Art by Northwest
From art walks to ORCA cards, drone scoreboards to a dim-sum smackdown, the city is swimming in soccer crossovers.
Yesterday, Seattle-Tacoma International Airport unveiled its new C Concourse expansion — completed, like so many city projects of late, just in time for the FIFA Men’s World Cup.
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Designed by local architecture group Miller Hull, in partnership with Australian firm Woods Bagot, the lofty, skylit space is centered on a knockout showpiece: a towering, tree-shaped pillar. Clad in locally sourced Douglas fir, it branches up and over an airy amphitheater space that faces the concourse and a new live-performance nook for local musicians. The tree’s “canopy” continues across the ceiling in a fractal pattern — a nod to the calm of a Northwest forest tucked inside the 11th-busiest airport in the U.S.
To my mind, the tree pillar feels like a call and response with Seattle artist John Grade’s “Boundary,” which hangs above travelers ascending the escalators over at the N Gates. Installed in 2021, Grade’s 40-foot tall wooden tree sculpture provides a worm’s eye view of an old-growth Red Cedar, its root system stretching 85-feet wide.
Sea-Tac (locals have been steadfastly ignoring the rebrand to “SEA” since 2020) was the first airport in the country to establish its own art collection, in the 1960s, and has greatly expanded its holdings in the past five years under the direction of curator Tommy Gregory. You’ll see artworks at baggage claim, next to security lines and throughout the concourses — so much so that when I land at other airports I always wonder: Where’s the art?
This new, 145,000-square-foot LEED Gold expansion continues that trend, with commissioned pieces dotted all over.
Embedded within the “grand stairs” below the tree are nifty square lightboxes holding a variety of small abstract works (flowers, geometry, DNA strands) by Northwest artists Jaq Chartier, Beccy Feather and June Sekiguchi.
Upstairs, near a breezy outdoor deck with a view of the Olympic Mountains, stands a tall glass sculpture: a mass of moss-green cloud shapes by Seattle artist Fumi Amano. In the neighboring “sensory room” (a calming rainbow of soft green walls), you can chill out with a beautiful woodland mosaic by artists Baso Fibonacci and Alex Sandvoss.
On the main floor, Juneau artist Crystal Worl (Athabascan, Filipino and Tlingit) has installed a wall of hand-blown glass bears in pastel colors, titled “wooch isxán” (“love for each other”). It’s not Worl’s first go-round with airline projects — in 2023 she created a Native formline design to wrap an Alaska Airlines plane. Both Worl’s and Amano’s C Concourse works emerged from an innovative collaboration between the airport, Pilchuck Glass School and the Museum of Glass.
And on the mezzanine level, a large digital screen projects video art by Rebecca Bird, Dan Mirer and Anna Mlasowsky. That installation wasn’t quite ready for prime time during the ribbon-cutting event, but once rolling the video works will join the impressive collection on view all over the complex. Which means it’s definitely worth building in a little extra time for an art walk before your next flight (maybe even hoping for a flight delay).
Will World Cup travelers pause on their way to the pitch to check out the airport’s art collection? You never know. Arts/sports crossovers are certainly having a “you got peanut butter on my chocolate” moment in Seattle right now (see my May newsletter about the murals the games have already inspired.)
Pioneer Square galleries are banking on crossover appeal, having banded together for official Post-Game Art Walks (June 15, 19, 24 & July 1, 2-6 p.m.). Galleries including Stonington, Chatwin Arts, J. Rinehart and Foster/White are opening for extended hours to capture the crowds exiting Lumen Field (World Cup games start at noon). Check out the complete map of participating galleries and remember: Game attendance is not required for post-game art walks!
Across town, our hometown architectural icon has had a soccer makeover. Last week crews painted the top of the Space Needle in the black pentagons and white hexagons of a game ball. It’s the first time the Needle has sported a new look since 2022, when it was drenched in “Galaxy Gold” to commemorate its 60th anniversary. Unless you’re in a plane it’s a little hard to see, but video footage shows how the curve of the historic roof amplifies the visual effect.
Next up: commemorative World Cup transit cards. Designed in the Northwest Coast formline style by Tlingit artist Alison Bremner, the SEA26 ORCA card (which you can load up like a regular metro card) features raven heads, whale tails and bouncing soccer balls. Bremner was perhaps the perfect person to design the card: She grew up playing soccer in Juneau before becoming an artist. There are only 27,000 limited-edition cards, so make haste to an ORCA vending machine if you want to secure an artful souvenir aimed at avoiding World Cup traffic.
Goodwill is also getting in on the action, offering game-day screen printing of shirts and totes, featuring a World Cup-inspired design by Seattle artist Hoa Hong in collaboration with local music organization The Vera Project. (June 19 and 24, 3-7 p.m. at the Evergreen Goodwill on Dearborn).
And how’s this for deep soccer culture? The Seattle Aquarium is staging an online “Ocean Cup,” pitting marine mammals against each other (only theoretically!) to determine which would make an ideal goalie, striker, defender and coach. “Will the sea otter’s clever paws win them the goalie spot,” the aquarium asks, “or are the Giant Pacific Octopus’s eight arms best suited to protect the net?” Instagram voters will pick the perfect underwater team.
At this point you may be wondering: Is World Cup madness getting a little out of hand? But we haven’t even talked about the drone scoreboard. As conceived by Visit Seattle, a fleet of drones will take to the skies near the Space Needle after each of the Seattle-hosted games to portray the final score alongside the winning team’s flag in colored lights. Will this hovering billboard be weird or cool or just a buzzing annoyance? We shall see! (Note: Since we’re in our late-sunset days, these drones won’t go up until 10 p.m. or later.)
From the skies we move to the seas for a “barge celebration” hosted by local teams Seattle Sounders FC and Seattle Reign FC. This floating marine vessel has been custom-built to resemble a soccer field — including a 38′ x 80′ mini pitch. It’ll be docked near Pier 62 and will host watch parties, soccer activities and other fan events on the water (June 11 – July 6).
I don’t know that I’ll attend the barge bonanza but it does remind me that we were promised a pool barge (yes, click) in the original plans for the Seattle Waterfront renovation. If this is the path to finally getting our pool barge, I’ll take it!
We’ll end with the first-ever Chinatown-International District Summer Kickoff (June 18, 3-9 p.m.), featuring live music, traditional cultural performances and an official attempt at breaking the Guinness World Record for “largest dim sum gathering.” What’s the soccer connection? The record is currently held by Australia (764 participants), who will play the USA in the World Cup on the same day as the record attempt. So high-stakes dribbling meets high-stakes dumplings, and as the poster says, “You win some. You dim sum.”
Check out Season 2 of our television show Art by Northwest, featuring in-depth interviews with the printmakers, painters, sculptors, wood carvers and photographers who are creating captivating work across Washington state. Nominated for two Northwest Regional Emmy Awards.
