Seattle Asian Art Museum - $17.99

The Seattle Asian Art Museum is located at the core of Volunteer Park. It was built in 1933, and was designed by Carl Gould and Dr. Richard Fuller. It's an excellent example of art deco design, and as such has been marked for historical preservation. The building was originally home to the Seattle Art Museum and remained so until 1991, when that establishment moved into the downtown area. In 1994, the building was renovated and re-designated as the Seattle Asian Art Museum.

Personally, I don't find this museum that compelling. The Majority of the artwork consists of historical artifacts from around Asia. While these types of objects can be interesting, the Seattle Art Museum has displays of similar objects in lesser quantities. Also, the art deco elements are only on the front. The rest of the buildings faces are plain concrete. However, as I understand it, if you visit SAM and save the ticket, you can get into SAAM for free if you do so within a week. If it's a nice day, you could head over to the museum, and then spend the rest of the day in Volunteer Park. It is also part of the free first Thursday program.


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The museum has also somewhat recently added some modern Asian art galleries. These had some very interesting works in them. This was my favorite part of the museum.



I also liked the central atrium space. The massive skylight is pretty impressive, as are the monolithic statues that occupy the space.






This isn't actually a sculpture, per se. It's a bench in the museum. I just really liked the design.