Frye Art Museum — Attraction in Seattle

So far it's been an amazing art gallery the likes of which are seemingly lacking or outright missing here in the beautiful beauty and green landscape of my favorite city's heart and pretty much center. It's actually better than the Seattle Art Museum downtown because the building itself is an actual work of ART and beautiful architectures that nicely blend into the skyline very well. It's less expensive than others and also friendly enough for kids who love ART and older folks like myself really. The space used, and exactly how the Frye uses their mind blowing space there is not only amazing but also unbelievably ingenious and also fascinating for everyone blessed enough to check it out,... -Not to mention, probably actually unknown, simply because of its beautiful awesomeness! -you've absolutely got to stop by and see for yourself to believe it's wide open galleries, high ceilings and incredibly short distances to pass through that makes the warm and small appearing larger on the inside SOMEHOW place seemingly such an architect's impossible masterpiece just to behold from the outside to the inside alone, then, -your getting to see what you actually came to see, this awesomeness and righteousness and incredible, unbelievably amazing ART and perhaps actually even an actual artist or artists because they've even got performance ART there from time to time as well, incredible just doesn't quite explain how incredibly incredible that incredibly incredible Frye Art Museum actually is to witness! I've been going for over 15 years and there's always so much righteous ART that I, myself took the time to write this review about how awesome this particular place in Seattle Washington really is to myself and others loving it always! The staffing is friendly enough and I'm certain they've got a "free" day or two every week. My favorite ART museum in Seattle WA.

Yours, Eddie...

This museum has the potential to be 5 stars, but a few things hold it back.

Free admission is a huge plus and would normally earn a perfect rating on its own. However, a lot of the open space isn’t being used well, many exhibits are often closed, and most of what’s on display, specifically the modern art, is just not good.

The classic paintings are excellent, but the modern pieces often feel like parody. I get that art is subjective, but much of it comes across as satire rather than serious work, which feels out of place in a museum setting.

I’ve visited this place 10–15 times, as the free admission makes it an easy thing to take guests to. They used to have a small cost or a pay-what-you-can fee, so I’ve given them a fair bit of money, and in these cases I can’t really say it was worth the cost to be honest.

My friend, whom I took on the most recent visit, said that he felt he should have been paid to go there and that all the modern art legitimately seemed like a joke.

There is a cafe inside, but bags aren’t allowed in the museum (despite there being no signage indicating this, and a locker storage facility suggesting bags would be allowed), so it ends up not being a good cafe or environment for getting work done.

The final reason it’s not 5 stars is the employees are just kind of rude. Short-tempered, scoff at questions, don’t really have a lot of knowledge on the artwork (I’m sure this depends on who is working. My experiences haven’t been great).

If this was a paid museum I’d rank it 1 or 2 stars based on everything above, but with the free admission, the faults could easily be improved and turn this place into a 5-star museum.

I often begin to like places more after frequenting them, as a sense of homeliness and anticipation of nostalgia for it in the future sets in, but this museum hasn’t had that effect on me,...

One can't help but appreciate what the folks at Frye are trying to do. They're a rare free museum and thus committed to the public good. And nor are their donation appeals intrusive -- they simply set up a box near the exit.

The problem: there's no "there" there. This is a glorified gallery, with a tiny collection. You can get through the place in less than an hour. I parsed through the first floor; I'm not clear if there was any more to the place but they didn't direct visitors upstairs.

The collection isn't particularly distinguished, either. I saw the PAN exhibition, a collection of copies of great works. Not impressive. A small place should show the very best, but they just don't have it. The pieces hailed from the late 1800s and early 1900s, a period interesting only because it illustrates the evolution of art to modernity. Context aside, the pieces were uninspiring -- undeveloped abstraction without classical beauty.

A successful museum will harmonize gallery and art. The Frye doesn't. The construction of the space makes it feel oddly empty. The galleries are large boxes, but the work in the PAN exhibit was roughly letter-sized. This mismatch lent an uncomfortable aesthetic. The spaces would be better suited to larger works. Moving walls (a la Whitney) would also work.

The small details fall apart too. The PAN logo, one they called custom-designed, didn't even employ basic kerning. Hard to believe that no competent designers were available in Seattle of all places. At least one of the frames was poorly constructed, loose at the corner. It looked like one you'd buy at Walmart. A museum exists to showcase beauty and it should only commit to details that accentuate that beauty. Sloppiness damages the experience.

If you're able, I encourage you to give to this and other arts institutions. They could use...