Suzanne Zahr, Mercer Island architect and general contractor, invites the community to celebrate the one year (paper) anniversary of her design/build firm and art gallery on Thursday, April 6.
Over the last year, the SZ Art Gallery has featured the work of 13 local and international artists, helped re-launch the first Thursday Mercer Island Art Walk and hosted events for community organizations such as MICA, SJCC, FASPS, Art With Heart and Washington state Sen. Lisa Wellman’s election campaign.
Her firm has also kept busy working on homes, apartments, retail spaces and corporate interiors, often handling the full lifecycle from design through construction. The event will be catered by one such lifecycle client, Caruccio’s, which will open its culinary event center in August 2017.
The featured artists are photographers and Islanders Laurent Bourscheidt, Joe Iano and Donatella Lombardini.
In April, Clarke and Clarke Art and Artifacts will feature “Forms and Faces in Sculpture,” with pieces from many cultures. The gallery’s art walk hours will be posted on its website, www.ethnoarts.com.
“Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that encompasses three dimensions. Works of art that are carved, molded or modeled in stone, clay, wood, metal or man-made materials,” according to a Clarke and Clarke press release. “[Sculpture is] an art form that is constantly evolving and redefining itself and we embrace the technology but hold dear the historic examples that will endure, enrich our lives and continue to educate us.”
Many cultures are represented in the the galley, with displays including a Chinese Sandstone Bodhisattva from the Sui-Tang Dynasty (late 6th-early 7th century), a 20th century wooden figure from the Metoko People of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Himalayan/Tibetan Masks and Phurba also from the mid 20th century and from 1000-1450 (Common Era), a pair of scarce male and female Chancay culture, as well as Peruvian pottery figures in traditional patterned designs.
From Clarke and Clarke’s contemporary collections, there will be a Granite Torso by Ontario, Canada artist Babe Gunn signed and dated 1991 along with several colorful Hopi Kachinas of the Southwest and the charming rustic carvings in soapstone of the Alaskan Inuit People.
