OPENING RECEPTION: SUN, NOV 6, 6PM-8PM

Regeneration: After the Bolt Creek Fire presents photographs by Melinda Hurst Frye of renewal through sprouting seedlings and fungi exhaling spores into the spring air, revealing the resilience and adaptability of an understory after fire in Western Washington.

The summer of 2022 broke records in Western Washington with the most days above 90 degrees and the driest summer on record. The area often dubbed “the wet side of Washington” saw the Bolt Creek fire that burned 23 square miles in the Cascade Range. While Western Washington was blanketed in smoke and ash, we couldn’t stop looking at the strange orange sky and hearing murmurs of “the new normal.”

Using a flatbed scanner as a camera, Melinda Hurst Frye captured images illustrating the environmental changes and the potential for regeneration along the fire boundaries where the landscape is both impacted by fire and untouched just feet away. The signs of forest regeneration months later emphasize the natural world’s resilience as it is faced with a warmer and more variable climate.

Supported in part by a grant from 4Culture.