December 15 - Catherine Roche

Details

Last Updated on Thursday, 05 January 2012 03:06

On December 15, Seattle Art Museum's Interim Curator for Asian Art, Catherine Roche, will give a PowerPoint presentation showcasing the jewels of SAM's renowned Asian collections.

Guest Speaker Catherine Roche

Featured art will show 160 of SAM's Asian art masterpieces, including paintings, screens, sculpture, ceramics, stone, wood, lacquer and metal ware. Inspired and educated by travel to Asia with his mother, SAM's founding director Dr. Richard E. Fuller had a deep knowledge and passion for Asian art. Many of the works he collected, including Crows (ca. 1650), a pair of six-paneled Japanese screens that he purchased not long after the museum's 1933 opening, became the core of the museum's founding collection and are still beloved by visitors. Today, the majority of the museum's Asian art holdings of more than 7,000 works are exhibited on rotation at SAM's original home in Volunteer Park, which since 1994 has been known as the Seattle Asian Art Museum.

Head of Buddha, Gray andesite, Javanese Indonesian, Height: 14 1/2 in. Collection of Seattle Art Museum, Gift of Mrs. John C. Atwood, Jr. Photo: Paul Macapia

Last year, a selection of highlights from SAM's Asian collections traveled throughout Japan, where they were enthusiastically received from Tokyo to Fukuoka. This current exhibition celebrates the homecoming of SAM's treasures and marks the first time these objects have been assembled in a major exhibition at SAM downtown.

Invited to provide a contemporary response to this historical material, internationally recognized artist Do Ho Suh (born 1962) has created a unique multimedia installation for this exhibition. Born in Korea and presently living in London, Suh is the creator of SAM's famous "dog-tag" sculpture Some/One, currently installed in the double-height gallery on the third floor of this museum. This stunning work has achieved something akin to celebrity status since it was first displayed in 2002, when SAM presented a major exhibition of Suh's work in the downtown galleries and at the Asian Art Museum in Volunteer Park.

Gate, by Do Ho Suh Photo: Nathaniel Willson

Over the past year, Suh and SAM have engaged in a dialogue discussing eastern philosophy, East Asian painting, the contemporary art scene, and the problematic space of the art museum. The artist's observations pepper the text panels throughout the show, offering insight, adding perspective and provoking further questions.