Arts Spaces & Companies

Animal Fire and String & Shadow Go Out to Play

At summer’s height, when many theaters are dark, two South Sound companies go out to play in picnic-perfect parks. Both Animal Fire Theatre and String & Shadow Puppet Theater stage major shows when the days are long and the skies most likely blue. Animal Fire is producing the seldom-staged and seriously silly Love’s Labour’s Lost, opening July 3, and String & Shadow. is producing a return of 2025’s Night at the Grand Opera. These outdoor productions will be performed in Olympia’s Decatur Woods Park and Wonderwood Park.

Slow Work by Susan Christian and Steve Belz at Childhood’s End

Slow Work is an excellent art exhibition featuring paintings on wooden lathe with a sea full of blue by Susan Christian and bonfire fired pottery by Steve Belz at Childhood’s End Gallery in Olympia — thought provoking, deceptively simple and beautiful art. This is a must-see exhibition through July 26.

Authors Among the Highlights of Washington Center Season

The Washington Center for the Performing Arts’ 2026-27 season, announced Tuesday, June 17, features the center’s traditional mix of Broadway shows, comedy, music, dance and family — plus two leading lights of literature.
“We’re very excited to have Amy Tan and Tim Egan coming in this season.” said Jill Barnes, the center’s executive director. Also among the season’s big names are satirical singing sensation Randy Rainbow (Oct. 15), comedy icon Tig Notaro (Nov. 13) and gospel giants The Blind Boys of Alabama (April 1).

Shoestring Circus: Joy, Magic, Whimsy and Heart

Shoestring Circus performs “Dreamland” in Olympia from June 19 to 28. Only in its fourth year, Shoestring Circus was founded in Bellingham by four veteran circus performers: Osterloh, Matthew “Poki” McCorkle, Justin Therrien and Nicole Laumb. “We try to have a different show each year, so it feels to people who come every year that they’re coming into a whole new world,” Osterloh said. Only 15 performers were chosen from the 320 audition videos the circus received last fall.

Puget Sound Book Artists’ 15th Annual Membership Exhibition

The Puget Sound Book Artists are highlighting artists who have transformed the bare bones of books into fractals, dioramas, sculptures, and stunning blossoms of origami. The exhibition is running through June 30 at University of Puget Sound, appropriately in the Collins Memorial Library; surrounded by thousands of bog-standard books, the books being exhibited are wild and frequently abstract. One uniting factor among the works is the theme of “15,” which is interpreted in various ways.

Olympia Peace Choir Enters a New Era Under Matthew Melendez — AND — ‘I Was a Stranger’

Matthew Melendez has been named the incoming Artistic Director of Olympia’s Peace Choir, assuming the role in September when the new season begins. He follows Kerri Lynn Nichols, who founded the choir in 2010 and has shepherded it for 16 years into a distinctive South Sound community chorus. Earlier this spring, Melendez stepped into his audition for the role of the Peace Choir’s new artistic director with a mix of excitement and nerves, despite his decades of experience as a conductor, educator, and nonprofit arts leader. AND ‘I Was a Stranger’ at FUMCO June 7.

Abe Singer’s Grass Lake Park sculptures

Sculptor Abe Singer turned an old water tank as large as a boxcar into a series of sculptures for Olympia’s Grass Lake Park. The water tank was on the park property before the recent park renovation. It was to be removed as part of the renovation, but instead of sending the tank to a scrapyard, the city thought it would be cool if someone could repurpose it for art. The city said they would deliver the tank to the selected artist if the destination was within 60 miles of the park. Singer lives on a farm in rural Montesano, so when he was selected for this project, the city delivered the tank to his shop on the farm property where it now keeps company with his turkeys. He utilized pieces of the massive tank to create the two mushroom entryway sculptures as well as the bird blind sculpture on the bridge.

Pipeline at Lakewood Playhouse

Pipeline — now playing through May 10 at Lakewood Playhouse — revolves around Omari, a high school student played by Isaiah Myers, who himself is a junior in high school. Omari shoved a teacher, which is his third offense, and is now in a situation where he can either run away or face the potential consequence of jail time. As a young actor playing his own age, wrestling with the fury and shame of his circumstances, Myers is a magnetic presence onstage. He’s able to play a character who is smarter than he’s willing to let on, but too stubborn to back down from an impossible position.

Love/Sick at OFT — Nine Quirky Vignettes

“In the play, Love/Sick by John Cariani, now playing at Olympia Little Theater, you’ll meet a bunch of what I call desperate optimists — people who believe in love but are terrified that it won’t last,” Cariani said in a 2013 interview with The Public Theatre of Lewiston, Maine, then producing the show. Love/Sick is a series of nine vignettes about love and relationships, adds fantastical details to relatable situations, said Kathryn Dorgan, who’s directing the OLT production which opened on April 24.

Peek Into Artists’ Process on Studio Tour

“The point of the studio tour is to allow people to go behind the scenes and see how the work is made.” said Susan Aurand, acting president of the South Sound Studio Tour’s board of directors. Many artists are sharing their studio space with colleagues for the tour, happening the last weekend of May in Olympia, Lacey and Tumwater, so there’ll be about 80 artists involved, showing their work and offering insights into their methods.

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