July 31 Research Club Brunch

The Research Club brunch continues today at noon. It's a potluck with speakers and a chance to talk to other artists. In a focus on reducing waste, please bring a cup, plate and utensils! At Gallery Homeland www.galleryhomeland.org 2505 SE 11th x Division Noon-3ish Free

July 30 Vanessa Renwick & Montana Merida Art and Boat Shows

Vanessa Renwick & Montana Merida show videos and photos tonight. Accompanied by Lori Goldston and Marisa Anderson on guitar and cello. At Cherry Sprout Produce 722 N. Sumner. Evening Free



Carlos Gonzalez performs Sea Dogs. Gonzales trained as a painter graduating in 2010 from PNCA. He performs at 9 sharp on a 65 foot boat docked at a marina on the river. At 12128 Labrador Project www.labradorproject.com It's moored at Fred's Marina 12900 NW Marina Way, Portland. Easily the largest boat at the moorage, you cannot miss it. More detailed directions, don't get lost, on the website. 7PM-10 Free

July 29 Outdoor Dance Performance

Butoh was inspired by the wild landscapes of Northern Japan. Nature continues to be an inspiration in creating its improvisational movement. Haruko Nishimura, performer and art director of Seattle's Degenerate Art Ensemble journeys to Portland to collaborate with Mizu Desierto, Tracy Broyles and Kestrel Gates in an outdoor work inspired by permaculture. All four performers are quite noted for their creativity, individualistic movement styles, and shear physical chops. The performance takes place in a large yard in St Johns. Presented by Water in the Desert witdpresents.com/?page_id=18 9233 N. Bristol Avenue 7PM $10-15

July 28 Last Thursday

With warmth comes Alberta tribal fire fever. There are a few galleries there and even some art. But it is primarily people art. OK



Artist designer Stephanie Simek performs Sensitive Insides, at sunset, at experimental gallery False Front. Simek has performed compelling work previously at the gallery. Sensitive Insides is a duo of works made of deconstructed portable "Walkman" magnetic cassette players. In each piece, a half dozen to dozen players, with their circuit guts exposed, play ambient style loops. The sound machines are choreographed by photo sensitive devices. In one work, vintage videos of synchronized swimmers from the 1950's excite the sensors hidden behind a translucent projection surface. The movement of light and dark values defining the swimmers' figures in the frame makes a sound composition. In the second, Simek activates the tape sounds by playing a touchboard of sensors, illuminated by a saturated prismatic rainbow, produced by an old overhead projector and diffraction optics. Monoprints inspired by the vintage synchronized swimming videos complete the show. Because of the ephemeral nature of the vintage electronics, the one time performance will primarily be available as a video on the False Front website. Recommended. At False Front Studio www.falsefrontstudio.com 4518 NE 32nd Map 6-10 Free



At Appendix Project Space Nik Pence has made objects. Meanwhile PNCA grad Cathy Cleaver creates a performance in the hay antespace around churning butter from cows beginning at 7. Appendix Project Space. On the alley between 26th and 27th, South of Alberta. www.appendixspace.com Map 6-10ish Free



Together hosts Paper by Greg Gossel, I Will Meet You There by Sohaila Saadati and Mouth Breathers by Adam Baumker. All at Together Gallery www.togethergallery.com 2916 NE Alberta, Ste A Map 6PM-11, music 9:30 Free



Grand Detour curator of experimental moving images hosts New Hampshire animator Jodie Mack. Mack is an animator. The program spans six years of animation shorts. Presented by Grand Detour grand-detour.org at RECESS Gallery 1127 SE 10th 8PM



Goodfoot opens Jesse Reno, Kyle Gossman & Patrick Haemmerlein. Ryan Organ, Carrier & Sunday Grip DJ. At the Goodfoot www.thegoodfoot.com/gallery 2845 SE Stark Map 5-midnight Free

July 27 Antique Art Being and Time

Philosophy talk, Praxis, is back. Jason King and Tori Abernathy discuss Seeming & Seamlessness: Martin Heidegger and the Machine, in the context of art. Heidegger had a large impact on the big thinkers in ubiquitous computing, cultural anthropology applied to computer and office work, and artificial intelligence, technology we have now. Heidegger also influenced later philosophers, including the 20th century French, who, in turn have also had a large impact on art theory. So this should be a cool talk. At Place, a gallery on the 3rd floor of the Pioneer Place Mall. 700 SW Fifth. Doors 6:30PM, talk 7-9. Free



Notwithstanding the scandalous state of arts rights and value in the contemporary world, most art in museums is stolen. It's improved under UN agreements that limit exports of antiquities and stealing them in wartime. But the chain of custody and the integrity of each link is vaporous for art or antiquity older than about 100 years, even less for tribal objects. A very few objects have a solid legitimate history, those held continuously in a religious institution or by some dynastic governments.

The Getty fortune obtained from extracting ancient oil from the ground. The great Getty museum also extracted antiquities from the world. They were caught, triggering a cascade of other museums to return artifacts to their cultural countries of origin. That is the story told in the new book, Chasing Aphrodite. The museum purchased the namesake statue illegally in 1988 for $18 million, but were forced to agree to symbolically relinquish it, ultimately establishing the Getty Sicily to which the statue returned about two months ago. Authors Jason Felch and Ralph Frammolino present their book at a reading tonight. At Powell's Books www.powells.com 1005 W Burnside 7:30PM Free

July 26 Wasteland Utopia: Deep Canyon Cinema

David Sherman is a force in the Cali experimental film community. He ran Canyon Cinema, distributor of rare films, has been in the Whitney, taught at Cal Arts and created a low to the ground Total Mobile Home microCINEMA, similar to one Portland had in a basement on SE Clinton which became Four Wall Cinema at Oak Street. Born in Tucson, Sherman now lives in sunny mining town Bisbee. Part of the Craig Baldwin school of samplers, Sherman has made a film Wasteland Utopia from old open source footage. The film is in surrealist style, relating the visions of the real estate developer who invented retirement utopias with endless golf blooming from desert; and an influential intellectual psychoanalyst who became obsessed later in his career with cosmic Orgone Energy. The resulting film is a mashup of historic footage. Presented by Grand Detour grand-detour.org at RECESS Gallery 1127 SE 10th 8PM

July 22-24 Skating Pre-Post-Feminism Artists

Early skateboards had steel wheels, wheels of steel, with the axle rigidly fixed to cheap-assed decks. The invention of the pivoting truck and cushier, grippier tires and more dynamic decks made what we know as skating. The excellently edited documentary, Dogtown and the Z-Boys, shows the crossover in style between surfing and skating, in the 1970's, coming from Santa Monica and Venice, on the new trucks and boards.

That then leads directly to now.

Skating's a skill mastered by outsider kids, with a ton of free time, and no bodily fear. They are physical artists. They infected a couple of generations of skate culture and innovation. And now skating is a legit sport. One so infected was artist Chris Johanson. Johanson is an artist literally lifted off his board into the art world of New York's Whitney Biennial. His loose psychological urban folk art may be a result of a shy skater's observational modus.

Johanson has not forgotten his roots and has organized a skate film festival with art/skate photographer bud Pat O'Dell, Super Skate Summer 2011. It's got films, talks and bands. It's got bands scoring films. It should be fun. Super Skate Summer 2011 is at Hollywood Theater 7:30PM each night, $7 a night



Feminism. Somehow we got entranced by the French philosophers and their post-Modernism, and ever since, everything is post-, post-post-, or post-post-post-. So I have no idea what post- of feminism any reader is on. But there is a pretty good argument that contemporary art as we know it would not be what it is without the feminist artists of the 1960's.

Filmmaker-artist Lynn Hershman-Leeson was part of that era and filmed artists of the time in her apartment and at work. She has edited it all into a sprawling documentary !Women, Art, Revolution, !W.A.R. The film features Yvonne Rainer, Judy Chicago, Marina Abramovic, Yoko Ono, Cindy Sherman, Barbara Kruger, Nancy Spero, Carolee Schneemann, Miriam Schapiro, Martha Rosler, Eleanor Antin, Janine Antoni, Miranda July, The Guerilla Girls, and more. The score is by Carrie Brownstein. Wow.

The film premiered at Sundance. It just entered theatrical release June 1, showing in NY. But in an insane piece of fortune, it shows at PSU's Fifth Avenue Cinema at a bargain price. Film at the PSU Fifth Avenue Cinema. www.5thavenuecinema.org 510 SW Hall Friday and Saturday 7PM, 9:30; Sunday 3PM. Free for PSU students & faculty w/ID. $2 for all other students & seniors. $3 General Admission. Free popcorn for all!

July 22 Return (of the Son) of Khan

In Indian music of the subcontinent, one of the most noted musicians of our time was the late Ustad Ali Akbar Kahn from Bangladesh. His instrument was the sarod, a fretless stringed instrument, allowing each note to assume an infinite pitch range. He brought Indian music to the West in 1955, at age 33. Establishing a school here, he played and taught almost until his passing at age 88. You can get an idea from this 1981 performance with Ustad Swapan Chaudhuri.

Alam Khan, son and student of the Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, performs tonight on the sarod in Portland, accompanied by Javad Butah on tabla and Josh Feinberg on tamboura. Presented by Timings at The Movement Center Yoga & Meditation, 1021 NE 33rd Avenue. Doors 7PM, Performance 7:30. $20

July 21 Art Spark and Pop

The periodic artist, arts administrator happy hour meet up is tonight. PDX Pop Now gives a short presentation at 6. The PDX Pop Now weeken also begins tonight. One of the City's most powerful arts administrator came from PDX Pop Now and music is one of Portland's most successful art exports today. Art Spark www.portlandartspark.com. At Backspace 115 NW 5th. All ages. 5PM-7 Free

July 18,20,22,23,24,25,29 Boundary Crossing: Extended Animation at PNCA

Portland has a small animation base, with Dark Horse, Bent Image, Laika and others. Contemporary moving imagemaking combines live and CG is a seamless style, think Avatar; and in hybrid forms, including sampling, more like collage. Added to this is idea-based work by artists. PNCA provides a chance to unwind it all in the Boundary Crossing Summer session. Public programs include July 18, an opening lecture by Norman Klein, "Dismantling the American Psyche"; July 20, an artist talk with Mack MacFarland and Marieke Verbiesen; July 22, the opening reception for the show Pre-Nostalgic by DripDrop; July 23 a panel discussion, "Pre-Nostalgic: Concepts, Visions and the Usual Suspects"; July 24 a late showing of Pre-Nostalgic by DripDrop; July 25 a screening of re-situated animation; and July 29, the closing reception. Details at the PNCA website, though there are faulty links in patches. www.pnca.edu Discussions Free, admission for the films

July 16 Strange Place Stories

The gallery in the mall opens two new projects this evening: Mirrors, curated by Andrea Boyle, and Can You See Me Now Reflections on Palestine, curated by Sarah Farahat. The first project was created by artists working with facilitators from PSU's conflict resolution program, Middle Eastern Studies program and art therapists. The second continues the artist's inspiration with the region and individual culture in conflict zones. At Place, placepdx.tumblr.com a gallery on the 3rd floor of the Pioneer Place Mall. 700 SW Fifth 6PM-9 Free



Strange Cities is a show of photographs made by Portland photographer John Ryan Brubaker and also a book made of those photographs. Great publishing effort by local bookstore gallerists Ampersand. At Amersand Vintage Printed Material www.ampersandvintage.com 2916 NE Alberta, Ste B. Map 6PM -10 Free



Project Grow hosts one of their aperiodic talk-oriented events, Telling Stories. Details. At Project Grow at the Port City Development Center. 2156 N Williams Ave at Tillamook. 6PM-9 Free

July 15 Reading Cosmic Forest

No one can dispute the mystic myth of the West. From the transcendentalist currents underlying explorations of the great Western photographers of the 19th century to Morris Graves, it's a recurring theme. There is an argument to be made that Eugene's country fair is so themed. And so it's no surprise that progeny of mid-late 20th century new age adherents might tap similar inspiration. It's evident in the last about two years fascination with crystals in the landscape. Illustrator Meg Hunt provides her interpretation with figures in a schematic landscape in her show Cosmic Forest. Opening at Buy Olympia's Land Gallery www.landpdx.com 3925 N Mississippi 6PM-8



Ampersand is primarily a bookstore, and one of the finest in Portland of its kind. Most of the books are picture books. But tonight they tap text with readings by Scott McClanahan, Patrick DeWitt and Jenny Forrester; reading from Stories V1, Sisters & Brothers and Guns, God & Irony, respectively. At Amersand Vintage Printed Material www.ampersandvintage.com 2916 NE Alberta, Ste B. Map 7:30PM

July 10 Place Artists Talk and Music

Artists Will Justice, James Mulvaney, Rebecca Steele and Ním Wunnan talk about their current projects, which are closing 4PM-6:30. After 5:30PM-9:30 it's the Leisure Project. Read all the details at the website. At Place, placepdx.tumblr.com a gallery on the 3rd floor of the Pioneer Place Mall. 700 SW Fifth

July 9 Midyear Readout of PNCA MFA

PNCA visual studies artists, graduating next year, get in the exhibition groove with a mid program show. Artists Nadia Buyse, Jodie Cavalier, Patrick Driscoll, Kei Horiuchi, Juleen Johnson, Fletcher Meisenburg, Jamie Nadherny, Oriana Lewton-Leopold, James Papadopoulos, Stefan Ransom, Victoria Reynolds, Marilyn Skalberg and Timothy Stigliano show work. Let me mention that publication of MFA student shows news by PNCA has been abysmal. At Disjecta, in the shadow of Paul Bunyan www.disjecta.org 8371 N. Interstate Map 6PM-9 Free

July 8+10 All That Glitters Are Not Hair Pomes

Glitterheart is dispersed across the planet, but they are all captured the pull of the moon. At Nationale, they celebrate it with a show Lunation. Glitterheart artists are Jess Hirsch, Emma Lipp and Matt Marble. Hirsch, formerly in Portland, is now in Minneapolis working on her MFA. On Sunday the artists perform with the objects in the show at 11AM. Then from 4PM-6, Hirsch offers experimental hair sculpture to participants, free. Then after, at 6PM, gives a talk about her hair projects for which there is an admission of $3 - cheap. At Nationale thenewnationale.com 811 E Burnside Map




Research Club at Homeland continues their show with a reception this evening. At Gallery Homeland www.galleryhomeland.org 2505 SE 11th x Division 6PM-9



Worksound has Poemophone, performance sculpture by Jorn Ake, M. C. Boyes, Tim Cooper, Ethan Rose Peter Suchecki & Lauri Twitchell Jeff Wolf and organizer Tracey Cockrell. Performances continue this month on July 14, 15 and 16th. At Worksound www.worksoundpdx.com 820 SE Alder Map 7PM-10

July 7- 17 Movement and Performance - The 1 Festival

This event takes place at a performance space by the Columbia Blvd railroad tracks and sugar factory. The organizers have a great network and have gathered a variety of local and out of town artists for a series of performances and workshops in an intimate space and at a reasonable price. Some highlights include Vangeline, Sheri Brown, Mizu Deserto and Kat MacMillan; Tonya Jone Miller; Tahni Holt, Aura Fischbeck and Hannah Sim; and Erin Leddy. There are highly recommended workshops for experimental movement artists too. The organizer is doing a series of farm movement dinners under a separate project. The 1 Festival is at the Headwaters studio the1festival.com. Leave extra time to find the location, park below in the back of the venue, do not park on the active railroad tracks. 55 NE Farragut Street #9

July 7 Westside Art Openings +

Journalist turned documentary photographer Sara Terry collaborated with a former child soldier in the Sierra Leone war to tell her story. I have worked there as well and was able to help a friend with local connections doing related work. Her project included giving former child soldiers Flip-type video cameras to tell their stories. Entirely fascinating subject, let's just say it's personal, we are so fortunate in our lives not to have those experiences. The Nines gallery inside Blue Sky has Jerry Mayer and Ellen George, well known for minimal and the most elegant of installations. Recommended. At Blue Sky Gallery www.blueskygallery.org map 122 NW 8th



Summer, of course, needs a Summer Series! Never one to disappoint, Fourteen30 has just that. The first installment is Raymond Boisjoly, from Vancouver, BC presented by TARL, a gallery in a home basement on Capitol Hill in Seattle, organized by the old Crawl Space curators. For more, RocksBox, in collaboration with Fourteen30, has performances Snorri Asmundsson, from Reykjavik performs Polarbear. Jordan Wayne Long, from Bald Knob, Arkansas has Box Shipment #2. It's au courant, a gaming paradigm is all the rage. At Fourteen30 Gallery www.fourteen30.com 937 NW Glisan 6PM, performances 8PM-10



Balls Out is back. It's a show of small works by dozens of artists in the Grass Hut family at a diversity of price points. Recommended. Grass Hut in Floating World. www.grasshutcorp.com 20 NW 5th inside Floating World Comics




We need to engage with Islam as a culture. A small part of that process may be remixing Islamic art. Arabic caligraphy is beautiful and offers many possibilities. Tonight Joe Bartholomew does his own Islamic culture remix by altering the geometric patterns that are found in the impressive tiles of major Islamic architecture. At Chambers Gallery www.chambersgallery.com 916 NW Flanders Early close 8:30PM



Land sampler Mathew Picton is back too with relief sculptures derived from maps, apropos to the mobile geolocation explosion. At Pulliam Deffenbaugh www.pulliamdeffenbaugh.com until 8



Aki Miyajima is an illustrator from Tokyo, making ink illustrated figures with select areas enhanced by saturated rainbow shades of watercolor. Perfect Summer material. She comes to Portland through the Digmeout project, a model which should be recreated in Portland. At Hellion Gallery www.helliongallery.com 19 NW 5th Suite 208. Through the lobby of the arched brick entry, up the stairs and to the back. Very upper floor Japan-style.



Amalgamation is Ryan Berkley, AJ Power, Bradley Delay, Eveline Taruadjaja, Jamie Zolars, Kristopher Pollard and Miyu Karaki. At Compound Gallery www.compoundgallery.com 107 NW 5th



Nicole Linde has paintings at Grassy Knoll Gallery www.grassyknollgallery.com 123 NW 2nd



American business today does not understand failure, and it shows, in their failure. The strategy is averting risk, driving negative risk to zero. Of course that drives positive risk to zero, and business just keeps muddling on, downward. The ad agency understands this. Tonight they present an art show themed on failure. But they demonstrate daily that positive risk triumphs. At W+K www.wk.com 224 NW 13th Map 5PM-9 Free



The Everett Lofts, the block starting at NW Broadway and Everett, recommended as always.