Curators / Sean Miller and Laurie Cinotto
32 artists present 32+ viewpoints on Death

Dead

Larry Barsness, Sarah Barsness, Ryan Bolin, Dan Corson, Joe Crookes, Sara Davies, Anderson B. English, Richard Ewan, Ellen Felsenthal, Donald Foster, Scott Greenig, Jenny Hale, Lorre Hoffman, John Kieltyka, James Leslie, Monika Lidman, Margaret Meehan, Saya Moriyasu, Dirk Park, Joseph Park, R. Eugene Parnell, Sonja Peterson, Bellamy Printz, Samantha Scherer, Margaret Wagner, Randy Warren, Brent Wantanabe, Walter Wright

October 3 – 31, 1996
Reception / October 3
Closing Party / October 31 featuring performances by Powderkeg, Dan Wisdom

Location / 82 University Street (Harbor Steps)

One of three shows in October involving spirituality, death, and ‘the hereafter.’

Dead is a group show involving local artists as well as artists from around the US, dealing with issues of death and dying.
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With the Dead exhibition we wanted a basic theme that would resonate with local artists. In October, Seattle residents became painfully aware that the seasonal climate had shifted. "Dead" was an iconic, obvious, fun pop title that we thought would pull in some great work. It also acknowledged the onset of winter and the dark, cold, depressing, rainy months that follow. Seattle has such a dark side to its art, comics, music and writing that it seemed an apt theme.

Dead was one of SOIL's first major exhibitions in terms of the number of exhibiting artists locally and nationally. It was SOIL's third exhibition in the Erikson Building and we wanted a show that could include a lot of local artists and begin forming relationships with new local artists. Laurie Cinotto made a funeral wreath for the opening, Dave Rainey assembled altar installations by spiritual artists who performed ritualized activities, Blair Wilson organized a wall of zine art related to death, Powderkeg Performance Art Group performed, and Chuck Swaim MC'd the event dressed in a hot pink dress.

Text by Sean Miller