David F. Martin

A major rediscovery in the history of Northwest art Beulah Loomis Hyde (1886–1983) was an important cultural figure in Tacoma, Washington, as both a contemporary painter and a patron of the arts. Growing up in the rugged Northwest environment, Hyde was an athletic individualist who defied the societal restrictions of her time. She signed her paintings with initials to conceal her gender from possible limitations or exclusionary practices. Her early painting career was interrupted by the raising of three sons. After her sons matured, she returned to painting and expanded on her interest in modernism. In the 1930s, she began a series of paintings that utilized industrial and architectural subjects as her main themes. She developed a highly personal and sophisticated style that incorporated elements of precisionism, surrealism, and geometric abstraction. Although Hyde was considered one of the more accomplished and progressive regional artists in the early to mid-twentieth century, her work has remained primarily in the collections of her descendants, unavailable to the general public. With the resurgence of interest in and scholarship on the accomplishments of American women artists, this book and the corresponding exhibition introduce and reexamine a major talent whose work transcends the boundaries of gender and regionalism.

Celebrates the work of an influential Asian American photographerThis is the first study of the work of Chao-Chen Yang (1909–1969), an important Seattle photographer who gained national prominence in the mid-twentieth century. Born in Hangzhou, China, Yang received his art training at the University of Hsin-Hwa in Shanghai. After graduating, he became art director for the Government Institute of Nanking. In 1933 he moved to Chicago as chancellor of the Chinese Consulate and attended the Art Institute of Chicago. Initially trained as a painter, he later used photography as his main medium for artistic expression. In 1938 Yang was transferred to Seattle as chancellor of the Chinese Consulate and became actively involved with the Seattle Photographic Society. He was also an influential art and photography instructor and worked tirelessly to advance Chinese culture in the United States.Yang won numerous awards in important photography salons and became a Fellow of the Photographic Society of America, the Professional Photographers Association of America, and the Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain. He was a pioneer in color photography in the Northwest in both advertising and the fine arts.Exhibition dates: Cascadia Art Museum, November 9, 2023–February 11, 2024

One of the leading Northwest artists of his generation, George Tsutakawa (1910–97) is internationally known for his sculpture and fountain designs. However, a lesser-known aspect of his career was the production of blockprints, watercolors, and works on paper that began in the 1920s and continued throughout his career.Born in Seattle and educated in Japan, Tsutakawa had early success while still in high school. He attended the University of Washington, where he received an MFA in sculpture in 1950, and became an influential instructor at the university's School of Art from 1947 to 1976.Drawn from the Tsutakawa estate, most of the works shown here have never been seen previously by the public. These early works display concepts and inspirations that would inform Tsutakawa's aesthetic throughout a long and distinguished career. Contextual works by Tsutakawa's instructors and contemporaries provides a broader understanding of his oeuvre.Exhibition dates: Cascadia Art Museum, December 1, 2022–March 26, 2023

Invocation of Beauty accompanies the first full-scale exhibition of this important American photographer. Drawing almost exclusively from the family archives, the book includes many images that have been previously unpublished.Soichi Sunami was born in Okayama, Japan in 1885 and immigrated to the United States at the age of twenty and arrived in Seattle in 1907. Initially aspiring to be a painter and sculptor, he studied with local artist Fokko Tadama and became part of the Seattle art community. During this time, he became seriously interested in photography and apprenticed with important local figures such as Wayne Albee and Frank Asakichi Kunishige. He soon found employment in the photography studio of Ella McBride, who became associated with Seattle's Cornish School in its early years. Important modern dancers such as Anna Pavlova and Ted Shawn performed in Seattle and were photographed by the McBride Studio through Nellie Cornish's connections. Many were or became major figures of modern dance.When Sunami moved to New York in 1922, he attended the Art Students League to advance his art training. He met numerous visual artists who posed in his studio and employed him to photograph their works. Retaining his interest in modern dance from his connections in Seattle, Sunami soon began a collaboration with Martha Graham, producing some of the most iconic images of her dance performances. In 1930, Mrs. John D. Rockefeller Jr. asked him to become staff photographer at the new Museum of Modern Art. During the next thirty-eight years he produced more than twenty thousand large-format negatives for the MoMA archive and independently created an important body of work in the field of modern dance photography.The book includes Sunami's rare, early pictorialist images of the Northwest landscape and follows his journey to the east coast where he became internationally recognized for his brilliant studies of dancers and cultural figures of the era.This publication is distributed for Cascadia Art Museum.

Internationally acclaimed fine-art photographer Ella McBride (1862-1965) played an important role in the Northwest's photography community and was a key figure in the national and international pictorialist photography movements. Despite her many accomplishments, which included managing the photography studio of Edward S. Curtis for many years and being an early member of the Seattle Camera Club, McBride is little known today. Captive Light: The Life and Photography of Ella E. McBride reconsiders her career and the larger pictorialist movement in the Northwest. The book accompanies an exhibition that is co-curated by David F. Martin, a Seattle gallerist and leading art historian on Northwest artists of the early twentieth century, and Margaret E. Bullock, curator of collections and special exhibitions at Tacoma Art Museum. Captive Light is part of the Tacoma Art Museum's Northwest Perspective Series on significant Northwest artists.

Danger and adventure creep into Sugar Dog, Jimmy and his friends' lives once again, but this time it takes them into and below the forbidden old mill

Territorial Hues: The Color Print and Washington State, 1920-1960 will consist of prints that display the cultural and stylistic influences used by Washington State artists to produce highly exceptional works that reflect the color, light, and atmosphere that is unique to this region. The book focuses on several mediums including color woodcut, intaglio, serigraphy, and lithography. The influences of Japanese prints and regional appropriations of international movements will be examined as well as the local production of white-line prints.

A collection of one-page reflections by an ordinary man trying to live out his relationship with God under very ordinary circumstances. Colloquial in tone, these reflections are reverent, laced with a sense of humor, and above all, uniquely personal. They are rooted in the author's Catholic faith, but relevant for any Christian. The reflections are intentionally brief and arranged as prose poems to provide just enough material to stimulate the reader's own reflection and meditation. In a sense, they are like "spiritual tapas," meant to be savored, not devoured.

During 2014-2015, Northwest Watercolor Society celebrates its 75th anniversary. The society has attracted many of the most accomplished regional watercolorists as members and exhibitors, and is one of the earliest and most successful continuing arts organizations in the history of Washington State. A Fluid Tradition: Northwest Watercolor Society . . . The First 75 Years – richly illustrated with color reproductions and artist biographies – reestablishes the reputations of many early society members while giving a glimpse of rare works by some of today’s leading regional artists.The annuals for the society were sponsored by the Seattle Art Museum for over thirty years and many members were honored with solo exhibitions at the museum during that time. As Seattle grew, several members created many of the region’s most iconic cultural images. Northwest Watercolor Society continues to be a leading force in national watercolor competitions. This book is the first in-depth account of its important historic contributions to regional and national culture.

Austere Beauty is the first major survey of Vanessa Helder's life and artistic career. Born in Washington State, Helder (1904–1968) began her artistic training at the University of Washington and then relocated to New York to study at the Art Students League. She then returned to Washington to work for the WPA Federal Art Project at the Spokane Art Center.In 1943 she relocated to Los Angeles, where she became deeply involved in the local art scene and the California Watercolor Society, for the remainder of her career. Helder's exhibition history encompassed not only regional museums and galleries but also stretched throughout the country, most notably her inclusion in the American Realists and Magic Realists exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in 1943. Her career spanned several periods of major change in American art, from the advent of modernism in the early part of the 20th century to the rise of abstraction in the post-war years. Her unique personal style was a hybrid of traditional and modern ideas -- she worked primarily in watercolor, creating works that radiate clear color and showing a rare talent for tightly controlling a medium known for its fluidity and soft, blurry line.

One of the state's oldest arts organizations, Women Painters of Washington was founded in 1930 with the aim of overcoming limitations faced by women artists. Over its 75-year history, the group has counted among its members talented artists of national prominence whose stories have not been widely shared, until now.From founding members' early efforts to support fellow women artists, to contemporary members' cultural exchanges and international exhibitions, David F. Martin tells the story of Women Painters of Washington. He examines members' artistic achievements and the recognition they received in the national and international art worlds. In addition, a selection of works by current WPW members demonstrates the organization's continued vitality. Abundant color plates clearly illustrate the talent and innovation of these artists.