Skip to Content

Pacific Northwest Artists


The Frye Art Museum’s substantial collection of works by artists of the Pacific Northwest reflects the Museum’s transformation from a personal selection of late-nineteenth and early-twentieth-century—predominantly European—oil paintings to a museum dedicated to creative practice in its myriad forms. Since opening in 1952 to the present day, the Museum has remained steadfast in exhibiting and collecting artworks by contemporary artists, especially those living and practicing in the city of Seattle and surrounding region.

Walser Sly Greathouse, executor of the Frye estate and founding director of the Museum, ensured Charles and Emma Frye's vision for a free, public art museum for the people of Seattle was brought to life. Beginning in 1952, Greathouse was the first of six directors who expanded the Museum’s collection, acquiring new works to enliven and contextualize the paintings bequeathed by the Fryes. Subsequent leaders sustained the Museum’s legacy within the evolving identity of the Pacific Northwest through the ongoing collection and exhibition of works by artists of the region—from Washington and Oregon up to Alaska. The Museum’s extensive holdings of Alaskan art were initially assembled by the Museum’s second director, Ida Kay Greathouse. Between 1969 and 1993, she acquired over 125 paintings and works on paper. Subsequent Frye directors Richard V. West, Midge Bowman, and Jo-Anne Birnie Danzker added 175 more works by artists associated with the northernmost state.

Highlights of the Pacific Northwest holdings range from twentieth-century Alaskan landscapes by artists such as Sydney Laurence and Eustace Paul Ziegler, to evocative works by contemporary artists and artist collectives across a broad range of mediums, including Juventino Aranda, the Black Constellation, Alison Bremner, Degenerate Art Ensemble, Ellen Lesperance, Jeffry Mitchell, Buster Simpson, and Ko Kirk Yamahira, among others.


  FILTER RESULTS
by Artist
by Year
The Redhead

Bettina Steinke
Pastel on paper
ca. 1979

Bamboo No.19

Rebecca Struck
Letterpress and print
1994

Old Maple Tree

Roy Terry
Watercolor on paper
ca. 1964

Ode to Octavia: Neo-Ancient Taliswoman

The Black Constellation
Incantation, repurposed bronze, brass, silver, stainless steel, rosewood, beechnut, abalone shell, ibex and dik-dik horn, precious and semiprecious stones, 1996 GMC truck key
2012

The Storm

Diana Tillion
Octopus ink on paper
ca. 1974

Seated Man

Mark Tobey
Mixed media on paper
1940

Bamboo No.23

George Tsutakawa
Letterpress and Sumi ink
1994

El Sisifo (The Sisyphus)

Rodrigo Valenzuela
Three-channel digital video (color, sound); 12 min.
2015