404. Juliette Aristides in conversation with Mike Magrath: The Inner Life of the Artist: Conversations from the Atelier
Town Hall Seattle Arts & Culture Series
Release Date: 05/11/2025
Town Hall Seattle Arts & Culture Series
Who isn’t hoping for a quality partner to build a life with? Someone charming, reliable, with a great personality? But what happens when that sparkling personality is far darker around the edges than you realized? In her tensely thrilling new novel Don’t Let Him In, author Lisa Jewell explores the layers of truth and deception unraveling before three women who find themselves tied together by a man who has more secrets than any of them bargained for. Nick Radcliffe seems to have it all – he’s a man of substance and good taste, with a smile that could melt the coldest heart and a...
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`This is a dynamic and inspiring community panel on the joyful power of arts activism. In a time when many are facing systemic erasure — politically, socially, and culturally — Pottery Northwest is transforming art into resistance through equity-driven programming that uplifts Black, Brown, and LGBTQIA+ voices. Moderated by James Miles, the panel features ceramicist Aisha Harrison, former legislator Kirsten Harris-Talley, and Pottery Northwest Executive Director Ed King. Leading Pottery Northwest is a privilege for Ed King after a career as an award-winning visual artist and ad...
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Far more art is produced in a place like Seattle that is seen by the general public, in venues like galleries, museums, and art fairs. Who decides which art goes on display, and which work remains in the maker’s studio? A panel of art world experts discussed the often behind-the-scenes process that selects certain artists while sidelining others, and whether the current structure encourages or suppresses diversity, and where there is room for improvement. Elisheba Johnson is a conceptual artist and curator for Wa Na Wari. She was previously a public art manager for Seattle’s Office...
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Many of today’s anti-trans sentiments revolve around the belief that things like gender-affirming care and nonbinary identities are part of a new trend. Yet, over a century ago, one doctor’s revolutionary work around gender and sexuality suggests otherwise. Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, a German-Jewish sexologist and activist, grew famous (and infamous) for his theory of sexual relativity. While he may be largely forgotten, journalist Daniel Brook wants to reintroduce Hirschfeld to today’s discussion around gender and sexuality. Drawing from his book, The Einstein of Sex: Dr. Magnus...
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Have you ever wondered how American cuisine came to be? When we look at food from around the world, we may more readily accept the complexity of its origins or their legacy in the culinary landscape. But it may be surprising to some that many of our country’s dietary customs likewise stem from culturally robust beginnings. From a James Beard Cookbook Hall of Famer and the star of the Netflix docuseries High on the Hog, Dr. Jessica B. Harris comes her latest work, Braided Heritage: Recipes and Stories on the Origin of American Cuisine. This cookbook — replete with over 100...
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While the war in Ukraine continues to grab news headlines, the daily lives of Ukrainians remain opaque and mostly anonymous. What is it really like to live there during wartime? Historian Danielle Leavitt answers that question in her book, By the Second Spring: Seven Lives and One Year of the War in Ukraine. By going beyond familiar portraits of wartime heroism and victimhood, Leavitt reveals the human experience of the conflict. A U.S. citizen who grew up in Ukraine, Leavitt draws on her deep familiarity with the country and online diaries to track a diverse group of Ukrainians through...
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Ted Bundy, arguably the most notorious serial murderer of women in American history, committed many of his crimes in the landscape of the Pacific Northwest. But in the 1970s and ’80s, Bundy was just one perpetrator amid a large number of serial and violent acts across the region. Why were there so many, and so particularly gruesome? What caused the rise and then sudden fall of an epidemic of serial killing? In Murderland: Crime and Bloodlust in the Time of Serial Killers, nonfiction author and Pulitzer Prize winner Caroline Fraser maps the lives and careers of Bundy and his infamous...
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A fur-trading schooner beached in 1811. A passenger liner lost in 1906. An almost-empty tanker broken on the shore in 1999. These shipwrecks, and thousands more, are why the northwest coast of North America is sometimes called the “Graveyard of the Pacific.” Drawing from his book, Wrecked, history professor and author Coll Thrush tells the stories of many vessels that met their fate along this rugged coast and how they open up conversations about colonialism, Indigenous persistence, and place-based history. Shipwrecks are commemorated in museums, historical markers, folklore, place...
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You could argue that Dave Barry is the country’s class clown, but did you know that he actually was elected class clown in high school? It’s no wonder, then, that he’s made a career out of making fun of pretty much everything. So how in the world does the son of a Presbyterian minister wind up winning a Pulitzer Prize for writing a wildly inaccurate newspaper column read by millions of people? Dave Barry will explain. Barry draws from his latest book, Class Clown, to take us on a ride through his life so far, starting with a childhood largely spent throwing rocks for...
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Founded in 1970, NPR is America’s most powerful broadcast news network. Despite being overshadowed by the larger and more glamorous PBS, public radio has long been home to shows such as All Things Considered, Morning Edition, and This American Life that captivate millions of listeners in homes, cars, and workplaces across the nation. In On Air, a book fourteen years in the making, journalist Steve Oney tells the history of this institution, tracing the comings and goings of legendary on-air talents (Bob Edwards, Susan Stamberg, Ira Glass, Cokie Roberts, and many others)...
info_outlineFrom bestselling author Juliette Aristides comes an inspirational guide to thinking, making, and embodying the mind of a creative person.
The third Monacelli Studio title from Juliette Aristides, The Inner Life of the Artist, is an inspirational guide to thinking, making, and embodying the mind of a creative person. The book contains a series of short, insightful essays and significant, meaningful quotes by contemporary and historical artists, each accompanied by a moving and inspiring selection of nearly 100 past and present artworks to help enlarge our capacity for wonder. For those interested in drawing, painting, and other art forms, the book expands upon Atelier principles with fun, approachable, and practical exercises applied throughout, with an emphasis on cultivating the artistic mind, along with the hand and the eye. This is the perfect book to inspire all creative thinkers, presented in a visually arresting compact package and wrapped in a cerulean blue cloth case.
Juliette Aristides is a Seattle-based fine artist, author, and educator who seeks to understand and convey the human spirit through art. She has participated nationally in dozens of museum exhibitions including the solo shows Observations at the Reading Museum of Art in Reading, PA and A Life’s Work at the Customs House Museum in Clarksville, TN. Aristides is the author of six best-selling books including Lessons in Classical Drawing and Lessons in Classical Painting, which have been translated into several languages. Her seventh book, The Inner Life of The Artist publishes this April from Monacelli. Juliette has been the director of the Aristides Atelier for over 20 years and founded the first Atelier in the Northwest at Gage Academy in Seattle. Her Atelier’s achievements have been recognized in four consecutive exhibitions at the Maryhill Museum of Art. Aristides’ artwork and writing have garnered national media attention in publications such as Fine Art Connoisseur, American Art Collector, Artist’s Magazine, and American Artist. She has also been recognized as an Art Renewal Center “Living Master” and is the recipient of the prestigious Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation grant.
Michael Magrath received his BA in mythology and comparative religions at Reed College and his MFA in Sculpture and Public Art from the University of Washington in Seattle. Mike has studied in Florence and Rome, and taught at The Art Academy of London, The University of Washington, and the Gage Academy of Art where he began teaching in 2004. Since 2014, he has directed the Magrath Sculpture Atelier, where he also serves as Faculty Chair. His awards include the IFRAA best Religious Sculpture, the ART Renewal center First Prize in Sculpture.
Magrath brings a craftsman’s approach to sculpture, having come into art via the trades, working as a finisher, fabricator and foundryman. He also worked in college art programs for many decades, and so approaches teaching and artmaking from conceptual and maker-based perspectives. As such he seeks a marriage between elegance of concept and excellence in craftsmanship. As a teacher he seeks to demystify and make accessible to all the art making process. Magrath does both private and public commissions and has exhibited internationally. Clients include Microsoft, the University of Washington, the Archdiocese of Portland OR, as well as numerous private clients.
Presented by Town Hall Seattle and Gage Academy of Art.