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Step right up, folks. The Binewskis—the family at the center of Katherine Dunn’s much-hallowed 1989 novel Geek Love—are coming to Portland, which is appropriate because this is where the whole unsettling, horrifying and beautiful thing started. Carnival Fabulon, an art exhibit inspired by the book, opens at Brassworks Gallery on Aug. 10.
To refresh: Geek Love tells the story of a family headed by patriarch Aloysius Binewski, who would regularly poison his willing wife Crystal Lil while pregnant in order to create deformed babies to keep their traveling “freak show” on the road. A few of his favorite baby formulas were cocaine, arsenic and amphetamines. That’s showbiz for ya.
It’s a literary premise—if you aren’t completely aghast—that takes you on an odyssey full of shock, old-fashioned growing pains and, yes, family values, however twisted. You won’t soon forget the megalomaniac Arturo “Arty” Aqua Boy with flippers where his limbs should be; or Oly, the albino hunched-over narrator of the story.
The book has deep connections to Portland. Dunn lived here much of her life. One day, she set out on a walk through the International Rose Test Garden in Washington Park, leaving her 8-year-old son Eli, who refused to go with her, at home. “A little miffed,” as she recalled to WW in 2014. “I sat on the brick steps there and looked out at all these hundreds of roses, each of which had been bred very differently for particular qualities….I started thinking about…nature versus nurture, and about the manipulation of genetic heritage. "
And Geek Love was born.
(Fun fact: Dunn also covered boxing as a freelance columnist for this very paper from 1984 to 1992.)
In the book, with his children cozied up around him, Aloysius would recount a walk he took in a “big rose garden with arbors and trellises and fountains. The paths were brick and wound in and out,” where he sat on a step and took in all the experimental roses. Sound familiar?
Dunn’s son, Dr. Eli Dapolonia, Ph.D., owner of Archer Apollo Neuropsychology on East Burnside Street, recalls, “My mother was a great fan of art, and starving artists most of all. When she was a struggling writer herself, waiting tables at the Stepping Stone Cafe and tending bar at the Earth Tavern, she would sometimes scrape together tip money to buy a painting from a friend who might be having a tough time making rent. The Laura Russo Gallery was down the street from her home, and she loved to wander in every time they had a new show. She may have painted with words, but the visual arts were important to her as well. "
Which brings us to the exhibit, a collection of works by more than 50 artists—many of them Portlanders, but others from the Netherlands, Spain and South Africa. The exhibit features acrylic and oil paintings along with sculptures, wire art and collage pieces. As for the artists’ inspirations, there’s no shortage of imagery bursting with tenderness and shock on every page. Painter Dave Lebow contributed a ravishing portrait of the “beautiful, slim and huge-eyed” twins Elly and Iphy against a piano, complete with their sheet music to “She Was a Salt-Hearted Barmaid.”
Nathalie Tierce chose the book’s narrator and tutu-wearing carnival barker Oly as her subject for an oil pastel painting against various collage items, saying, “Olympia’s role as a carnival barker, clad in a tutu typically reserved for delicate ballerinas, shouting through a bullhorn to attract crowds, struck me as a poignant metaphor.”
Stephanie Brockway carved the twins from discarded found objects. “The discarded forgotten items are much like people who don’t fit in,” she says. “Twisting and elevating them into art feels fitting. The book seemed odd and scared me the first time I read it. It doesn’t seem so shocking to me today. The theme of proudly being a freak has stayed with me.”
Brassworks co-owner Robin Seymour Weirich promises an “immersive” experience at the opening for the exhibit of pieces by some 65 artists. Arsenic cocktails, anyone?
SEE IT: Carnival Fabulon opens at Brassworks Gallery, 3022 NE Glisan St., 503-593-9311, brassworksgallery.com. 5 pm Saturday, Aug. 10–Sept. 7.