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    Set in Motion: A Public Art Exhibition

    In the Saints series, Marin Burnett reflects on her experience as a Black woman in America. Burnett challenges the distorted and fragmented images of Black women through a societal lens, drawing a parallel to how light refracts around an object as it moves through water. Refracted Saint No. 1 envisions the differences between how Black women view themselves and the ways others see them. The work depicts a Black female body as a “whole saint” adorned with only a halo. Set against a vibrant gilded background, she occupies space with her refracted reflection in water. “As we pass through an intolerant society, our image is distorted, our light and our sainthood refracted – but we are somehow still whole,” Burnett has explained. “Real saints are not gilded, they are pained, flawed, and beautiful people.”  

    Image: Marin Burnett, Refracted Saint No. 1, 2019

    Seattle, WA
    December 2020 – February 2021
    The Henry is pleased to present Set in Motion, the museum’s first city-wide public art exhibition. The work of ten artists from the Pacific Northwest and beyond will be presented on sixty public buses throughout the Seattle area.
    The title, Set in Motion, while in part referring literally to the mobile and transitory aspect of the exhibition format, also provided a loose thematic framework for artists to consider. To set in motion, by synonym, is to activate, to initiate, to get under way, to instate, to usher in, to open. There are myriad ways to interpret the phrase and how movement might be considered in this moment. Through their work, artists were able to respond to the rapidly changing social, political, economic, and environmental climates in which we find ourselves, interpreted through their different perspectives, aesthetic/conceptual approaches, and personal narratives. The ten artworks in Set in Motion form a decentralized group exhibition on the city’s public transportation and communication infrastructure.
    The presented artists were selected through an open call as well as by curatorial invitation.
    To view artworks, artist statements and bios, as well as location information, click here.
     
    CREDITS

    Set in Motion is organized by Shamim M. Momin, Director of Curatorial Affairs. The open call was juried by the Henry curatorial team.