Exhibits focus on Northwest’s natural and built environments

The Lynnwood Convention Center’s gallery is displaying two exhibitions this season because of COVID-19.

Through June, see the exhibitions “Northwest Enterprise: Working in the Northwest,” featuring photos and paintings of work and industry in the region, and “Northwest Eden: Trees, Plants and Gardens of the Northwest,” featuring paintings and photos of the paradise we call home.

Artwork featured in the “Northwest Enterprise” and “Northwest Eden” exhibits are by Michelle Bear, Shelbey Cook, Scott Filipiak, Trish Harding, Soo Hong, Doug Keith, Matilda Kim, Sonya Lang, Jason Otto, Judith Rayl, Siege and Valentina Voronkova.

“We always focus on the art of the Northwest, and most of the artwork we get is from artists in the Puget Sound region,” said Ann Morgan, curator of the gallery. “Our region itself is so inspirational for art and for artists, and so that’s what we like to focus on.

“These two shows, both of them, really do that. I mean, they’re very different aspects of the Northwest — the built environment vs. the natural environment.”

As curator, Morgan manages the Lynnwood Convention Center gallery’s biannual showcase of Northwest artists.

She said “Northwest Enterprise” includes scenes of commercialism in the Northwest: freight trains traveling through the Cascades, Boeing jet assembly at the Everett plant and the crossing of the Mukilteo-Clinton ferry.

Look for Scott Filipiak’s work in the “Northwest Enterprise” display. Two of his paintings are of birch trees painted to look like barcodes. Not only do they look like barcodes, they work like them. If you scan the barcodes in each painting with your smartphone, they will link you to a website.

Filipiak, 45, specializes in painting and photography. He has about 66 barcode paintings in his series that marries fine art with website technology.

“I like my paintings to be like Easter eggs you can find in technology, like a video game,” said Filipiak, who is a creative director and graphic designer. “I like to have my work have that secret message tucked in there.”

Filipiak, of Federal Way, earned a bachelor’s degree in fine arts from the International Fine Arts College in Miami. In addition to the Lynnwood Convention Center, he shows his work at Gray Sky Gallery in Seattle and the Smith & Vallee Gallery in Edison.

For the “Northwest Eden” exhibit, Morgan said the artists captured scenes of Northwest parks and gardens, including a rushing Boulder River, Rosario Beach at sunset and irises growing in a field off Banta Road.

Look for Soo Hong’s work in the “Northwest Eden” exhibit. She painted abstracts inspired by flowers for the Lynnwood show by layering acrylic paint, oil stick and paper on canvas.

Hong, of Bellevue, has a bachelor’s degree in furniture design from Hongik University in Seoul, South Korea, and a master’s degree in communication art from Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in London. She also has shown her work at Kirkland Art Center and Linda Hodges Gallery, Center on Contemporary Art and Ryan James Fine Arts in Seattle.

Hong, 42, primarily paints abstracts, but she also does mixed media and collage work. All three of her paintings in the exhibition are in her “Temporarily Ambiguous” series.

“When we moved to Washington, I started to paint over my canvases,” said Hong, who teaches art at the Kirkland Art Center. “That’s how I accidentally work in mixed media. We couldn’t afford canvases, because we had just moved, so I was reusing what I had.”

Sara Bruestle: 425-339-3046; sbruestle@heraldnet.com; @sarabruestle.

If you go

Through June the exhibits “Northwest Enterprise: Working in the Northwest” and “Northwest Eden: Trees, Plants and Gardens of the Northwest” will be displayed 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday at the Lynnwood Convention Center, 3711 196th St. SW, Lynnwood. Call 425-778-7155 or visit www.lynnwoodcc.com for more information.