The postmodern facade by Robert Venturi is clumsy and dated, but the once-cramped gallery spaces have been redesigned, expanded, and reconfigured, making a visit to the Seattle Art Museum a real pleasure. Outside, Jonathan Borofsky’s giant kinetic sculpture Hammering Man pays homage to Seattle’s manual-labor workforce. The entrance lobby showcases a big, eye-catching, but rather intellectually shallow installation called Inopportune: Stage One by Chinese artist Cai Quo-Qiang with several full-size cars suspended in a topsy-turvy sequence across the ceiling with colored lights shooting out of their sides. There is usually a first-rate exhibition or traveling show to be seen here, but the permanent collections are definitely worth your time. One is devoted to painting, furniture, sculpture, and decorative arts from the Pacific Northwest, with historic gems like the mid–19th-century painting Astoria Harbor, its ships bathed in golden light, by Cleveland Rockwell. Even more impressive is the sizeable collection of Northwest Coast Native American art, which includes totem poles, masks, wood carvings, and many other treasures. Also worthwhile is the African Art collection and the Northwest Contemporary Art Collection, the latter featuring works by the so-called Big Four (or "mystic") artists (Guy Anderson, Kenneth Callahan, Morris Graves, Mark Tobey) active in and around Seattle and La Conner, Washington (where there's also a museum dedicated to their work in the 1930s and 1940s).