Cascadia Art Museum to host book signing for ‘Invocation of Beauty’ Nov. 3

Cascadia Art Museum will sponsor a book signing event on Saturday, Nov. 3, to celebrate publication of the museum’s latest book — Invocation of Beauty: The Life and Photography of Soichi Sunami — by museum curator David F. Martin.

“This is the museum’s second book, part of our mission to document our shows and to add to the body of art history in the Northwest,” said Cascadia president Lindsey Echelbarger. “I hope that the rest of the community is as proud as we are that Edmonds has emerged as the publishing capital of the region for art history.

“Few would have thought it possible when our small museum opened three years ago that we would be able to launch our publishing program so quickly and, frankly, so successfully,”  he added.

The museum is already discussing publication of the museum’s third book in September 2019, with the University of Washington Press, Echelbarger said. The UW Press was the national distributor for Cascadia’s first two books.

The Saturday event will feature author and museum curator Martin, who will give a tour of the exhibition at 11 a.m. and then sign and personalize books until 1 p.m. at the museum, located at 190 Sunset Ave.

“We are so happy that the book arrived in time for the holiday season,” said museum shop director Gwen Johnson, noting that the book is reasonably priced at $29.99 and makes the perfect holiday gift.”

Soichi Sunami was born in 1885 in Okayama Prefecture, Japan. In 1905, he emigrated to the U.S., coming to Seattle in 1907, where he began working in the Ella E. McBride photography studio. He was active in the Seattle Camera Club, which was comprised of mostly Japanese-American photographers.

A preeminent modernist and pictorialist photographer, he won three awards from the Frederick & Nelson salons prior to moving to New York in 1922. There he enrolled in the Art Students’ League, and became friends with artists Alexander Calder and John Sloan.

Sunami became best known for his portraits of the pioneers of American modern dance, especially Martha Graham and Agnes De Mille. Admired by Museum of Modern Art founder Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, he was named the first staff photographer for MoMA, a position he held for over 38 years. He died in 1971. The exhibition features his photographs dating from 1910 through 1938.

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Real first and last names — as well as city of residence — are required for all commenters.
This is so we can verify your identity before approving your comment.

By commenting here you agree to abide by our Code of Conduct. Please read our code at the bottom of this page before commenting.