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RANDOM SIGNAGE
Jul 10th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

SOMEBODY doesn’t like Hummers. (But nobody doesn’t like Sara Lee.)

SOMETIMES a blown lighting fixture can reveal more than it conceals.

GAY PARADE '03
Jul 8th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

AS PROMISED, here are some of the pix I took but was unable to upload last month, starting with what’s commonly known for short as the “Gay Pride Parade” (the official name’s almost as long as the parade itself).

This year’s parade was to have been hardly different from any, except for the larger and more numerous surrounding beer gardens. (They’re here, they’re queer, they’re drinking beer.) But recent news events gave the paraders a couple extra things about which to feel proudly.

First, a court in Ontario ruled gay marriage legal in Canada’s most populous province. The move capped a half-year in which the Great White North, once seen as quaint and stuffy, suddenly attained a reputation as North America’s bastion of Euro-progressivism and (relative) political common sense.

Then the U.S. Supreme Court, in a rare victory for libertarian conservatives instead of authoritarian conservatives, said Texas couldn’t criminalize “sodomy” (a code-word for gay-male sex). G.W. Bush, who as Texas governor had supported the law, was uncharacteristically quiet about its overturning.

Thus, an event that, as late as a week before, might have held a mood of brash defiance, instead took on an air of only slightly-muted celebration for lesbians and gays, and for everybody who’s been yearning achingly for even the slightest hope.

Hope for a way out of the right-wing nightmare.

Hope for an America that would run on compassion and common sense, instead of greed and fear.

Hope for not just a more prosperous future, but for any future at all.

The new age people say anything we do to maintain a positive attitude will help us achieve our goals. Let’s hope this time they’re right.

AFTER SOME OF THE SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL…
Jul 8th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

…posted to this site in the past week, here’s some nice clean romance pulp-novel covers courtesy of the Private Screenings boutique in Fremont.

I JUST KNEW that decade-old “menswear for women” fad would finally get its logical counterpart.

EVERY BOY'S WISH
Jul 7th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

…to so skillfully manipulate his wand that a beautiful girl ends up on her back, smiling angelically and floating beyond the bounds of earthly reality. (Found at the Pioneer Square Magic Shop.)

WHEN MCDONALD’S REOPENED its Third and Pine branch earlier this year (it was shut while the upstairs was remodeled into moderate-income housing units), they didn’t bring back the loud country music they’d formerly blasted out onto the sidewalk in a futile attempt to repel street loiterers. Instead, they had Ronald himself give a proxy warning.

(BTW: A fan site called McBurgers offers recipes it claims resemble the chain’s original formulae, and insists McD’s current market-share troubles would be solved if the company went back to the way it used to make things, before the efficiency experts and cost-cutters started messing everything up.)

A SURE SIGN OF SUMMER in the city: An elegant barefooted lady relaxing with her PowerBook.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA, YOU DON'T LOOK A DAY OVER 210
Jul 6th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

Public displays of patriotic bombast were thankfully sparse at this year’s Fourth of Jul-Ivar’s gathering.

Perhaps it’s a positive sign that folks, at least around Seattle, have gotten bored by the past one-point-five years of force-fed flag-wavin’ and jingoism-spoutin’.

Abundant, however, were all the new massive condo projects just over the railroad tracks from Myrtle Edwards Park. Many of these glass boxes are still somewhat less than fully occupied.

It was a refreshingly ordinary Fourth, full of low-key people of all ages waiting around all day for a good view of the big boomies later that night. One disappointment: The musical bookings for the Fourth of Jul-Ivar’s were a lot less diverse than in prior years, emphasizing the rote-aggressive “blooze” bands that have been Seattle’s official establishment music since the ’70s.

I didn’t stay in Myrtle Edwards for the big blast, having been invited to a deck bash at a FIrst Hill condo, from which the rival Gas Works fireworks show could supposedly be seen.

But with the Metropolitan Park towers rising like twin cans of Spam (the meat product, not the email) between the condo and Lake Union, we could only see the largest or tallest of the fiery boom-booms. Still, a splendid, if cold and windy, time was had by all.

THE ALLEGED GREAT COMPROMISE WORKED…
Jul 4th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

…this past First Thursday. Independent art vendors were moved one block north from Occidental Mall to Occidental Park, instead of getting banned altogether (which some of the corporate art galleries wanted).

So the unofficial, un-curated, anything-goes art bazaar continued, with more square footage and just as many buyers and sellers. The only police trouble came when Greg Kucera (one of the bigtime gallery operators who’d pushed for the indie art-sellers’ expulsion) was almost arrested while wearing a second-hand police uniform shirt.

Meanwhile, the kind of outdoor art sale the corporate gallery guys would prefer took place at the Harbor Steps development, west of First and Union. Everything was clean, slick, and quality-control-committee approved. Glass bowls and cutesy sculptures dominated. Surprisingly, it wasn’t all completely dull.

'SPACE AVAILABLE' PIX
Jun 20th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

SOME MORE ENTRIES in our Space Available photo series.

AS THE SOLSTICE APPROACHES…
Jun 19th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

…here’s something to remind you of the joys of winter, sort of.

NO USE CRYING…
Jun 19th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

…over spilled ranch dip.

RANDOM PIX
Jun 18th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

A 'SPACE AVAILABLE' SHOT
Jun 17th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

ATHENIAN SODA FOUNTAIN SIGN
Jun 17th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

RANDOM PIX
Jun 16th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

RANDOM PIX
Jun 13th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

CULTURE POLICING
Jun 10th, 2003 by Clark Humphrey

Seattle officials are planning to crack down on the unofficial open-air art market along Occidental Avenue during the Pioneer Square First Thursday art walks. They’re talking with gallery owners and official neighborhood booster groups, but apparently not with the outdoor art vendors themselves (except to give ’em stern warnings not to come back in July without a permit).

The SeaTimes quoted gallery owner Greg Kucera as saying the unauthorized, un-curated, un-mediated art sales on the sidewalks “erases the work we’re trying to do” as per “trying to get people to understand the difference between good art, bad art, high art, low art.”

If you ask me, erasing such hierarchical boundaries is a Good Thing. We oughta encourage more of it.

If the street art’s popularity is overcrowding Occidental, then expand it into Occidental Park across the street. But don’t have screening committees or “quality control” bureaucrats deciding who gets to sell what. We don’t need another exclusive spot that only offers the same slicked-up, blanded-down, tourist-friendly “fine” art you can already find at every summertime street fair.

That mellow-but-meaningless image, of course, is precisely what’s caused so many hipster critics and scenesters to scoff at Seattle’s most commercial contribution to the art world, glass art. This week’s international Glass Art Society convention here in town, and all the associated local gallery shows, might be changing a few minds about this. COCA and Roq La Rue have found plenty of pieces to display that show typical COCA and Roq La Rue subject matter, only in glass. The pliable, moldable, clear or semi-opaque material can be utilized for a lot more than just prosaic giant bowls.

In other words, glass artists don’t always blow.

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