The Holidays Are a Time for Traditions, and Breaking Them

As we enter the depths of winter and the holiday season, art in Seattle is picking up a familiar festive theme—with a twist, of course. Tradition connects us to our heritage and identity, but it can also feel limiting. The ability to evolve traditions and create something new and interesting for the present is and has always been integral to art. Rest assured, there will be plenty of opportunities to revisit and reconstruct our favorite holiday classics this December.

Seattle Public Theater is bringing a Christmas classic to the mix with a revival of their A Very Die Hard Christmas, running from December 3 — 30. Similarly, A Very Drunken Christmas Carol is coming back to the Seattle Opera after a sold-out run in the 2021 season.

Town Hall and Seattle Sacred Music and Arts presented Jovino Santos Neto Quinteto on December 3. The fusion of Traditional Brazilian Music and Jazz uses the traditional to highlight what the future could look like. The group’s style is characterized by “energetic grooves, deep harmonies, telepathic improvisation, lyrical melodies, and great ensemble playing— always inspired and informed by the colorful richness of Brazilian music” (Town Hall).

Finding contemporary relations to the past, the Burke Museum presents Body Language: Reawakening Cultural Tattooing of the Northwest. The exhibit explores the Indigenous practices around tattooing and how those traditions are being brought back, resisting generations of cultural erasure.

Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt draws inspiration from Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five to tell stories of loss and trauma. Seattle Arts and Lectures hosted another artistic and literary great with Patti Smith: In Person and Online as Smith continues with her tour for A Book of Days. This month, we’re highlighting art that reveres, revisits, and reinvents the past for a more culturally profound and compassionate world.

Lead Photo: Photo by Jonathan Knepper on Unsplash

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