{"id":1322,"date":"2009-11-28T23:17:11","date_gmt":"2009-11-29T07:17:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp\/2009\/11\/james_washington\/"},"modified":"2009-11-28T23:17:11","modified_gmt":"2009-11-29T07:17:11","slug":"james_washington","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/2009\/11\/james_washington.html","title":{"rendered":"James Washington Jr. &#8211; spiritual matter"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Seattle&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.historylink.org\/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&amp;File_Id=5328\">James W. Washington Jr.<\/a> was a stone carver who sought to reveal spiritual forces in the physical realm. His roughly hewn and symbol-studded stone altars, hatching<br \/>\nbirds, sacrificial lambs and marble reliefs are guides to higher<br \/>\nground. He was drawn to life that is on the point of coming into being or making<br \/>\na breakthrough, not only the birds for which he&#8217;s best known,<br \/>\nbut also snakes ready to squirm out of their coils, sperm swimming<br \/>\nacross a marble relief to a radiant egg, and human figures caught in<br \/>\nthe moment of enlightenment. Each chiseled stroke echos the New Testament promise, that every hair of the head is counted.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"jameswashingport.jpg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/jameswashingport.jpg\" class=\"mt-image-center\" style=\"margin: 0pt auto 20px; text-align: center; display: block;\" height=\"306\" width=\"389\" \/>A survey of smaller sculptures is at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.woodsidebrasethgallery.com\/\">Woodside\/Braseth Gallery<\/a> through Dec. 31..<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"jameswashlamb.jpg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/jameswashlamb.jpg\" class=\"mt-image-center\" style=\"margin: 0pt auto 20px; text-align: center; display: block;\" height=\"337\" width=\"499\" \/>Washington was 91 when he died in 2000, having proved to be a fiercer artist in his old age than in his youth. In his 80s, his work became bigger and more brilliantly festooned. In places he painted his stones with colored encaustic and set his symbols of ancient life flowing across the surface, as if the stone were supple and easily yielding to his chisel. <\/p>\n<p>Washington:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>I visualize the subject within and feel it out as I go. I<br \/>\nam the medium, just like copper wire is the medium for the current of<br \/>\nelectricity turning on a light bulb.<\/p>\n<p>I was speaking with some ministers a few years back. There were preachers of all things. I asked, how many of you<br \/>\ncan tell me how many times you&#8217;ve drunk your own bath water? Life goes<br \/>\nin cycles. The last breath of a minister may turn out to be the first<br \/>\nbreath of a pig. Life exists and continues. It uses everything.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Seattle&#8217;s James W. Washington Jr. was a stone carver who sought to reveal spiritual forces in the physical realm. His roughly hewn and symbol-studded stone altars, hatching birds, sacrificial lambs and marble reliefs are guides to higher ground. He was drawn to life that is on the point of coming into being or making a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1322","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1322"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1322\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}