LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

[June 8th, 2005] Artbroken

"Where's the Art?," Angela Valdez's May 18 cover story investigating Richard Valencia (a.k.a. Russell Blackburn) and his shady dealings with 82-year-old Margaret Rosenborg, was important and well-researched. In the interest of accuracy and to give readers a sense of just how large Margaret's loss is, I feel compelled to provide a bit more information.

Contrary to the assertion that my gallery's sales of Ralph Rosenborg paintings "never earned more than a few thousand dollars," the 60 paintings I sold amounted to at least $150,000.

Besides the $21,000 and the 58 paintings (worth well over $200,000 now, and far more should there be a major Rosenborg retrospective), Richard Valencia also "borrowed" many irreplaceable archival materials (letters, photographs, early catalogs, etc.) with which to write his skinny "book." He refuses to acknowledge even that he has them.

Valdez writes, "Margaret says she doesn't know who to trust. Mark Woolley, without her permission, dropped off a letter at Valencia's Roseburg home demanding the paintings be returned...." Valencia lives in Redmond, not Roseburg. I happened to be in Central Oregon and received Margaret's explicit permission in a phone call to deliver the letter before actually doing so.

We thought Valencia might avail himself of "doing the right thing" before press time. Instead, he chose to ignore the requests. He can still write his own ending to this sad story.

Mark A. Woolley
Northwest 9th Avenue

sauceboxer Rebellion

My weekly lunchtime ritual is to sit down with the newest copy of Willamette Week. You can imagine my horror when I read the May 11 issue's scathing review ["Drink and Be Merry"] of Saucebox, which has been around for 10 years and received rave reviews in national publications.

Nancy Rommelmann was all over the place in her writing. Part of me was laughing at her absurdity, the other part of me was blown away at how mean-spirited her review was. My guess she was having a bad day and took it out on the restaurant.

Anytime I have been to Saucebox, we have enjoyed the music and haven't had to compete with the clanging of downtown traffic. The dim sum pupu platter for two, which she described as tasting "as though it was pulled from the freezer case," is hands-down one of the best appetizers out there. Perhaps Ms. Rommelmann's taste buds aren't fully developed to appreciate good food when she tastes it. And maybe she shouldn't write her reviews "hung over" from all of the mojitos she managed to suck down. I also find it odd that she didn't mention the baked coconut cream she had, as stated in her online journal (http://www.nancyrommelmann.typepad.com).

Saucebox's owners shouldn't get worked up, though; it's not like she's a New York Times food critic. This, too, shall pass.

Marna Gatlin
Warren