Fountain of the Northwest

Installed in the Intiman Theatre's courtyard in 1962. The Fountain of the Northwest is a cast bronze sculpture created by James Fitzgerald. Its painted bronze spires and troughs reminiscent of the crags of a Chinese scholar's rock. Soothing to ears and eyes, this 20-foot cast bronze sculpture in the Playhouse courtyard appears to be naturally eroded by the falling water. Until his untimely death, James Fitzgerald was among the leading modernist sculptors of the Pacific Northwest. Fitzgerald's narrative and smaller bronze sculptures addressed explicitly the politically charged context of the 1960's and 1970"s and risked formal chaos in favor of an obsessive piling of images in an effort to evoke a sense of disorientation and alarm in the viewer. Upon close inspection, however, his work operates as a symbolic residue of culture created out of a commanding skill and determined vision. The enclosed landscaped courtyard of the Playhouse (now Intiman), with its bronze sculpture by James FitzGerald and airy high-loggia, is still one of the most restful outdoor spaces in the city, even though traffic roars down Mercer a few feet away.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IonPEZa3_dA&hl=en