Seattle Art Museum's new schedule is out, and it looks quite like the old schedule. Remember how the Romans were coming? Then how the Impressionists were coming? Then the early Americans (with so much bunting!)? Now, Michelangelo is coming to Seattle Art Museum—and not just Michelangelo but also Calder and Cobain.

No new exhibitions are scheduled at the Olympic Sculpture Park, or inside its pavilion, through the end of 2010.

SAM's choices for historical shows aren't terribly exciting, but they never are (this is an exception). The Michelangelo exhibition (Oct 15, 2009-Jan 31, 2010) is a loan show of 12 of the artist's preparatory drawings, along with works by his contemporaries, borrowed from the Casa Buonarroti in Florence. It could go either way. What will be nice is seeing contemporary Seattle artist Heide Hinrichs's ephemeral anti-monuments up at roughly the same time (Nov 7, 2009-June 13, 2010) as the jealously guarded objects that Michelangelo himself wanted burned. The Calder show (Oct 15, 2009-April 11, 2010) is a straight-up survey said to include many special works rarely seen in public, but somehow that seems only mildly interesting.

At SAM, the real action almost always takes place away from the spotlight. Special exhibitions that draw crowds are just so-so, while quiet interstitial stuff is what steals your heart. I'm looking forward to a formalist take on Jacob Lawrence (Dec 1, 2009-Oct 3, 2010), a 60-image survey of Imogen Cunningham (July 11, 2009-Aug 29, 2010), a pairing of the graphic works of James Ensor and Georg Baselitz, who did not know each other (April-Oct 2010).

The hit of the Seattle Asian Art Museum will be a show of the famous ukiyo-e prints of 18th- and 19th-century Japan, including the recently acquired Hokusai Wave as well as his Red Fuji (Nov 19, 2009-Feb 10, 2010). After this year's Indian paintings show, that may be ho-hum.

Curator Michael Darling's next big contemporary undertaking is Kurt, devoted to you-know-who (May 13-Sept 12, 2010), concurrent with Andy, devoted to you-know-who. I like the contrast between these for next summer (here's at least one thing that will be in Kurt) and the hard-headed Target Practice (contrasted with the soft-headed Andrew Wyeth small survey) planned for this summer, and I'll be looking forward to seeing what the museum programs around the shows. Cobainartposium?