This still from The Boat People, a film shot in the Philippines following five children as they travel by sea, collecting objects, is one of many evocative artworks on display at Seattle Art Museum’s exhibition Our Blue Planet: Global visions of water
Tuan Andrew Nguyen 2021. Courtesy the artist and James Cohan, New York
Seattle Art Museum
FROM its pure essence to its significance in culture and society, water takes on rousing and inventive forms in these artworks from Our Blue Planet: Global visions of water, an exhibition at the Seattle Art Museum in Washington. The show explores one of the world’s most crucial resources through more than 80 artistic interpretations.
Raqib Shaw
Advertisement
At top is a still from The Boat People by Tuan Andrew Nguyen. Shot in the Philippines, the film follows five children as they travel by sea, collecting objects. Above is The Garden of Earthly Delights V, Raqib Shaw’s mixed-media depiction of mystical underwater creatures, inspired by Dutch painter Hieronymus Bosch.
Claude Zervas
Adrienne Elise Tarver
Above shows: Nooksack, a sculpture by Claude Zervas made from wire and cold-cathode fluorescent lamps that mimics the form of the Nooksack river in Washington state; Mirage 24 by Adrienne Elise Tarver, part of her watercolour series of nude women lounging and swimming in tropical environments; and below, Mask of Kumugwe’ (Chief of the Sea), an alder and red-cedar-bark mask made around 1880 by the Kwakwaka’wakw Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest coast, whose culture and traditions are centred on the natural environment.
Mask of Ḱumugwe’ (Chief of the Sea), ca. 1880 Native American
Our Blue Planet is on display at the Seattle Art Museum until 30 May.
More on these topics: