OBAMA Celebrates Bad Art
Upstairs at Café Racer, feast your eyes on the Official Bad Art Museum of Art
By Sam Steele May 3, 2020
This article originally appeared in the May 2020 issue of Seattle magazine.
When Marlow Harris and her husband, Jo David, were given free rein over 10 square feet of a friend’s café back in 2008, they decided to honor two of their favorite things: then presidential candidate Barack Obama and bad art. Today, most of the pieces in the Official Bad Art Museum of Art at Café Racer still come from Harris’ personal collection, although the Jesus made of marshmallow Peeps is by local artist Janet Galore. Now constituting the café’s entire second floor, the OBAMA Room not only serves as a cozy refuge for Racer regulars, but provides what owner Jeff Ramsey describes as “an alternative to exposed wood, wrought iron and fake ferns,” giving young techie transplants a space to recharge away from Amazonia, and older Seattleites a little bit of grunge nostalgia.
Follow Us
Nord-West Connection
Food for thought.
There has always been a strong connection between Seattle and the Nordic countries, and the National Nordic Museum’s current exhibition, New Nordic: Cuisine, Aesthetics and Place, is a visual reinforcement straight from Norway. A cross-disciplinary show exploring how New Nordic Cuisine—a culinary movement that developed in Scandinavia in the early 2000s that focuses on using…
Black History Month in Seattle
Events, landmarks, and businesses to support year-round.
Black pioneers first arrived in Seattle in the mid-19th century. The city’s earliest known African American resident was Manuel Lopes, who arrived in 1852 from Cabo Verde. A couple of decades later, African Americans began migrating to the Pacific Northwest from Southern states to work in coal mines. During this period, two Black enclaves began…
A New Year of Influence
Seattle magazine’s Most Influential list kicks off 2026 with leaders across the city.
New year, new issue! As we kick off 2026, Seattle magazine is proud to present this year’s cohort of the Most Influential list, which showcases local leaders in politics, philanthropy, arts, hospitality, and business. Determined, creative, empathetic, humble, and bold are just a few of the words you’ll see describing them—each one has achieved great…
The Queen of the Seattle World’s Fair
With a fur coat and gold Cadillac, Gracie Hansen struck a figure. Her business savvy and whip-smart humor made her a star.
In 1960, a group of well-attired men from the Seattle World’s Fair planning committee gathered in a downtown office. With the fair only two years away, people were starting to pitch their business ideas and on this day, some lady wanted to meet with them to do the same. At the scheduled time, the door…