On February 28, Seattle band Deep Sea Diver released their fourth album, Billboard Heart, their first release on the Sub Pop label. As part of their promotion of the record, the band performed songs from the album on release night at Easy Street Records in West Seattle and hosted a record signing event for fans after the show.

Founded in 1997, The Grand Cinema has been Tacoma and Pierce County's destination for independent, foreign, and repertory films. This four screen theater is a non-profit cared for and kept up by tremendous and tireless volunteers. Thanks to the generous donors who have already contributed to the Save the Grand campaign, The Grand hopes to purchase The Merlino Arts building in which it resides.

For this week, I wanted look back at a poem and poet that fell into my lap in a time that I needed it the most. Cody R. Simpson, also known as singer/songwriter and actor Cody Simpson, released his poetry collection Prince Neptune in 2020. The collection touches on a conflicting battle between his struggle to uphold his godlike persona and reflecting on his own mortality of fame and fortune. “Simpson’s poetry combines themes of freedom and the ocean with the wisdom of an old soul.”

Photo by Stanislav

The annual comics celebration Emerald City Comic Con is a great time to discover local shops that carry books by the incredible artists you met at the show. 

Here are five shops from across the Puget Sound region that will serve all of your geeky needs. These are by no means the only shops to go to, but have made a particular impression on a comic lover like me.

Curry painted iconic musicians from Jimi Hendrix to civil rights activists James Baldwin, Michelle and Barack Obama, John Lewis, and Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Curry titles his show Where Do We Go From Here—prodding conversation about how we continue to fight and move forward as agents of change.I asked Curry how the people in his portraits answer the question posed by his show. “We keep fighting. We keep supporting,’” Curry answered. 

Nicole Bearden (NB): In honor of Seattle’s Faux Spring weather last week, I decided it was time to have a confab with one of my personal favorite Seattle Icons: A Sound Garden. Located on the NOAA campus near Magnuson Park, between Piers 15 and 17 on Lake Washington, A Sound Garden reverberates with hauntingly atmospheric intonations as the wind blows through artist Douglas Hollis’ twelve, 21-foot high, steel tower sculptures. Sound Garden, I appreciate your presence today.

A Sound Garden (SG): a chorus of metallic hums breezing through the air We are delighted to converse with you.

In the 2020s, the topic of sustainability has become a major focus in classrooms—specifically regarding fast fashion, prompting many students to face the fact that their shopping habits or favorite retailers may be harming people and the planet. In recent years, fashion has gained a reputation for being one of the most extractive and exploitative industries. Student organizations play an important role in creating collective change by holding space for education and action, both with their members and their greater campus and local community.

It wasn’t until after her death that the poetry collection Ariel was discovered and published in 1965. The Restored Edition was published later in 2004. With an honest and heartfelt foreword written by Plath’s daughter, Frieda Hughes, the collection “found comfort in restoring the balance” of Plath as both the poet and the human.

Plath’s poem “Lady Lazareth” first exposed me to her dynamic wordcraft. Of all the poems I came across in Ariel, there was something honest and authentic about Plath’s “Barren Woman” which solidified its spot for this week.  

It began slowly—the plague, the greed, the riots. Revolutionaries rose up behind symbols, murals, and songs, while the masses were fed machinery and religion. In the wake of the destruction, politicians deemed art a dangerous thing—a worthless thing—and the masses agreed. They took away the paint, the books, and the instruments. But they could not wholly silence the artists. These are the stories they left behind.

February 12 was, aptly, a bit of a dark and stormy night. Wet snow dripped onto the sidewalks as people in winter coats trudged into Third Place Books in Ravenna. That night, Tacoma-based writer J. Ann Thomas was discussing her newly published novel, The Spirit Collection of Thorne Hall, a Gilded Age romance novel, and her first adult novel. 

Nicole Bearden (NB): Hello, and welcome to another Iconic Convo with Seattle’s most recognizable icons. Today we are speaking with the Fremont Troll. We appreciate you spending time with us today, Fremont Troll. 

Fremont Troll (FT): Grunts, and nods slowly as dust drifts from his head to float through the air

NB: Now, you’ve been around since 1990. How have you noticed that the city has changed over the past 35 years?

Every quarter, SFS hosts the In Focus series celebrating Seattle directors and cinematographers that features shorts, music videos, and more in a diverse range of content. SFS chooses a director who has a strong intention and vision to their stories with robust elements of “framing/staging/blocking, confidence in editing, making distinctive choices, and thematically cohesive style choices,” said the SFS Artistic Director, Marcus Baker.  

February 2025’s In Focus event showcased director and cinematographer June Zandona, known for her work on Penelope, The Sex Lives of College Girls, Special, and I Don’t Feel at Home in This World Anymore. The screening featured three of Zandona’s shorts: Dancer, Wedding Video, and This is Concrete. 

Judith Skillman, Seattle author of Red Town, crafts a fictional town through a handful of poems that reflect on one’s past self and the experiences weaved within, around, and through. Reviewer Beth Bently claims that an “ordinary experience undergoes a surgical probe to reveal the underpinnings of relationships, ancestral connections, memories from childhood. No event is too slight to remain unexamined”. Red Town is a perfect example of coming to terms with one’s dark past to move to a future of pure gold.

I attended a Martin Luther King Jr. Day march in Seattle’s Central District on January 20, 2025. That day was also the inauguration of our nation’s 47^th president, Donald Trump. Many Americans are tired of talking about politics and Trump. Well, not everyone. I think there’s something about this coalescence of events that stands to unite us more than divide us. Hope stems from the fact that this march, which at times threatened to be more about Trump than Dr. King, ultimately succeeded to underscore the importance of some of the very radical problems King was putting his lifeforce into trying to solve before he was assassinated.

Imagine a free seat at a fine dining restaurant where each dish goes beyond flavor, offering a unique connection to Filipino culture and community—this is Archipelago. Archipelago is a minority, family, and women-owned Filipino American restaurant that creates delightful tasting menu experiences through culinary excellence and inspiring stories. The restaurant’s attention to detail is evident from the uniquely shaped and beautifully sculpted dishware to the intricate placement of each ingredient highlighted in every bite. Each guest is intimately around the dinner table like warm-hearted friends and family.

This week we’re taking a look at a book that’s a bit out of my normal reviews here in Parker’s Pages. This one is an interactive Tarot card guide called Every Little Thing You Do is Magic by two Seattle artists, Callie Little and Moorea Seal. While doing my usual rounds of the local bookstore, I came across this guide while digging through the store’s collection of Tarot decks and just knew I had to have it.

A.K. Burns’ current show, What Is Perverse Is Liquid at Henry Art Gallery, curated by Senior Curator Nina Bozicnik, uses materiality, speculative fiction in the form of short, multi-channel film installations, and sound to envision a future spawned from our current trajectory. Burns’ work centers the queer capacity to thrive in the face of chaos and persecution, and draws a strong connection between our own human resilience and that of nature. 

Writer and dance director Carol Levin published her poetry collection Confident Music Would Fly Us to Paradise in 2014. As a patron for all distinct art forms, Levin dedicates her collection to the Seattle Opera. The collection offers a deep dive into many intricate facets of a colossal opera production. 

Playland gives us one last night in Boston’s oldest and most infamous gay bar, featuring the ghosts who, even in life, haunted this place. Whimsical and bittersweet, Georden West’s film pays tribute to one of the oldest gay bars in the country: the Playland Cafe, previously located in the so-called Combat Zone in Boston, the city’s adult entertainment district. The cast of characters includes bar flies, performers, servers, and all manner of debauches and renegades.

It began slowly—the plague, the greed, the riots. Revolutionaries rose up behind symbols, murals, and songs, while the masses were fed machinery and religion. In the wake of the destruction, politicians deemed art a dangerous thing—a worthless thing—and the masses agreed. They took away the paint, the books, and the instruments. But they could not wholly silence the artists. These are the stories they left behind.