Any time of the year, art is all around you in this city.
As a real estate agent, I spend a lot of time driving around our fine city, and I run across a lot of beautiful spots that inspire and transport me. I’ve been moved while sitting in traffic, just looking to my left to see the Bettie Page House mural along the I-5 corridor. All of the awesome wood trolls around town are getting a lot of attention, but let's not forget the original Fremont Troll. You can visit this car-eating-curmudgeon any day of the week! Continue reading for a list of great spots around Seattle to view some of our city’s most talented artists’ work. From the big installations to the small, incredibly moving pieces, you’ll be stunned into silents and perhaps find inspiration in the most unusual places.
FREEMONT TROLL - STEVE BADANES
The Troll is a mixed media colossal statue, located on N. 36th Street at Troll Avenue N., under the north end of the George Washington Memorial Bridge (aka the Aurora Bridge). It’s clutching an actual Volkswagen Beetle, as if it had just swiped it from the roadway above. The vehicle has a California license plate. Originally the car held a time capsule, including a plater bust of Elvis Presley, which was stolen with the sculpture was vandalized. The Troll is 18ft high, weighs 13,000 lbs, and is made of steel rebar, wire, and concrete.
BLACK SUN - ISAMU NOGUCHI
Black Sun is a 1969 sculpture by Isamu Noguchi located in Volunteer Park. The statue is situated on the eastern edge of the park’s man-made reservoir, across from the Seattle Asian Art Museum. The view from the sculpture includes the Space Needle, Olympic Mountains, and Elliott Bay. Many mistakenly believe Soundgarden’s hit single “Black Hole Sun” was inspired by Noguchi’s sculpture, as the band took their name from another outdoor public art work in Seattle, A Sound Garden, and the resemblance of the song’s title to Noguchi’s work. However, singer-songwriter Chris Cornell attributes the song’s inspiration to a misheard news broadcast.
A SOUND GARDEN - DOUGLAS HOLLIS
A Sound Garden is one of six such works on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) campus, which lies adjacent to Warren G. Magnuson Park on the northwestern shore of Lake Washington. Designed and built by Sculpture Douglas Hollis from 1982 to 1983, the sound sculpture is composed of twelve 21-foot high steel tower structures, at the top of each of which hangs an organ pipe attached to a weather vane that produces soft-toned sounds when stirred by the wind.
BETTIE PAGE MURAL
The story begins in 2006 when homeowners Chris Brugos and Jessica Baxter asked friend John Green to add some pizazz to his home along the Roosevelt/Ravenna area of the I-5 cooridor. Bettie is not alone, however. Joined by Divine, a famous drag queen, in a bright red dress and hard-to-miss makeup, painted by local mural artist Matthew Brennan IV, aka Two Thangs. The mural has been vandalized a few times over the years, but continues to stand tall, representing, according to Baxter, “there is no wrong way to be feminine, no wrong way to be a woman, despite the status quo.”
HAT ‘N’ BOOTS PARK (OXBOW PARK)
Hat ‘n’ Boots is a roadside attraction and landmark in the Georgetown neighborhood of Seattle. Built in 1954 as part of a Western-themed gas station, it is billed a the largest hat and cowboy boots in America. To preserve this landmark, the City of Seattle moved the Hat ‘n’ Boots to the new Oxbow Park in December 2003. You can spot the Hat ‘n’ Boots in two films - National Lampoon’s Vacation (opening credits) and Hype.
For a longer, more comprehensive list of awesome public art in and around Seattle, I recommend this great article from Curbed!
Many descriptions and photos of these art pieces are pulled from Wikipedia. Thanks, Wikipedia!
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