NW GALLERIES
"Mail: Magic + Mud".
A show by J. Claire Dean documenting the places, people and spaces of the West African country of Mali.
1928 NW Lovejoy St., 227-6667. Event closes Nov. 2. Map
Michael Knutson.
There’s a paradox in the paintings that make up Michael Knutson’s
Enfolding Fields: Their psychedelic, Op-influenced patterns are the type we normally associate with graphic works with flat surfaces, but Knutson renders them in gloppy impasto. It’s an intriguing conceit that works in bright-eyed, Venn diagramlike compositions such as
Double Wobble Coil II but comes across as hackneyed in less chromatically and compositionally engaging works such as
Tripolar Coils III.
420 NW 9th Ave., 234-2634. Closes Oct. 4. Free. Map
Glasswork from April Surgent. Engravings from Czech engraver Jiri Harcuba.
300 NW 13th Ave., 227-0222., 227-0222. Map
It’s a comfy domestic scene—easy chair and ottoman, pillow, a lamp to read by—except all of these objects are covered with spiky barbed wire. It’s a beautiful shadow box filled with pastel-colored glass—except the glass is in the shape of hand grenades. Italian artist Silvia Levenson’s work delights in juxtapositions of the comfortable and the sinister. Her show,
it’s not living alone..., brilliantly shows the ways in which a repressive childhood leads to an adulthood brimming with inner demons and addictions.
300 NW 13th Ave., 227-0222., 227-0222. Closes Dec. 6. Map
Juri Morioka.
To try to describe the experience of this Japanese artist’s semi-abstract tableaux is to lose oneself in long, smooth Technicolor muscles, striated with dots of color and round flecks signifying flowers, with squares of gold leaf here and there like little cubes of bullion—or bouillon. Morioka may profess Buddha and placid Fujiama, but hers is the haiku of her adopted home, New York City; her style is built upon Manhattan’s grid: the Zen of construction and crosswalks and angry honking horns.
What’s Mine Is Yours, Underground City, and
I Can Almost Fly, which evoke the expansive spirit of her Butters show two years ago, have given way to the claustrophobic
Voices from the Sky and
We Have Plenty of Food for Everyone. Tiny quaint vignettes of geraniums in window-sill planters have surrendered to encroaching circles and mounds. Nature recedes; the city metastasizes.
520 NW Davis St., 2nd floor., 248-9378. Closes Nov. 2. Map
With their 12 layers of sanded gesso, Curtaz’s drawings are obsessive meditations on everyday objects reimagined as semi-abstract compositions. Wear your sunglasses: The show is blindingly, bracingly white.
134 NW 8th Ave., 287-3886. Map
Group Show.
Glass art and paintings by the owners of Portland's new Eyeful Gallery—Flynn Helper, Jeff Ballard, Josh Sands and Joe Tsoulfas. Gallery currently open for First Thursday and by appointment, as well as "randomly throughout the week."
625 NW Everett St., No. 104., 243-1222. Closes Jan. 1, 2009. Map
Drawings, paintings and screenprints from Austin-based painter Michael Sieben and Los Angeles-based artists Mel Kadel and Travis Millard. Their work has been featured in numerous magazines and publications including
Arkitip,
Color,
Thrasher and
Juxtapoz.
23 NW 5th Ave., 548-4835. Map
In the wake of Yugoslavia's bloody civil war, a subversive zine and comic culture took root and thrived underground, breeding some of the region's most adventurous artists. Featuring Igor Hofbauer, Dunja Jankovic, Aleksandar Opacic, and Radovan Popovic.
20 NW 5th Ave. #101., 241-0227. Map
New paintings from Gregory Grenon.
805 NW 21st Ave., 226-2754. Map
Recent paintings from Jackie K. Johnson.
805 NW 21st Ave., 226-2754. Map
The Ceramics of Gertrud and Otto Natzler.
Gertrud and Otto Natzler crafted ceramics together out of their Los Angeles-based studio for over 40 years. The Natzlers arrived in the U.S. in 1938 after fleeing Austria during World War II and created over 25,000 pieces of ceramic art during their tenure. Select pieces of the Natzler collection will be on display.
724 NW Davis St., 223-2654. Closes Jan. 25, 2009. Map
Artists painstakingly rework nondescript manufactured items into incredible brand new objects, like "Cat Chow's
Bonded, a dress made from one continuous zipper."
724 NW Davis St., 223-2654. Closes Jan. 4, 2009. Map
Simulated chairs, appliances, teapots, and teacups, meticulously constructed from recycled, pre-printed tins.
724 NW Davis St., 223-2654. Closes Oct. 28. Map
Hilary Pfeifer.
Hilary Pfeifer’s show,
Natural Selection could be subtitled “Botany Gone Wacky.” Her Fraggle Rock-like fake plants, fashioned from wood and clay, are displayed with scientific rigor in an atrium. This show would be insufferable if the little plantie-wanties weren’t so darned cute.
310 NW Broadway., 227-4333. Closes Nov. 1. Free. Map
"Museum-quality reproductions" of art by Charlotte Salomon, killed in Auschwitz in 1943.
310 NW Davis St., 226-3600. Map
"Oregon Nisei Baseball: The Early Years".
"A nostalgic exhibit about Japanese American baseball in Oregon."
121 NW 2nd Ave.,., 224-1458. Event closes Jan. 11 2009. Map
Selected paintings and drawings from Lucinda Parker's past 20 years. "The exhibit also unveils her large-scale commission for a new Gerding Edlen Development project in Bellevue, WA."
1241 NW Johnson Street., Map
One of the Northwest’s most inventive visual thinkers, painter Brenden Clenaghen, is known for his elegant sprays of semi-abstract imagery. His new work promises a step back from his signature texturality. Without that texture, will his compositions still delight the eye? Check out the show to find out.
929 NW Flanders St., 228-6665. Closes Nov. 1. Map
New paintings from Laurie Reid.
929 NW Flanders St., 228-6665. Closes Nov. 1. Map
Michael Scoggins.
As Election Day draws near, Michael Scoggins’
So American It Hurts feels perfectly timed. His oversized sheets of ruled notebook paper are scrawled with schoolkid-style handwriting that comments on adult sociopolitical issues. One piece shows nuclear missiles raining down on the White House, while another,
Bad Words, depicts stick figures spewing racial epithets. Sly and satirical, the show packs considerable punch.
916 NW Hoyt St., 227-5060. Closes Nov. 1. Map
Conceptual sound installation from Beaverton sound artist Dan Senn. Twelve rejection letters—ordinary sheets of paper—individually suspended from conductive piezo-electric wires act as functional speaker diaphragms, each projecting the recorded sound of the letter being read by an unknown robot voice. Each paper speaker has an audible range of just two to four feet. "The idea is to draw patrons to the installation by its sculptural elements, and then into the installation itself as the machine voices sound the letters." Sounds good.
108 NW 9th Ave., Suite 300., 823-5111. Closes Oct. 31. Map
Paintings by Santiago Uceda, graphic designer and illustrator for Oregon State University.
1720 NW Lovejoy St., #109., Map
Conceptual photomontage by Horace Long.
226 NW 12th Ave., 224-4909. Map
Pen-and-ink perspective drawings by James Pettinari, University of Oregon professor emeritus of architecture.
70 NW Couch St., 541-346-3134. Map
Repurposing near-valueless dollar store merchandise into meaningful design and art.
70 NW Couch St., 541-346-3134. Map
Buffet and silent auction, featuring regional artists Ellen Dittebrandt, Judith Cunningham, Lillian Pitt, Rick Bartow, Will Richards, Roger Long, Mimi Matsuda, Thomas Rude, Scott C. Johnson, Adam Bacher, Jane Pagliarulo, Jean Covault and more.
224 NW 13th Ave., 224-8499. $50. Map
SW GALLERIES
Robert Motherwell and Helen Frankenthaler.
It’s hard not to read this Robert Motherwell-meets-Helen Frankenthaler exhibition as a gender-studies primer. Motherwell’s lithographs are etudes on the terse masculine gesture, while Frankenthaler creates liquidic atmospheres such as Contentment Island, which soothe and ooze and envelop. Both are exemplars nonpareil of Abstract Expressionism and are brilliantly counterposed in this first-rate show.
817 SW 2nd Ave., 224-8182. Closes Oct. 31. Map
Featuring oils, watercolors, soft pastels, and acrylics from Portland's Paint-Out Group.
1126 SW Park Ave., Map
The story of two local tiny printing companies—Loaded Hips Press and Red Bat Press—told in a collection of small woodblock, lino-cut, and letterpress prints from the company founders Shannon Buck and Carye Bye.
917 SW Oak St., No. 218., 827-0249. Map
"Beyond Green: Toward a Sustainable Art".
"Exhibition includes existing works, commissions, and previously presented work that has been 'recycled,' spotlighting ways in which artists are building paths to new forms of practice."
0615 SW Palatine Road., 768-7000. Event closes Dec. 7. Map
by Julian Chadwick.
1825 SW Broadway., Map
New paintings by David Stein. Imaginative scenes, rendered in incredible texture and detail, feel like a children's story remembered twenty years later.
817 SW 2nd Ave., 224-5475. Map
Miles Cleveland Goodwin, David Stein.
These desolate gray sea- and skull-scapes have a
Seventh Seal grimness to them. Goodwin is a talented artist, but this body of work is so similar to his last outing with Woolley, it appears not to have evolved. In the downstairs exhibition space, David Stein presents surreal landscapes peopled by hydra-headed creatures in a bubblegum palette. This is an exceedingly well-paired show: Goodwin’s and Stein’s alternate universes are equally creepy—the former’s chilling, the latter’s childlike.
817 SW 2nd Ave., 224-5475. Map
Paintings, drawings, clay, and more from Multnomah Arts Center Youth Arts Classes.
7688 SW Capitol Highway., 823-2787. Map
Michael Curry.
Puppetry: An Out of Body Experience, features Oregon native Curry's puppetry works from
The Lion King and Cirque du Soleil.
1200 SW Park Ave., Closes Oct. 19. Map
APEX : Marc Dombrosky.
Hand-sewn paper art, located in PAM's Wintercross Foundation Gallery, 4th Floor, Center for Northwest Art.
1219 SW Park Ave., 226-0973. Closes Oct. 26. Map
Department of Prints and Drawings.
30th anniversary celebration.
1219 SW Park Ave., 226-0973. Closes Oct. 5. Map
Wild Beauty: Photographs of the Columbia River Gorge, 1867-1957.
More than 250 images of Oregon and Washington's iconic Columbia River Gorge, orgazined by Portland's own Terry Toedtemeier.
1219 SW Park Ave., 226-0973. Closes Jan. 11, 2009. Map
Jonathan Lasker.
New large-scale paintings by New York artist Jonathan Lasker.
1219 SW Park Ave., 226-0973. Map
Paintings from Becca Bernstein, Elise Mravunac—whose work is showing in the Smithsonian and Kennedy Center—and Gwenn Seemel. Seemel is attempting to paint every face in the world. Bernstein and Mravunac are fantastically talented, too.
1825 SW Broadway., 725-3000. Map
Show and sale featuring the fine crafts and art of over 90 women artists. Catered by Devil's Food Catering.
4033 SW Canyon Road., $20. Map
NORTH PDX GALLERIES
Malleus Rock Art Lab.
Art Nouveau meets ’60s psychedelia meets 2008 graphic novel, the prints of Italian collective Malleus Rock Art Lab make their first-ever appearance in a U.S. show at Disjecta for this limited engagement. Malleus makes posters for rock stars like Beck, the Chemical Brothers and Iggy Pop, but its prints have serious high-art chops. Show hours: Wednesday-Thursday Oct. 1-2 by appointment only. Open to the public 6 pm-midnight Friday-Sunday Oct. 3-5.
8371 N Interstate Ave., 286-9449. Limited run. Show closes Oct. 5. Map
TBA On Sight.
“The New Absurdists” is the theme for this year’s visual arts offerings at the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art’s Time-Based Art festival. Curator Kristan Kennedy says she has chosen “artwork whose meaning has been intentionally obscured,” hoping to spur the viewer to deeper, more active thought. Artists showing throughout TBA include video-meisters
Ryan Trecartin and
Lizzie Fitch,
Jacob Hartman with his detritus-filled Medusa’s head sculpture,
Corey Lunn—who’ll contribute a suite of foam carvings and an animated short film—and
Justin Gorman, who will mount a series of temporary billboards around town as an ongoing commentary on local architecture. The international consortium of troublemakers, artists and activists dubbed
The Yes Men is represented with a major exhibition of props, posters and videos from their sociopolitical pranks (marketing the SurvivaBall, Halliburton’s answer to global warming; proposing a new WTO initiative for slavery in Africa), as well as teasing a few new tricks they’ve got up their sleeves. The majority of TBA’s visual arts shows take place at the Works at Leftbank. The Yes Men exhibit takes place at the Feldman Gallery, Pacific Northwest College of Art, 1241 NW Johnson St., 226-4391 (show closes Oct. 26). For information on site-specific TBA projects, including Justin Gorman’s billboards, visit pica.org/tba.
240 N Broadway., Most shows close Oct. 4. Free. Map
Bruce Conkle.
As Portland’s preeminent “eco-artist” (whatever that means), Bruce Conkle is perennially fascinated by the environment in general and global warming in particular, and his current show at Rocksbox,
Friendlier Fire, updates these pet themes with deep foreboding. Past shows have been fashioned from aluminum foil and stuffed animals; this one is mostly comprises scrawly, amateur-chic drawings, Styrofoam coffee cups and black-lit incense burners. It’s all part of the artist’s populist strategy to make fine art more accessible to the archetypal “common man.” As Conkle told me on opening night, “When people say, ‘My 5-year-old could’ve made that,’ I take it as a compliment.” The show’s most imaginative departure,
TGI Doomsday, portrays the White House fireplace as it might appear after environmental Armageddon: lit by a sorry propane canister, the flame’s lonely shadow flickering over an overhead-projected drawing.
6540 N Interstate Ave., 971-506-8938. Closes Oct. 26. Map
NE GALLERIES
Broadsides from master letterpress printer Sandy Tilcock.
623 NE 23rd Ave., 927-4409. Map
Masks and hats "in a variety of media including reclaimed fibers, woven natural materials, ceramic, paper and encaustic." Juried by Alyce Cornyn-Selby, curator of "America's only Hat Museum."
4136 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 971-255-9599. Map
Brian Kappel builds robots. Well, to be more specific, the Portlander crafts very cool laser-cut wooden robots that fall somewhere between art and the kind of toy big boys and girls covet (full disclosure: There's a flame-and-skull-themed Kappel-bot sitting on my home library shelf right now). But when he's not making custom robots or selling his creations at Black Wagon and other local shops, he's also creating funny, vibrant movie-monster posters and unexpectedly evil creatures like zombie rabbits. Fittingly enough, his October show at Extracto is called
False Advertising & Movies That Never Existed. 2921 NE Killingsworth St., 281-1764. Closes Oct. 31. Map
"Beyond Green: Toward a Sustainable Art".
"Exhibition includes existing works, commissions, and previously presented work that has been 'recycled,' spotlighting ways in which artists are building paths to new forms of practice."
0615 SW Palatine Road., 768-7000. Event closes Dec. 7. Map
SE GALLERIES
Installation by Jim Neidhardt and Kerry Davis.
8235 SE 13th Ave., Suite 5., 432-3513. Map
Masks and hats "in a variety of media including reclaimed fibers, woven natural materials, ceramic, paper and encaustic." Juried by Alyce Cornyn-Selby, curator of "America's only Hat Museum."
4136 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 971-255-9599. Map
Devon Oder.
L.A.-based photographer Devon Oder processes Polaroid film within an inch of its chemical breaking point, getting crackly surfaces, dazzling colors, and abstract topographies that suggest the drying and puckering of paint and linseed oil. Certain images would have benefited from higher contrast, but the show as a whole reads like a visual meditation on the paradoxes of motion and decay.
1430 SE 3rd Ave., 236-1430. Closes Nov. 1. Map
Grand opening for a new gallery claiming to "bring an irreverent and satirical edge to the Portland art scene." Like this town needs more sarcasm? Paintings from Gris Grimly, Ragnar, Mary Miller, Allison McClay, Anthony Conrad, Jonathan Stanish and Edith Casterline.
936 SE 34th Ave., 971-285-9300. Map
John Brodie is a fine painter well-versed in painterly abstraction in the vein of abstract expressionism. In the cheekily titled
My Carbon Footprint Weighs a Ton, however, he essays collage with largely successful results. With billboards, 1950s romance novels, and jewelry catalogs as jumping-off points, he excels particularly when he draws from his gift for abstraction, as in the to-die-for
Flag with Landscape.
2045 SE Belmont St., 239-1887. Map
"MASKS".
A show of masks from artists such as Mary Dixon, Susan Gallacher-Turner, Brita Gould, Bonnie Meltzer and Diane Trapp.
3601 SE Division St., 230-0588. Event closes Oct. 31. Map
Ethan Jackson.
The camera obscura is a strange device that has existed for centuries, but contemporary artists like Ethan Jackson are using it in new ways. Jackson turns the entire exhibition space at NAAU into one giant functioning camera obscura, following up on similar installations he’s done in New York City and Milwaukee.
922 SE Ankeny St., Closes Oct. 5. Map
Better to explain it with a quote from the organizers: "Features artworks from 25 local artists, interpreting technological and social progression and regression, revolution and devolution."
107 SE Washington St., Closes Nov. 4. Map
Building Block
BULLSEYE GALLERY
