Weatherwax High School, ca. 1910. University of Washington Libraries, Special Collections, WAS1780

J.M. Weatherwax High School, a historic building in Aberdeen, WA was destroyed by a fire in 2002. The 1909 building facade’s architectural sandstone blocks survived, and were salvaged for reuse. A meaningful artifact to the local community, the stones serve as a reminder of the local family for whom the high school was named, and also symbolize strength and survival, rising from the ashes, and resilience – qualities that Aberdeen residents see within themselves.

The City of Aberdeen, in cooperation with the Grays Harbor Community Foundation, is seeking an artist to create a significant three-dimensional artwork that will honor the Weatherwax family legacy and inspire both generosity and commitment to community in local residents and those that pass through the City. The artwork will be of a scale and level of detail to support both motorist drive-by and up-close viewing experiences, and will incorporate the architectural standstone blocks in a meaningful and visually engaging way. The artwork will be sited at the Simpson Triangle, a highly traveled site between the business districts of Aberdeen and Hoquiam, WA.

This artwork opportunity is an exciting step in the City’s efforts to revitalize major arterial routes within the city and create a vibrant civic space that will set the tone and design standards for future development and public art integration.

The artist for this commission will be selected through an open call process, with the final artwork decided on the basis of paid, competitive proposals. Professional artists residing in Washington, Oregon and British Columbia are invited to visit our Opportunity Listings and apply.

4Culture Public Art is managing the artist selection process, final design development and artwork implementation process for this artwork opportunity.

October marks the final month of Secret Songs of Your Surroundings’ life online, on your phone, and on the bus. A public art project designed for the inaugural year of King County’s first line of RapidRide service, don’t miss the chance to listen and co-compose a sonic portrait of the A Line corridor.

Hop on board the A Line, for bus rapid transit service from Tukwilla to Federal Way along International Boulevard, and to encounter the sounds of the route captured by Christopher DeLaurenti.  The buses are Wifi-enabled, so you can bring your laptop or smart phone to interact with the soundscape, or simply use your cell phone to call in and listen.

Check out the project website at ALineAudio.4Culture.org or give a call to 206.651.5981.

As Chris describes it, Secret Songs of Your Surroundings is “at once a jukebox and an oracle. By layering everyday, often overlooked sounds, I hope that these new contexts make ordinary sounds not so ordinary after all.” His audio artwork brings attention to discrete sounds, sound patterns, and to the act of listening.

To learn more about the project, check out this previous post.

The A Line celebrates the completion of its first year of service this month, just as the next line of RapidRide service – the Bellevue-Redmond serving B Line launches. Stay tuned for the B Line’s public art, in the form of a mobile game, coming soon.

A Line Soundscape postcard, (c) 4Culture.

Congratulations to Seattle-based design firm Hornall Anderson on its selection to create an innovative and artistic mobile game that will explore and enhance the rider experience on the RapidRide B Line, King County’s second route of bus rapid transit. Hornall Anderson was selected from a pool of 14 King County-based game designers and teams to create a mobile game that will serve as public art for the inaugural year of B Line service in Bellevue-Redmond, a unique opportunity to deepen public understanding of the potential for games to be rich, artistic and culturally significant.

The mobile game will be accessible via personal mobile devices while onboard WiFi-enabled RapidRide buses and through broad internet access.

The Hornall Anderson team, led by interactive strategist Zak Menkel, design director Joseph King, producer Halli Thiel and developer Corey Paganucci, self-describes as “experience designers.” Committed to storytelling and innovation, the team’s everyday work and exploratory play in the Hornall Anderson Experience Lab (HAX) targets the “intersection of design, technology and the spaces we inhabit.”

Previous related projects include  “Where To?”, Seattle’s first interactive transit and amenities kiosk created to promote increased public transit usage and explore the South Lake Union neighborhood; “iLevel”, an online game experience designed to introduce 16,000 employees to a new business culture and enhance teamwork and communication; and “Shake the Sound”, an Earth Day dance party hosted on a floor that converted people’s movements into watts of electricity.

With a broad base of notable national clients, the team is excited to work with 4Culture and Metro on a project for the local community. The team plans to create an evolving, interactive artwork that will enhance the sense of community on the B Line bus experience.

Images: © 2011 Hornall Anderson, Joseph King, Halli Thiel, Zak Menkel, and Corey Paganucci – the Hornall Anderson B Line team; © 2006 Hornall Anderson, iLevel, gameplay screenshot.

4Culture & King County Metro Transit invite you – King County-based game designers and game design teams – to submit concepts for an innovative and creative mobile game for the RapidRide B Line, the County’s second route of bus rapid transit that will service Bellevue-Redmond.

The mobile game will be designed to (1) demonstrate innovation and artistry in interactive media; and (2) explore and enhance the rider experience along the B Line route, emphasizing the experience of interactive discovery on the bus itself. The game will be accessible via personal mobile devices while onboard WiFi-enabled RapidRide buses and through broad internet access.

The mobile game will serve as public art for the inaugural year of B Line service, providing a unique opportunity to deepen public understanding of the potential of games to be rich, artistic and culturally significant.  This is a great opportunity for a game designer/team to focus on artistry, for a public artist to collaborate with designers skilled in interactive media, and for design professionals to consider how artful play can transform a public bus into a rolling plaza for cultural experience.

Part of a series of ephemeral and experiential artworks that leverage personal mobile devices deployed by commuters to deepen their connection to a travel route, this project is contributing to Public Art 4Culture’s exploration of temporary projects. It’s also fostering a unique opportunity for us to engage creatives in our Northwest design and gaming communities in public art practice. We look forward to your ideas!

This project is open to artists and game designers living in King County.  The application deadline is Monday, May 9, 2011. For more information visit our Public Art Calls page.

Play by Kliment.

A new artwork in the King County Courthouse, Standing Tall honors Prosecuting Attorney Norm Maleng.  The artwork recognizes the commitment to public service to which Maleng dedicated his life, and acknowledges the public service of all King County employees.

Hear more about the artwork and the life and work it honors, in the words of the artist and Prosecuting Attorney Dan Satterberg via this KCTV video:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Thanks to KCTV for providing this contextualizing look at the light-filled presence Norm Maleng embodied and inspired.

The artwork is best experienced in person – head over to the 2nd floor lobby of the King County Courthouse to bask in its glow.

This video uses walker-generated documentation to share the three-day walk from Seattle to Snoqualmie with you.  Many thanks to all of the Long Walkers for sharing their video, photographic, and textual reflections of the journey and to editor Britta Johnson for weaving it all together. And thanks to Susan Robb for stewarding the video-making process.

Click here to view the embedded video.

For more Trails Project videos – by the artists, and of the artist-led public participation events, please visit the Trails Project website.

Beaumont combines light and glass, image and text to create a narrative prism that serves as a silent sentry to all that enter the Courthouse. Named for one of Maleng’s favorite maxims, a phrase that invoked his courage and dedication, Standing Tall reveres the light-filled presence Norm Maleng embodied and inspired.

On December 15, 2010 a courtroom full of people whose lives were touched by Norm Maleng came together for the artwork dedication. A group of distinguished speakers shared heartfelt words about what Norm meant to them and to the people of King County, and expressed how they saw the artwork embodying the light and spirit of Norm’s legacy.  The speakers’ program can be viewed in its entirety on KCTV.  An additional video with interviews with artist Linda Beaumont and current Prosecuting Attorney Dan Satterberg, who was also Norm Maleng’s chief of staff from 1990 to 2007, will be available later this month.

Distinguished speakers included:

•    Dow Constantine, King County Executive who served on the King County Council while Norm Maleng was in office from 2002 to 2007.
•    Robert S. Lasnik, Chief Judge of the US District Court in Seattle and Norm Maleng’s first Chief of Staff from 1983 to 1990.
•    Sally Bagshaw, Seattle City Councilmember and Chief of the Civil Division for the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office under Norm Maleng from 1999 to 2007.
•    Dan Satterberg, current King County Prosecuting Attorney and Norm Maleng’s Chief of Staff from 1990 to 2007.
•    Mark Maleng, son of Norm and Judy Maleng.
•    Linda Beaumont

Standing Tall was commissioned by 4Culture Public Art with 1% for Art funding from King County’s Facilities Management Division.

Photos by Spike Mafford

For more information on Monday’s radio show, visit KUOW’s website, and be sure to listen in on Monday!  To learn more about the A Line Soundscape, including how you can listen and co-compose, see this recent blog post and visit the project website.

As the Artist in Residence with the King County Bridge Unit, this is my first ever office job.  While a lot happens out in the field as well as at my studio, time spent at my desk, in meetings and in cubicle conversation has contributed a large part to my project.  These conversations primarily concern the  design issues relevant to my project, but they also revealed to me how little I knew my home county in contrast to my colleagues’ intimate familiarity.

Take the time when Bridge Engineer Jamie O’Day said to me: “You should really head down to Enumclaw and look at 3042, 3043, and 3040A.”  She was referring to three of the more than 300 bridges that County engineers inspect over the more than 2,000 square miles of King County.  And what continues to amaze me is that they not only know all of the bridges by number, but also their design, age, general condition, what road they carry, which bodies of water they cross, and exactly how to get there from here.

In the beginning of my residency, I got to spend a lot of time riding along with County engineers as they showed me the highlights and current projects of the bridge inventory.  I would pay close attention to where we were driving, but inevitably I would get disoriented in some part of the county unknown to me.  The more I was shown around our county, the more I knew I didn’t know.  So this summer, while working on the photographic element of my artwork, I took the opportunity to get to know more.  (One of these days, I’ll write a blog post about what the actual artwork is going to be.  For now, I’ll just tell you that the legs of my tripod are covered in muck from the creeks that short span bridges cross.)  Instead of sticking only to the places that I had been introduced to as part of my immersion process, I spent a lot of time exploring the roads of King County on my own, usually by bicycle, on routes that I knew would cross the little creeks that I wanted to investigate.

I rode through the farm fields near Enumclaw, along Soos Creek near Renton, up in the foothills of Issaquah, down the Snoqualmie Valley, around Vashon Island, atop the Redmond plateau, and in the woods near Lake Joy.  These personal, more intimate encounters with bridge contexts have brought me a little closer to that special connection the KC engineers have with the County.

Now I’m sure that this is not a groundbreaking discovery, but for those of you who know our county primarily by its major highways, I am here to tell you that we inhabit an extraordinary place that extends from Cascade peaks to Puget Sound, Crossroads market to Pike Place Market, old growth forest to farm pasture, and so on.  The list is too long for a short blog post like this, leaving you with the opportunity to conduct your own exploration.  I recommend picking a county park or trail to visit, taking the small roads to get there, and leaving time to stop or detour on the way.  You won’t be disappointed.

Leo Berk has worked collaboratively with the King County Bridge Unit to understand the function and design possibilities of short span bridges.  Having completed his initial research in the field and created design elements for small-scale bridges, he is now back at the office working towards a design manual for implementable projects.

(c) photos of short span bridges – over Soos Creek, Newaukum Creek and near Rutherford Slough – by Leo Berk.

What does a bus corridor sound like?  How do its sounds reveal stories of place?

In A Line Soundscape, a new audio artwork by Christopher DeLaurenti, the sounds of King County’s first RapidRide corridor are expressed as a sonic portrait.  A temporary public art project commissioned by 4Culture and King County Metro, Chris spent the summer and early fall of 2010 exploring the A Line route, capturing its many sounds along International Boulevard between Tukwila and Federal Way.  The result: an audio artwork that brings attention to discrete sounds, sound patterns, and to the act of listening.

“By layering everyday, often overlooked sounds, I hope that these new contexts make ordinary sounds not so ordinary after all,” Christopher explains.

Mining the route and its proximate surroundings, Christopher, a long-time bus-rider who produced his first field recordings aboard Metro buses and at its stops, encountered and recorded a plethora of audio activity.  The field recordings he selected for this audio portrait range from amplified resonances of abandoned houses to serendipitous interviews on the street.  Together, they capture and create a confluence of speech, silence, sound and place.  Chris describes them as “secret songs of your surroundings.”

Online at http://ALineAudio.4Culture.org, you can interact with the art in seven languages, using three sliders to adjust the file-play and co-compose your own soundscape experience.  Chris meta-tagged the field recordings in accordance to three poetic continuums: past – future, mysterious – obvious, and relax – explore.

“I hope the continuums of poetic terms capture the similar patterns of how I heard sound and speech flowing along the corridor,” Christopher says.  “While the terms are subjective, just like my own impressions, they capture the mood and invite interaction.”

By phone, you can call 206.651.5981 to sit back and listen to the audio files play in a version customized for cell phones.

For the full bodied experience, hop on board an A Line bus and call in or log on to encounter the sounds of the corridor as its horizon rolls by.  The buses are Wifi-enabled, so you can bring your laptop, smart phone or simply use your cell phone to call in and listen.

To hear more about the project, in the artist’s own words visit the Public Art Tumblr blog

RapidRide is King County Metro’s new bus rapid transit service.  The A Line is the first of six corridors of service that will launch between 2010 and 2013 to provide fast and frequent service.  Public Art for RapidRide creates unique transit experiences, experiences that open riders’ eyes and ears to a new understanding of a familiar bus ride, deepening connections to the places in which we live and travel.

© A Line Soundscape bus placard, detail by 4Culture.

© Christopher DeLaurenti at the launch of A Line service, photo by Sara Edwards.

This summer, as part of her work for the Trails Project, Susan Robb led a group of intrepid walkers on The Long Walk -  a three-day trek out of the city and into the forest from Seattle to Snoqualmie Falls.  While group-walking created a unique sort of shared space, the walk brought another space to Susan’s attention: “the safe communal space of the sleepover.”   As she describes it, “the vulnerable and intimate moments shared around bedtime were a twilight that unexpectedly provided an ideal forum for research, co-creation, and uninhibited insights.”

Inspired by the sleepover space, and seeking to explore it further, Susan invites you to Sleeper Cell Training Camp.  An over-night, special-ops program with training in such things as tactical dreaming and open source nomadic structures, Training Camp takes place Saturday, October 23 – Sunday, October 24 at the new Tom Kundig-designed Art Stable Building on South Lake Union.

More information and ticket reservations: http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/133641

© Sleeper Cell Training Camp by Susan Robb

Proprietary Issues in Public Art
Wednesday, November 17, noon – 1.30pm
4Culture, 101 Prefontaine PL S, Seattle
Registration and tickets: Brown Paper Tickets
CLE Credit: 1.5 credits pending

Attorney and educator Robert Cumbow will provide valuable legal information on intellectual property issues specific to the field of public art.  He will be joined by City of Tacoma Arts Administrator Amy McBride who will offer examples of how complex issues play out in the real world.  Together, they will tackle topics including:

•    Fair use in public art of copyright, trademarks, names and faces.
•    Does the artist or commissioning agency/company own the copyright in the work?
•    What are works-for hire provisions?
•    What are proprietary differences between permanent and ephemeral public art?
•    Who can authorize and own derivative works?
•    What are the rights under the Visual Artist Rights Act and how do waivers work?

Have your own public art-and-the-law question? Send it in for the panelists to review

© 2009, Robert Horner, Lunar Rhythmic Revolution, detail. King County Public Art Collection at Harborview Medical Center. Photo by Spike Mafford.

Tuesday, September 21, 12 – 1pm

More event info, including a map and directions here.

In August, Paul performed along the banks of Rattlesnake Lake, the southernmost point of the Snoqualmie Valley Trail.  The original cello compositions played that afternoon were inspired by attendee artwork created with watercolor paint on paper and trail-sourced painting tools.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Per Susan Robb:

” My! You smell divine. What’s the scent you’re wearing?”
” Why thank you. It’s called Soos Creek”

I wanted to use smell to capture my experiences with the Regional Trails so  over the past six months I have been collecting materials (from plants and berries to horse manure and cocoa pods) found at various Regional Trails (or directly nearby) and distilling essential oils from them. I then mixed these oils into trail-specific fragrances. The process was alchemical and magical (similar to the trails themselves) – one whiff of pine scent can transport me back to the Preston Snoqualmie trail where I gather the needles.

Join me on the Burke Gilman trail on Friday October 1 at noon to get spritzed and cloak yourself in the scent of the trails. 

Per Paul Rucker:

After walking along a Regional Trail, I will present an hour-long musical suite inspired by the journey to lunchtime trail-goers.  I look forward to engaging with folks who happen upon me on Tuesday, September 21, noon time.  An interactive component will be featured.

Per Stokley Towles:

On September 27, Susan and I will be out on the Regional Trails.  I will interview people to ask them about their experience on the trails, and am especially curious to see how their relationship to that space has changed with the changing weather.

For more information on the Trails Project, please visit www.trailsproject.com.

THIS POST WAS UPDATED ON 9/29: Susan had to reschedule her Burke Gilman spritzing event – the new date is this Friday, Oct 1!

Images:

Burke Gilman Trail by Stokley Towles

Paul Rucker and cello at “Water Pieces”, a concert at Rattlesnake Lake, the southernmost point of Snoqualmie Valley Trail by Heather Dwyer.

Susan and Stokley’s feet at the first rest stop on the Long Walk from Seattle to Snoqualmie Falls by Stokley Towles.

Sunday, Aug 22, 2pm
Rattlesnake Lake Recreation Area, North Bend
RSVP requested

Trails Project artist Paul Rucker looks forward to seeing you on the banks of Rattlesnake Lake, for a concert at the southernmost point of the Snoqualmie Valley Trail. Join Paul where the trail meets the water for an opportunity to interact with his work, and to create some of your own.

Paul will be playing original compositions written using water from the lake and invites you to compose your own watercolor images as you listen.  Paul will provide music, watercolors and paper, the trail will provide your twig/paintbrush or feather/stylus and the lake your water.

Picnic blankets (and picnics!) are encouraged, as are camping chairs and swimming gear should you desire a post-concert dip.

Directions:  from the Snoqualmie Valley Trail – follow signs to the lake.
Driving directions – from I-90, take Exit 32, 436^th Ave SE.  Go South on 436^th Ave SE/Cedar Falls Road SE for 2.7 miles and follow the balloons to Rattlesnake Lake Recreation Area.  Look for the Trails Project directional signs.

For more information on the Trails Project, please visit the Project website. To learn more about King County’s Snoqualmie Valley Trail, please visit the Parks website.

image © Paul Rucker

Exhibition Opening Celebration Event
August 14, 2010, 1-3pm
www.seattleartmuseum.org

Join the Quileute Nation Drum Circle in celebrating the opening of the exhibition Behind the Scenes: The Real Story of the Quileute Wolves. Organized in conjunction with the Quileute Nation, the Seattle Art Museum exhibition brings together rare, never-before exhibited art works and creates a public forum for the Quileute people to introduce their culture beyond what is depicted in the Twilight books and films.

The wolf plays a major role in the cultural beliefs of the Quileute Native Peoples of coastal Washington. According to oral traditions, the first Quileute people were changed from a pair of wolves into human form by the Transformer, Kwati. This creation legend is central to the Quileute world view, and wolf imagery can be viewed throughout the exhibition.

© Quileute wolf headdress, Seattle Art Museum

By Beth Sellars

The Long Walk inspired as many personal responses as participants.  Forty of us hiked 40+ miles through landscapes that many of us had only driven.  We all participated for different reasons, but were united in a collective goal of “reaching the end.”  The 40 individual participants ultimately morphed into a most unique art form; one of cohesive, but diverse group interaction with the spatial experience of the environment.  Along the way, we met old and new friends, shared in new experiences and dealt with physical suffering, always assisting one another.

Susan Robb and Stokley Towles, with Tamar Benzikry-Stern’s constant assistance, masterfully organized the incredible complexity of the project and were strikingly agile in revising problem areas.  Jed Dunkerley, self-titled “blister medic”, earnestly repaired wounded feet and kept everyone on the march.  PA Jana Brevick was pivotal in the success of the event, driving a rental truck filled with our gear, food, and water to every stopping point, repeatedly loading and unloading the confusing array of goods we had entrusted to her.  She was unflappable, and remarkably upbeat.

Although we walked along highways and byways, and through occasional construction, we primarily walked along the lush undergrowth of rivers and creeks, over bridges, continued along sun drenched or tree lined trails and roads, and along the railroad trail that hugged the hillside in an ever-increasing grade into the Cascades.  Mt. Rainier hovered on the horizon above the green expanse of corn fields in the Snoqualmie Valley.  Beavers silently swam alongside our stride, disappearing under water only to catch up with us further upstream.  Back water of vibrant green and pools of lilies yielded the sounds of competing frogs while eagles soared overhead.

The welcome shade of trees was enhanced by the sounds of songbirds.  Golden light of the full moon flooded the camp ground each night.  During the second night at the Tolt River campground, I listened to the long trill of coyotes howling.

Numerous bats living in the tall bat houses at Tolt McDonald Park swooped in a flurry through the dense swarms of mosquitoes that virtually disappeared as we enjoyed dinner in “high dress.” The evening ended with the captivating film Der Rechte Weg by Peter Fischli & David Weiss that paralleled our hike in surprising ways.

The combined resources of 4Culture and King County Parks Department made this project possible through a summer-long commission to three artists, including Susan Robb and Stokley Towles.

With the project, forty people gained new perceptions of the environment that surround us daily.  Let’s hope this type of collaborative project can be made possible in the future for even greater numbers of participants.  It brings significant new meaning to the art experience.

Aligned with the collective culture-building that was part of this experience, participants’ documentation in a variety of media will be combined to create an image slideshow and composite video piece.  Stay tuned.

Image © various Long Walk participants:
Group shot by David White
Jed Dunkerley by Sara Edwards
Jana Brevick by Rebecca Cummins
Mount Rainier above the Snoqualmie Valley by Beth Sellars
Beth Sellars and Rebecca Cummins in “formal wear” by Rebecca Cummins
End-of-walk group soak by Beth Sellars

Trails Concert: Solo Cello

Sunday, August 22, 2pm
Rattlesnake Lake Recreation Area, North Bend
RSVP requested

Join Trails Project artist Paul Rucker for a cello concert on the banks of Rattlesnake Lake, the southernmost point of the Snoqualmie Valley Trail.   Join Paul where the trail meets the water for an opportunity to interact with his work.

“For the past few years, I’ve created new music and improvisations based on audience participation,” Paul describes.   “Participants have created clay sculptures, drawings, and put together puzzle pieces to generate graphic scores and points of inspiration for my work.  For this concert, something brand new will be offered: Water Pieces – compositions written using water from the lake.”

Paul is exploring the trail system and creating original musical compositions inspired by people, nature, and characteristics of particular trails for the Trails Project.  A commission by 4Culture and King County Parks, the Trails Project has three multidisciplinary artists creating temporary, interactive public art experiences on and about the Regional Trails System throughout this summer.

For more information on the Trails Project, please visit the Project website. To learn more about King County’s Snoqualmie Valley Trail, please visit the Parks website.

Paul Rucker by Jennifer Stanton

Tune in to 94.9 FM on Friday July 16th @ 9am to hear some favorite summer sounds, courtesy of KUOW listeners and the Seattle Phonographers  Union.  Better yet, submit some of your own for the Phonographers Union to perform with!

The Seattle Phonographers Union, which includes artist Christopher DeLaurenti who is currently working on a RapidRide soundscape with 4Culture’s Public Art program, convenes to explore “the ways in which we recognize, differentiate, map and navigate our sonic environment.”  Together with KUOW’s Weekday, they are seeking recordings of your favorite summer sounds, and accepting them via SPUs...@gmail.com.

For more information, visit KUOW’s website, and be sure to check out the Friday morning on-air performance.

image (c) Seattle Phonographers Union

By Eric Kramak

At long last, we have finished!  (Though the opportunity for others is just beginning.)

Begun in the bygone days of December 2009, the University of Washington Geography Honors Seminar entered into a six month collaborative project with 4Culture and King County Metro. Our mission: establish a repository of cultural geographies that could be used to inform the creation of public art and more in areas soon to be serviced by Metro’s new RapidRide bus lines.

Over the period of our collaboration, my fellow Geography students and I have toiled over keyboards, endured arduous trips to remote and obscure locations on Seattle’s provincial fringes such as Bellevue and Redmond, Highway 99 between Federal Way and Tukwila, and the lonely peninsula of West Seattle. We’ve hiked and biked and driven and bused through these areas, scouring them for culture and conflict, seeking to understand what we see and how it’s situated within the greater history and culture of the Seattle region.

I am pleased to announce the public unveiling of our work, a website collectively known as The Selected Cultural and Historical Geographies of the Greater Seattle Area. If you think the title is a mouthful, get a load of the url: http://sites.google.com/site/alinehistoryprojectsite/. (We’re working to make the URL a bit more manageable, but the title will remain.)

This website has been created as an accessible accompaniment to our academic research. We have used maps and photographs, both archival and of our own creation, as well as theory we have adapted from existing sources or developed anew, to illustrate the conditions we have found in these areas. Ultimately, we have created cultural and historical geographies of the areas as they have yet to be told, we’ve developed new lenses through which to view these areas and new frameworks within which they can be understood.

My role in this project involved consideration of the role Highway 99 – Pacific Highway South to those in the know – has played in economic and cultural development of the area between Tukwila and Federal Way.

For me to truly engage with this unappealing landscape, it was necessary to scrape away the detritus of 60 years of suburbanization though extensive archival research. Understanding the highway and the built environment of the area in general as it existed between roughly 1900 and 1950 constituted half of my work. The other half was focused on situating that consideration of the physical landscape within the greater cultural and ideological landscapes of the nation during this time. When theorizing this cultural framework, I used the idea of manifest destiny as the foundation. I then showed America’s love affair with the automobile (and all things related) as the natural evolutionary descendent of manifest destiny. Through this process, I was ultimately able to consider the creation of Pacific Highway South as a localized physical manifestation of a larger national culture.

Intrigued?  Confused?  The entirety of this research, as well as that of my classmates, can be found on the website in all its ragin’ glory.

A further part of the process, coming at the time we were wrapping up our research, editing and creating the website, was a series of four presentations on our findings. With an ever changing and diverse audience including peers, professors, various Chair’s and Deans from the UW, 4Culture’s Public Arts Advisory Committee and representatives from Metro, these presentations afforded an unusual opportunity to offer our work, as well as our delivery of it, up for a critique that extend beyond our classmates and our instructor. In retrospect, this may have been the most valuable part of the exercise – learning how to tailor and adapt the presentation of a product to a diverse and changing audience.

Image courtesy of the Des Moines Historical Society