Current Exhibits

Based on the book of the same title by Peter Menzel and Faith D’Aluisio, this exhibit explores food traditions around the world through photographs of ten families at home, at the market, and surrounded by a week’s worth of groceries. Additional content examines a myriad of food issues in the 21st century, from sustainable farming to cultural survival.

Augmenting Hungry Planet is a related display, Salish Bounty: Traditional Native American Foods of Puget Sound, developed by guest curators Warren King George, Muckleshoot/Upper Skagit Indian Tribe, Historian/Traditionalist and Elizabeth M. Swanaset, Nooksack/Cowichan/Laq'a:mel Tribes, Cultural/Traditional Foods Specialist in partnership with the Burke Museum. Salish Bounty connects archaeological and historical research about 5000 years of tribal diets in the Puget Sound area to current efforts to revitalize Native food traditions.

Hungry Planet is toured by the Bell Museum of Natural History, University of Minnesota.

fashion STATEMENT: Native Artists Against Pebble Mine is a traveling exhibit of wearable art that highlights a rural Alaskan community's opposition to foreign mining investors attempting to build North America's largest open pit mine at the headwaters of their fragile salmon spawning grounds. Native Alaskan fisherwoman and artist Anna Hoover curated the exhibit as her Master's Degree project for the University of Washington. Presentation of the exhibit is funded by the Bill Holm Center. A set of the t-shirts has been acquired for the Burke's Ethnology Collection.
 

Please note: The Burke Room is a multi-purpose room and not always open for public viewing. Visitors are encouraged to call in advance to check the room schedule: 206-616-3962.

In fall 2009, the Burke Museum began a collaboration with the Hokkaido Ainu Association to foster cultural exchange between the Ainu people of northern Japan and tribes in western Washington. Among the joint endeavors was development of this display of contemporary Ainu materials acquired by the Burke through this project, including a beautiful new elm bark robe. 

Ongoing

With more than 100 species of plant life from both sides of the Cascades, the garden features plants important to Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest.

Ongoing

Over 500 million years of geological history! Lethal lava, grinding glaciers, and rampaging reptiles—marvel at the natural forces that shaped Washington's landscape, and at the amazing animals that once lived here...

Ongoing

Over 17 different cultures represented. Immerse yourself in the lives of native peoples from around the Pacific; learn about their arts, ceremonies and personal stories.