Matt Browning, Tradition as Adaptive Strategy(Carved wood, each 6 x 1.75 x 1.75 in.;
installation approx. 70 x 12 in.)
Winner of Seattle's final City Arts
Best Of Art Walk Award for 2010.
For the final Art Walk Award of the year, Best Of's Joey Veltkamp invited five leaders in the Seattle arts community to think back over 2010 and select their favorite piece by a local artist. We ended up not being able to attend last night — a real bummer. I love the winning work's inspiration and execution, as explained by Yoko Ott, director of Open Satellite, who nominated Browning's piece:
It was a departure from most of the work we had seen up to that moment. Thirty-four funnel-shaped statuettes were painstakingly carved from solid pieces of fir then filled to overflowing with pitch made from sap the artist gathered from pine trees throughout the Northwest. Inspired by The Pitch Drop Experiment—the longest continuously running scientific experiment in the world started in 1927 that is measuring the flow of seemingly solid substances—it was brilliant, expertly weaving together many threads.Browning's piece was part of a solo show at Lawrimore Project in May. See all of the finalists' work here.
Via Best Of.