Around Town

"I don’t think anybody would’ve guessed ten years ago that we’d still be standing.” — Bart Sher

BART GOES BYE-BYE
At his going-away fete, departing Intiman director Bart Sher joked that the event’s title, “A Bash for Bart,” was perhaps not ideal to honor “a person who survived a severe head injury as a child,” which he did. He also recalled hard knocks in Seattle: the WTO riot, an earthquake that almost closed the theatre and arts maven Peter Donnelly’s deflating comment, “The Rep is our most important, historic theatre. Everyone loves ACT. We all … like Intiman.” But now everyone loves Intiman, and Bart. “I don’t think anybody would’ve guessed ten years ago that we’d still be standing,” he said. Photograph by Matthew Kaplan/Team Photogenic

FIRST THURSDAY STAMPEDE
Throngs converged on Foster/White Gallery for February’s First Thursday Artwalk in Pioneer Square. Especially impressive was Paul Vexler’s seventeen-foot-high Tall Knot. “The best show there in a while,” said critic Regina Hackett. “More people than we’ve had in years,” said cocurator Phen Huang.Photograph courtesy of Foster/White Gallery

DON’T LOOK NOW
City Arts critic Joey Veltkamp hailed artist Randy Wood’s “adorably menacing creatures” at the OK Hotel Gallery. During the opening, the adorably menacing met the just plain adorable. Photograph by Eric Swangstu