Early Morning

Jay Steensma (1941-1994) was a prolific artist who left a large legacy of works in all media.  He attended the University of Washington School of Art in 1959 where he studied with Walter F. Isaacs, Spencer Moseley, Robert C. Jones, and George Tsutakawa, all of whom are represented in this exhibit.  Much of his work was respectfully reminiscent of imagery by the four artists of the Northwest School (Guy Anderson, Mark Tobey, Kenneth Callahan and Morris Graves) whom he revered.  He imposed his own vocabulary upon this imagery, however thereby creating his own unique style.
Despite the onset of manic-depressive illness which plagued him until his death in 1994, Steensma kept up a frenetic work schedule which resulted in thousands of works on paper, canvas, and related materials. Constantly flirting with the imagery of the major figures of the Northwest School (Guy Anderson, Graves, Mark Tobey, and Kenneth Callahan), Steensma turned his homages into a highly tailored style which became a potent vocabulary of subjective symbols while at the same time bordering on satire or parody of the older artists he so loved. By the end, he had turned to abstraction as a way of emptying out or purifying recognizable imagery.