Picture Window with Two Chairs

I first met Siah Armajani in 2008 when I became director of the Walker Art Center. I was struck by the quiet, soft-spoken qualities of the humble citizen-artist, whose towering legacy had shaped my sensibilities as a young curator more than a decade earlier.

My initial encounter with Siah had been through his art. The sculpture (1985) was a landmark piece in the Hirshhorn Museum’s collection, where I was an assistant curator. I recall how the hybrid architectural structure, which fused Western and