Lamps Meninas will play with the Velazquez theme on 15th Ave E

The Greg Lewis work Boxed Up was featured on the building to start the series (Image: CHS)

Details have been released for the next in a series of art installations designed to keep an empty 15th Ave E restaurant building active and interesting until it is demolished next year for a new mixed-use apartment building.

The new work to be unveiled on October 10th in conjunction with the monthly Capitol Hill art walk will be created by artist Jennifer Zwick and is a “re-envisioning” of the classic Velazquez painting Las Meninas.

SHUNPIKE is proud to announce Jennifer Zwick as the next contributor to the “Exquisite Corpse” Storefront at the Stream 15 development on Capitol Hill.

Continuing the great tradition of re-envisioning Diego Velazquez’ canonical painting Las Meninas, Jennifer Zwick presents Lamps Meninas.  This simple, striking installation will recreate the composition of the famous painting, with the key players represented by various types of lighting fixtures.

A funny, aesthetically lovely way to shepherd in our darker months, Zwick’s installation will inhabit the interior of the former Chutney’s restaurant, incorporating some visual elements of the old bar, as well as adding depth and illumination to Greg Lewis’ exterior installation Boxed Up.

Painted by Diego Velazquez in 1656, Las Meninas seems made to be recreated.  Not just a painting within a painting (though it does feature other works within), it is instead the painting of a painting.  The artifice of this work is its behind-the-scenes nature, depicting Velazquez standing at a large canvas, working on a portrait of the King and Queen (seen reflected in a mirror in the background).  Meanwhile, the Royal court are gathered to watch him work, including La Infanta Margarita and her attendants.  As the viewer is inevitably situated exactly where the King and Queen would be located to pose for Velazquez, to the viewer’s perspective, these backstage figures and the production of the “painting” are the main subjects; but from the perspective of the figures in the painting, the viewer (in the role of the Royal couple) becomes the subject.

Property courtesy of sustainable development company Stream Real Estate LLC.

Please join us for the opening of Lamps Meninas during October’s Blitz Capitol Hill Art walk:

605 15th Avenue East, Capitol Hill, Seattle

Thursday, October 10, 2013

5 – 8 PM

Lamps Meninas will be on display through December 2013