Top 7 Arts & Culture Happenings in January

Happy New Year! I hope you had a great holiday season and are ready to face January with resolutions in hand…or at least a raincoat (or an umbrella for us Seattle transplants!). I don’t mind the rain, particularly when there are so many great cultural events this month that are all indoors! Here are the ones I’m most excited about.

If You're Going to See One Thing This Month...

Dance Nation
by Clare Barron
Washington Ensemble Theatre
12 Ave Arts
Jan 17-Feb 3
Tix: $25

A Finalist for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in Drama, Dance Nation is a play about a group of 13-year-old girls preparing to compete in the Boogie Down Grand Prix dance competition in Tampa, Florida. While the premise may bring to mind images from reality TV (“Dance Moms” was an inspiration for playwright Clare Barron – a Wenatchee native!), the play dives a level (or five) deeper to offer a sharp exploration of the power and ferocity of young women as they navigate their own ambition. In watching adult actors perform this story, we think the performance will remind you that while our cringeworthy middle school years may be in the rearview mirror, they live inside us forever.

If You Happen To Be In...

South Lake Union: Check out Aperture
MadArt
Jan 7-Mar 28
FREE

Artist Ian McMahon creates massive pillow-like forms that look squishy, but are actually make of hard, cast plaster. Swing by if you’re looking for a little inspiration during your lunch break (but stay away if you’re looking for a cushy surface to nap on…). If you go between Jan 7-25, you’ll get to see the artist at work installing the piece, or you can meet him at the opening reception on Sunday, Jan 26, from 1-3pm.

Pioneer Square: Check out Quilts and Assemblages
Greg Kucera Gallery
Jan 4-Feb 1
FREE

Seattle artist Ross Palmer Beecher turns trash (think coffee cans, neck ties, license plates) into treasure in the form of quilts. A cross between folk art and Pop Art, this show will make you reconsider the items we throw away and those we put on gallery walls (beyond the now-infamous banana).

First Hill: Check out Donald Byrd: The America That Is To Be
Frye Museum
Last Call - closing Jan 26
FREE

This is your last chance to check out this amazing retrospective of the career of Donald Byrd, one of the preeminent modern dance choreographers of our time -- who also happens to live and work in Seattle. I highly recommend you go Tuesdays/Fridays at 12pm or Saturdays/Sundays at 3pm when you can also see a performance by dancers from Spectrum Dance Theater, Byrd’s dance company. Check out the Culturyst blog for more info.

If You're Looking for a Full Night Out...

Reparations
by Darren Canady
Sound Theatre Company
Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute, Central District
Jan 8-Feb 2
Tix: $5-75

Sound Theatre Company starts its 2020 season with the world premiere of Darren Canady's play about a new technology that turns blood into a time machine, allowing us to examining the secrets and traumas we carry in our veins. Sound Theatre Company won the 2019 Gregory Award for “Theatre of the Year” (beating much larger theater companies like Seattle Repertory Theatre), so I'm excited to see what they will offer this season!

Where to Eat Before: Reckless Noodle House

Bohemia
Triple Door, Downtown
Jan 16-26
Tix: $22-42

Bohemia is a combo of burlesque, dance, aerial, classical and contemporary music, and comedy set in 1890s Prague. Created by Seattle locals Mark Siano and Opal Peachy, it tells the story of composer Antonín Dvorák who, in an attempt to break through his musical writer’s block, reaches for a bottle of absinthe. Under its spell, he is visited by composer Frédéric Chopin and a group of green fairies (in very little clothing) who help him search for inspiration. This show has been entertaining audiences since 2015, but now is your last chance to catch it now before the group heads to Berlin.

Where to Eat Before: No need, as The Triple Door serves food straight to your seat!

Jodi Kantor and Meghan Twohey
Seattle Arts & Lectures
Benaroya Hall, Downtown
Jan 29, 7:30pm
Tix: $5-45

The Pulitzer Prize-winning reporters who broke the Harvey Weinstein sexual harassment and abuse story for the New York Times, Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, discuss their new book, She Said, which chronicles their investigation and the #MeToo movement.

Where to Eat Before: Ben Paris

What arts & culture happenings are you most excited about this January?