Seattle Art Fair | 7/23-7/26 | Seattle, WA

Regional Pride

The Seattle Art Fair returns to showcase the vibrant arts community of the Pacific Northwest and beyond.

By Audrey Eagerton

This July, the Seattle Art Fairreturns to the Lumen Field Event Center for its 10th edition—a milestone that marks the event’s evolution from a regional showcase into a genuinely international platform. This summer’s program is its most ambitious yet with a thematic focus on textile and fiber art, a wave of first-time global exhibitors, and participatory commissions that blur the line between gallery and lived experience.

Marie-Ange Daudé, The girl in the swing, 2024, suspended feathers, 40 x 40 in. Courtesy Artêria Gallery, Bromont, Québec.

The fair has always been rooted in its commitment to the local creative community. After years of highlighting the Pacific Northwest’s rich history with glass art, this year’s pivot to textile and fiber art opens the floor to new artists and an entirely different set of mediums.

That shift is more than aesthetic—it’s experiential. Textile art invites a different kind of looking. Instead of pausing before a canvas to read its strokes and hues, visitors move through the work, becoming part of it.

Kevin Ducoing, When We Became Aware of Ourselves, acrylic on canvas, 40 x 30 in.

Nowhere is that more literal than J. Rinehart Gallery’s debut of Tininha Silva’s immersive, walk-through fiber installation, where floating hand-dyed forms recreate the quiet suspension of an underwater environment.

Programming extends well beyond the booths. Dedicated tours and theater programs run throughout the weekend, tracing fiber’s evolution through material innovation, labor and storytelling.

Seattle has always offered something different from the traditional art fair circuit; it doesn’t just cater to the serious art crowd but instead focuses on welcoming all visitors. The balance of international heavyweights, national galleries and emerging artists gives the fair an energy that feels curated without feeling exclusive.

Matt Mele, Skylark I, 2023, film photograph on archival silk paper, 12 x 16 in. Courtesy treat gallery, New York, NY.

Returning this year are Seattle favorites Roq La Rue Gallery, Harris Harvey Gallery, Winston Wächter Fine Art and Woodside/Braseth Gallery, alongside Portland’s One Grand Gallery and international names like Tokyo’s A Lighthouse Called Kanata and Paris’s Sobering Galerie.

The Seattle Art Fairopens on Thursday, July 23, with a VIP and press preview from 4 to 6 p.m. and runs through Sunday, July 26. —