, and openness are able to gaze back at us.
This exhibition is the first showing of the project and includes unreleased work. Join us during the second annual Queer Art Walk for a photographic exploration of Queer Feelings.
www.queerfeelings.com | www.instagram.com/queerfeelings
ANDREW LAMB SCHULTZ
May 11, 6-11 pm
In a series of new drawings and paintings, Andrew Schultz uses flat, graphic forms and bubblegum colored explorations of pop, kitsch, and geometric line drawings. Aiming to convey scenes of willful isolation, ritual, and an inescapable queerness, Andrew works within a kaleidoscope of influences and references aiming to create an aesthetic world of absurd humor, poignant beauty and probably a dash of perversion.
HAIRSTORY
April 14, 6-10 pm
Hairstory is an art show, reading, and interactive performance featuring over 40 individuals' experiences about hair, opening on April 14th at The Factory. Hairstory tells how hair highlights or contributes to our culture, sexuality, color, religion, and gender. Featuring artwork and personal stories about bad haircuts, body hair, pubic hair, the lack of hair, shaving habits, and more.
Featuring artwork by Bryn Mooney, Demi Shaft Raven, Devin Ball, Ellen Forney, Jake Fennell, Janell Langford, Justice Latreice, Larissa Barth, Lethe Smith, and Mary Anne Carter.
Audio and video by Anna Lenau, Kyle Bain & Timothy Rysdyke, Rana San & Will Myers, and Stephen Anunson & Ariel Burke.
Poetry readings by Anis Gisele, Anna Lenau, Erin MacDonald, Isis Zystrid, and Imani Sims.
Haircuts by Marcia Galan.
PLASTIC
March 10, 6-10 pm
The Factory presents Katlyn Hubner with her first solo show in Seattle featuring her series "Plastic."
People of all ages and backgrounds are drawn to the Plastic paintings. Couples, singles, adolescents, children – you name it; they welcome the idea of this series and enjoy them in different ways and see past the nudity. The similarities the dolls and humans share, as far as the “female” dolls go, is that both have breasts, hips, buttocks, an hourglass shape. The differences between flesh and plastic, is that they are missing nipples, and some models of the dolls have built-in panties or leotards. The dolls in my compositions are in far more intimate situations than I would ever dare place live models, and they are embraced by the viewers with no judgement.
We usually would interact with these dolls as innocent children. During this young chapter of our lives we have not been tainted by the world with what is right or wrong, and what should or should not be seen. In today’s life, violence is far more prevalent in homes than sensuality. The dolls have made it possible for us to dive into the compositions and forget our pretenses. Life size, large paintings, these plastic figures enter a timeless contemporary dimension since we all have known them since our childhood and in the right hands can transcend our personal confinements.
A NEED OF SPACE
February 11, 6-10 pm
In their inaugural solo exhibition, “A Need of Space,” Juan Franco creates visual analogies of theoretical spaces and scenes. These spaces may never exist, or have already existed. The history of the spaces is uncertain, yet their traces become apparent. Their [re]appearance, their [re]emergence is beautiful. Like skin, architectural blueprints become landscapes when rearranged abstractly. They also become impossible diagrams of what they truly represent. They are long overdue, they are justified, and they are as close to real as they can be presently.
A mother and a child.
A blueprint and a building.
A negative and a photograph.
Juan Franco uses architecture, text, and photography to present work that holds authorial multiplicity constricting time from each work’s genesis to their current existence in this exhibition. This action serves as a constant rebirth, a continuous cycle in (re)claiming a sense of cultural and historical purpose.
About the Artist
Juan Franco was born in Bogotá and they were transported to Seattle in 2000 by an architect.
POWER, LOVE, SEX, MONEY, FAME
January 14, 6-11 pm
From the steamy discos of swinging London to the glittering casinos of the Las Vegas strip. From the chic runways of Milan to the mean streets of Hollywood California. And now at the Factory in Seatte, it's...
POWER LOVE SEX MONEY FAME: An artistic evening celebrating the life and works of best-selling author JACKIE COLLINS, whose epic sagas of love and lust, power and privilege, cocaine and champagne, blackmail and murder, introduced us to the cutthroat world of a dazzling array of characters.
Featuring paintings and photos by TARA THOMAS, audio installation by DAN PAULUS, and dishes prepared from Jackie's cookbook by JOE RANDAZZO.
A REALLY BIG AND VERY EXPENSIVE PAINTING
December 10, 6-10 pm
Graham Downing explores the correlation between a paintings' size and price. Featuring one very big, expensive painting, and the opportunity for attendees to buy a piece of it for as low as one dollar.
Top ten most expensive paintings of all time broken down by cost per square inch:
1. When Will You Marry Me? (40 in × 30 in) $250,000 per square inch
2. The Card Players (51 in x 38 in) $141,898 per square inch
3. Pendant portraits of Oopjen Coppit (82 in by 52 in) $38,927 per square inch
4. Women of Algiers (45 in × 57.6 in) $62,478 per square inch
5. Reclining Nude (23 in × 36 in) $199,063 per square inch
6. No. 5, 1984 (8ft x 4ft) $35,590 per square inch
7. Woman III (68 in × 48 in) $42,126 per square inch
8. Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I (54 in × 54 in) $48,560 per square inch
9. The Dream (51 in × 38 in) $81,011 per square inch
10. Portrait of Dr. Gachet (23 in × 22 in) $295,256 per square inch
FLUFF PIECE
November 12, 6-10 pm
FLUFF PIECE is a cozy conversation pit made of inflated status objects born of vapid wealth driven culture.
FLUFF PIECE is where YOU can make it rain, swim in treasure, roll in dough, queen for a day.
Make yourself comfortable, spend time with friends, cleeer your mind and relaaax in FLUFF PIECE.
Amanda James Parker creates three-dimensional works that probe the physical and psychological relationships which exist between the living and the “inanimate”.
12 SECONDS MAX
October 8, 6-10 pm
12 Seconds Max is an immersive wash of artist-made, ultra-short form videos, animations and moving images. At a time when our attention spans compress to milliseconds, we converse in animated GIFs, and we scratch our heads in misty contemplation of what it means to own digital art, we invite you to a curated assemblage of gems from Seattle and beyond. A selection of one-of-a-kind and short-run videos will be available for purchase.
The exhibition will feature a wall of screens with looping short videos, projected video, and featured works from Kurt Geissel, Johan Liedgren, Britta Johnson, and Jesse Higman & Roxanne Nihiline.
Full list of artists included in 12 Seconds Max: Alan Fulle, Alexander Martinz, Amanda James Parker, Angel O'Leary, Brandon Vosika, Brendan Griffin, Britta Johnson, Chelsea Klukas, Chris Corner, Chris Lefebvre, Christian French, Demi Raven, Ellie Dicola, Erin frost, Fernando Orellana, Flora Goldthwaite, Gil Alkabetz, Gregory John Smith, Jacob Fennell, Jaimes Mayhew, Jesse Higman & Roxanne Nihiline, Jessie Lyle, Joe Vollan, Johan Liedgren, John Osebold, John Williamson, Joseph Gray, Juan Franco, Julia Chamberlain, Justin Colt Beckman, Katie Clark & Tyler Lucas, Kenny Montana, Kimberly Collmer, Kristoffer Larson, Kurt Geissel, Kyle Bain, Lars Bergquist, Marlow Harris, Mary Anne Carter, Maurice Caldwell, Max Cleary, Michael Tyka, Michael Shannon, Michelle Hiphoppe, Mick Bello, Mimi Allin, Nichole Hart, Nikolai Lesnikov, Nola Avienne, Reilly Donovan, Rosemary Liss, Ross Laing, Salise Hughes, Sam McHaney & Rachel Houser, Sandra Whittington, Sara Van Belten, Scott Ashley, Shaun Kardinal, Stefan Gruber, Steve Lombardi, Tim Marsden, Ulises Mariscal, Wax Diamond, Yancy Way, and Yonnas Getahun.
Curated by Janet Galore & The Factory
RODRIGO VALENZUELA
September 10, 6-11 pm
Back in March when Rodrigo Valenzuela heard we were opening the Factory, he immediately asked for a show. Why give him a show when he'd just wrapped up a solo exhibit at Frye Art Museum? "I want to show work in Seattle that no one else will want to show or buy," he said. So the Factory presents Valenzuela's Seattle debut of a body of large-scale works that we think—regardless of what he says—are fucking cool. To make the series, Valenzuela appropriated the iconography of labor unions from around the world, creating fantastical, larger-than-life, screen-printed flags made with raw canvas and house paint from Home Depot.
Valenzuela's statement:
"We all feel this way (I do too): What is the point of doing anything if we cannot be unique? We actively try to escape our duties to make society better, but the less we organize, the more we yield power to the wealthy and to corporations, losing not only things like social security but our everyday identity too. I worry about my future as an artist. I worry that other artists don't consider themselves working class, building discipline and an economy, and working to help society understand that thinking is a labor-intensive duty."
See more at http://www.rodrigovalenzuela.com/
MAD WORLD
August 13, 6-10 pm
Mad World is a photo collaboration between Lauren Max, photographer, and Naomi Rincon, hair and make-up artist. Together, they've created a new portrait series that focuses on a fantasy world all their own by pairing natural settings and elements with unusual and futuristically-styled models as their subjects.
Naomi Rincon currently resides at Bang Salon as a hair stylist, and works with various designers, musicians, and photographers on editorial projects and shows in her spare time.
Lauren Max, a northwest native, is an editorial and commercial photographer that has been shooting in the greater Seattle area for years. She has worked with Nylon Magazine, Seattle Met, The Stranger, and many other local and international publications. Currently, she has a monthly fashion and lifestyle feature in City Arts Magazine. To see more of her work, visit laurenmaxphotography.com
THE LEAST BORING POETRY EVENT OF THE YEAR
August 11, 7-10 pm
Join us for “The Least Boring Poetry Event of the Year” featuring New York’s Ben Fama and Monica McClure with Seattle’s own Sarah Galvin. Visual art by Mary Anne Carter will accompany the reading.
Ben Fama is a writer based in New York City. He is the author of Fantasy (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2015), and the chapbooks Odalisque (Bloof, 2014), Cool Memories (Spork, 2013), New Waves (Minutes Books, 2011), and Aquarius Rising (Ugly Duckling Presse 2010). He is also the author of the artist book Mall Witch (Wonder, 2012). He is the co-founder of Wonder.
Sarah Galvin, the author of “The Three Einsteins,” which City Arts Magazine dubbed “the funniest book of poetry in the world.” Her blog, The Pedestretarian, is devoted to reviews of food found on the street. She has an MFA in poetry from University of Washington. In the Spring of 2025, Galvin cofounded Seattle’s oldest art space, lifestyle blog, and lifestyle, Fashion Hot Dog 225. She is widely known as "The Champagne of Queers." Her poems and essays can be found in io, New Ohio Review, Pleiades, Pinwheel, Vice Magazine and The Stranger.
Monica McClure: "McClure may be the poster-girl for a new generation of poets: irreverent, well-read, sexy, even dirty, snarky, but ultimately fighting an earnest battle against reductiveness and easy answers to the complex problems of the Internet age: 'Every citizen of this world is on trial / I'm learning to speak legalese / as I stroll through civil law like / a gamine through a sample sale.'"—Craig Morgan Teicher for NPR Books. TENDER DATA is Monica McClure's debut poetry collection. She is the author of the chapbooks Mood Swing and Mala.
Visual Art by Mary Anne Carter, a visual artist with professional and sexual ties to the poetry community. She will showcase a series of work that visually translates the work of contemporary poets including Fama, Galvin, and McClure to paper and apparel. In the Spring of 2025, she cofounded Seattle’s oldest art space, lifestyle blog, and lifestyle, Fashion Hot Dog 225. Although she is best known for wearing a shit ton of capes, her work has appeared on the covers of “Enough” by Chris Martin, “Sakra Boccata” by José Antonio Mazzotti’, and Ugly Duckling Presse’s “6x6.”
THE GIRL'S ROOM
July 9, 6-10 pm
Ashley Armitage is a 21-year-old photographer from Seattle currently majoring in photography at the University of Washington. Her work is an exploration of the representation of femininity, examining the rituals, mythology and fantasy intertwined with images of the feminine. For the last few months, she has focused on highlighting the private lives and routines of girlhood: applying makeup, getting dressed, hanging out in bedrooms, gossiping in bathrooms. Such things constitute traditional visions of girlhood and womanhood that are often reduced to cliché and condemned as superficial, vain, petty, and catty. Her work is an attempt to reclaim these activities.
NEW PAINTINGS BY JOHN CRISCITELLO
June 11, 6-11 pm
As apart of Seattle Pride's first ever Queer Art Walk.
Press: John Criscitello's New NSFW Paintings Are So Dirty and Penis-Filled I Can't Show Them Above the Jump
"John Criscitello is the smart-ass street artist who's making a ton of work about the bro-ification of Capitol Hill. He's the guy who first got noticed locally for putting a penis on a Jagermeister ad. There are so many penises in his new paintings I'm not going to do that to your coworkers' eyeballs. A few NSFW shots of Criscitello's penis-filled latest paintings are after the jump. Puffy jackets galore. They were taken with my cell phone at Criscitello's opening at The Factory last night."
QUEER FEELINGS
June 6, 4-8 pm
“Queer Feelings” is the debut exhibition by Aaron Klouzal and David Strand. Presenting new paintings bound and draped on various frames, “Queer Feelings” is the culmination of Klouzal and Strand’s four years of study at Seattle University. The exhibition will be on view for one night only at The Factory before moving to the Kinsey Gallery on Seattle University’s campus.
Aaron Klouzal is a painter who is inspired by the vividity and melodramaticism in animation and video game artwork. In his paintings, Klouzal is interested in investigating the authenticity of emotional presentation and performance.
David Strand is an artist and writer born and raised in West Seattle. With a sense of spontaneity and variability, Strand makes paintings and collages that seek to evoke the idiosyncrasies of desire through the language of color. Saturated, soaked, and stained these works carry traces from the fundamental gap within the self that cannot be seen but only felt.
THE JOKE'S ON US
MAY 14, 6-10 pm
The Joke's On Us: an exhibition by tnglr (www.tnglrart.com), Peter Benjamin Bigelow and Donald Walingford. Based upon their street art installation of faux Proposed Land Use Signs in front of Seattle Landmarks on April Fool's Day 2015.
The installation is intended to fuel and raise the profile of the debate over the rapid growth of the City of Seattle, building development, gentrification and their effects upon the infrastructure, power structure, artists, lifetime natives, poor and disenfranchised, personality, appearance and soul of the City of Seattle. Who is benefiting and who is being squeezed...The Joke's On Us.
News links:
kiro7
Komo 4
Seattle Times
Due Process
April 9, 6 - 11 pm
PDL takes on gentrification, the Pike/Pine nightlife and Capitol Hill bro culture.
Initial Reflections on PDL Artist Tryouts // Friday, 3 April 2015
Location: Pike St., South side, loading bay between Bimbo’s & Big Mario’s
Weather: clear and upper 40s, windy, full moon
Dual Hypotheses:
Pessimistic- Friday nights on Capitol Hill have evolved into something intractably hideous. There is now a critical mass of 20-something-year-old cool-seekers who strut around in peacock feathers, being variously entitled, violent, abusive, disrespectful to any constructive form of civilized society, and oblivious to the higher functions of the human brain. They are completely unaware of Capitol Hill’s history as a “gay neighborhood” and its designation as an “Arts District.” They are there to tie one on, find sex partners, or alternately beat the shit out of someone to prove their rightful place in the social order of human animals. Any attempts to interact with them on an artistic or intellectual level will be met with deep stares of ignorance, vulgar or vapid dismissals ending in the words “Bro!” or “Woooo!,” or aggressive physical behavior. We will constantly be warding off bodily harm, theft, and untoward psychological abuse, involving the derogatory use of the word “faggot.”
Optimistic- Friday nights on Capitol Hill have changed hands to a younger crowd, but the spirit of creativity lies latent in the ambitions of these energetic social folk. With proper outlets and a hands-on presence, the Friday night crowd can become educated and, if prompted, contribute to the artistic life of the neighborhood. We will spend our night delightfully navigating a horde of curious, talented, potential artists, with whom we will have intelligent conversations and cathartic interactions, helping to unleash a desire to make more, do more, and be more than just someone who wants to wait in line for shots of Fireball, have sex with ill-chosen partners, or cling to the slick tenets of mass-produced pop culture.
Conclusion:
So, based on 5-plus hours of observation, we conclude that our second, more positive hypothesis was more accurate. As for the general nature of the Friday night scene, the crowd was decidedly more diverse, less averse, and more inclined to art-making and intelligent interaction that our fears and the harshly-flung public opinions of late. There was still tell of deviance- a critical mass of blinking police lights just west of Broadway on Pike St. around 1 am. A friend reported that she had read of several violent acts perpetrated in that block of Pike between Harvard and Boylston recently. Another friend expressed that a different scene took place up on 11th, at the confluence of the lines to get in Barça, Grimm’s, and the Rhino Room. That’s only a few hundred feet away, mind you.
As for the art, there was a feeling that the vast majority of people who participated were interested in a quick fix, and they primarily employed tried-and-true styles and methods for mark-making which conveyed simple identity-based or glib messages. Roughly 10 percent of all who made art, though, seemed to experience a raw creative moment- using drawing to express something that they grappled with while making it- whether writing a testimony, crafting a spontaneous image, or exploring the limits of the media provided. How that stacks up against the larger numbers of people who make art involves statistics I can’t even fathom how to compile, but I imagine that it’s not too far from the norm. -PDL
WELCOME TO THE FACTORY FT. BRITTANY KUSA & JOE GARBER
March 12, 6-11 pm
The Factory, a new Capitol Hill art gallery and event space, is excited to open its doors on March 12th. Please join us to celebrate our debut with drinks and an opening exhibit featuring new paintings, mirror pieces, and video installations by Brittany Kusa & Joe Garber.
MARCH 12TH, 6-11PM
THE FACTORY
1216 10TH AVE
“I believe in low lights and trick mirrors.” - Andy Warhol