This last weekend, my husband and I made the trek from Vancouver to Seattle to check out the Seattle Art Fair - it was my first art fair ever, and exploring it was an engaging 2.5 hours (turns out, art fairs necessarily take all weekend to check out! I somehow thought they did!)

There were the usual offerings of forgettable art, but there were some zingers too. Plus I met a few artists, including Michael Abraham who lives 45 minutes from me (and who's work I've been a fan of for years), back over the Canadian border!

On an aside, some of the work I chose to feature is fun or obscure - When you've seen as much art as I have, you get drawn to stuff you've not seen before - I've thrown some of that up for you below.

Here is the tour:

Some artists and galleries leveled things up by painting the walls to match or offset the work - I didn't catch the name of this artist (sorry), but caught a photo

This booth, by the Lynn Hanson Gallery, was my favorite booth to look at - with so much playful and creative energy tumbling out of those walls, I was smiling ear to ear.

You can see my husband here (or my "arm candy" as I sometimes introduce him) checking out the exhibit.

Artist Mimi Sturman

Artist Melissa Monroe 

One of my favorite stops was Arcadia gallery - there were so many artists I've been following for years that they represent, and I was able to see their work in person - Like Denis Sarazhin (I've used his work to teach about hands and feet), Julio Reyes, Malcom Liepke, and Ron Hicks. I didn't take a lot of photos since my photos weren't doing the work justice. 

Another artist whose work caught my eye. Artist Anna Macrae. She works on carved foam and then pours on house paint (and more, as you can see)

A few other photos, but without the artist names.

Like this piece that was about 4 inches thick but was set up with mirrors so it looked like I could climb in and escape into another reality.

The shadows that this work casts on the wall is part of the beauty of them.

I'm glad we went, and I'd say it's worth checking out, though once you convert the ticket price to Canadian dollars, it cost a whopping $100 for the two of us. So be prepared for that. 

I'll save you from viewing the photos of Gum Ally, the world-famous gum-sticking-spot we stumbled across by accident (I can't get the memory of the smell of years of sun-heated gum out of my head). Look it up if you are curious, but be warned, maybe don't be eating breakfast while you do.

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