Kirkland Arts Center's new exhibition "Weldon Butler: Visual Abstractions" spans a range of his work

Talk about inspiration: When Weldon Butler first tuned in to art as a kid in Philadelphia, the stuff he was exposed to at his local art museum included greatest hits of the 20th century. "I remember looking at the Marcel Duchamp collection, 'The Chocolate Grinder,' all of that — and the modern art, Brancusi's 'Bird in Space,' " said Butler. "It was all instrumental in helping me see what art could be like."

Now the rest of us have a chance to see where those early epiphanies led him in the exhibition "Weldon Butler: Visual Abstractions," beginning today at Kirkland Arts Center. The show, organized by independent curator Molly Norris, spans a range of Butler's work since the 1980s, including painting, assemblage, collage, prints, photographs and mixed-media sculpture.

"Weldon's abstractions are almost like a language," Norris said. "He has a real voice no matter what series he's working on ... almost like he's solving a problem all the time."

A thoughtful artist whose striking abstractions carry their meaning through references to everyday things, Butler has worked over the years as a sign painter, a silk-screen technician, an auto-body repairman, a race-car driver, a Boeing toolmaker. "I like materials because all my training for the most part was on-the-job training," Butler said in an interview this week. "I worked with all kinds of materials, stainless steel, wood, aluminum, copper plates ...

"In the '70s, material was the signature of an artist. I talked to [sculptor] Michael Heizer, and he taught me a lot about that. When he was here doing his work, we had a little discussion down at [Myrtle Edwards] park. He said you have to forge ahead, because if you don't you're moving backward. And the material becomes your signature: It is in the very thing you are doing, you don't have to worry about signing it. Just like Richard Serra, his material is all steel — that's his thing."

When Butler moved to Seattle in 1973, he first showed at Bumbershoot and the cutting-edge Capitol Hill gallery and/or. Over the years, a number of prominent local art leaders have lent Butler their support, including and/or co-founder Anne Focke and gallery owners Greg Kucera, Lisa Harris and Catherine Person.

While Butler's may not be a household name, his work can be found in many top-notch local collections, including Seattle Art Museum, Safeco Insurance, the City of Seattle, University of Washington Medical Center and Olson Sundberg Kundig Allen Architects.

But work and life for Butler have at times been hampered by his struggle with bipolar disorder: "I had to take medication. It has made me very unstable ... things swing back and forth like a pendulum. The swings now are subsided. At the bottom of the heap — that's where the art is."

Butler's early training in art began in middle school when he was invited to attend Fleischer Art Memorial in Philadelphia. His sister brought him art books, and he got to know the groundbreaking imagery of Jacob Lawrence, among others. Vocational school provided Butler hands-on skills. Later, art courses at Green River Community College pushed him to keep experimenting with new tools and imagery.

Photography and printmaking have long been facets of Butler's work. "I deal with anything I can get my hands on," he said. "It's just in me to make something out of something, to generate an image." He once shot a photograph of Andy Warhol in New York's Easter Parade that came to be well-known. Butler said that when Warhol's work later showed in Seattle, his photograph was used on the poster.

One of the sweetest twists in Butler's life was meeting and becoming friends with Jacob Lawrence, his boyhood idol. Another payoff has been the art itself. "It isn't the only thing I can do, but when you do work over a period of time, you always want to get something from it, your personal gift. And that personal gift can only come to me through abstraction."

Sheila Farr: sfarr@seattletimes.com