Those newly emptied downtown windows can only mean one thing: The next round of Spaceworks installations is in the works! Stay tuned for more outstanding art and ideas from some of the region’s most creative minds, coming to downtown T-town on Oct. 10.
Downtown resident and mayor Marilyn Strickland is inviting Tacomans to attend a Trick Art Treat kick-off event, Oct. 28. Our city has been acquiring some flash and luster lately from a number of notable art projects – take a walk around town and you’ll get an eyeful: Fab 5’s vibrant and controversial (because its inspired by Islamic art) graffiti wall on the back of the Rialto Theater; Shaun Peterson’s monumental totem figure at Tollefson Plaza (10 years in the making); Jill Anholt’s public art installation on the 12th St. hillclimb; neighborhood mural projects created by teams of local artists; the psychedelic facade of the Broadway parking garages created by Chris Jordan and Kenji Stoll. Innovators all, and making the City of Destiny an art destination.
The Spaceworks Tacoma project matching vacant retail space with working artists is so tasty our neighbors to the north picked up the idea, with the Storefronts Seattle initiative in Pioneer Square and the International District. It happened here first, folks.