I’m stuck sick at home and can’t stop coughing long enough to fall asleep. But Bob Ross is here with me, and he says that even though viewers write in to tell him not to paint dead trees in his landscapes, he persists in painting dead trees “because they’re a part of nature.”

Speaking of dead trees, last night was the opening of a terrific show of new work by Seattle artist Dan Webb at Howard House. His wood carvings—of a face mask stretched and squished, of a candle full-bodied and burnt, of a grocery-store helium balloon—toy with the memorial aspects of sculpture, its presumed responsibility to mark and fight time. This is his Splash. (What appears to be a late-afternoon shadow falling on the object is in fact just the color of the wood.)

Webb is not only funny, he’s smart, and he’s giving a talk at the gallery tomorrow at noon. It’ll be good.