November 19-21 Seattle Butoh Festival

Butoh is a strange dance performance style. Up in Seattle they are having a 3 day festival of performance and workshops. One of the performers visiting is Vangaline from New York City. Her book offers a contextualization of the performance process in feminism and neuroscience. Events at https://www.daipanbutohcollective.com/seattle-butoh-festival. Yaw Theaterin Seattle Georgetown 6520 5th Ave S $20+

November 13 Longest Dry Cleaning Origin

Yellena James has poppy paintings that may be sea life or land plants, Origin. At Stephanie Chefas Projects www.stephaniechefas.com 305 SE 3rd Ave #202 - the City Sign Building, formerly a low cost artist space Map. Free 1PM-6 

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Emmanuela Soria Ruiz opens The Longest Leg, video work. At Fuller Rosen Gallery www.fullerrosen.com 1928 NW Lovejoy Map 5PM-8 Free 

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The UK brings quartet Dry Cleaning to Portland. Their music video for Strong Feelings is great glitch video work, inspired by discrete cosine encoding errors, over their solid instrumental rhythms. Their breakout was Magic of Meghan an abstract reaction to royals Americans can never understand. Two of the members of the band are art professors, including the talk lyrics singer. At Vitalidad Movement Center 116 SE Yamhill Doors 8PM $25

November 6 Softwood Landscapes, Water Murmurs, Bottoms Up Proximities

Three new shows take Adams and Ollman Gallery to mid-December when the pandemic should be over amiright?

Joy Feasley has Lysuslukker, abstract and impressionistic romantic landscapes, paintings and silk screen on photographs. Emma cc Cook has impressionistic black, grey and white landscape paintings of barns and billboards in the countryside of her base in Austin and around the Midwest and South. Vince Skelly has In Between, softwood sculptures. 

At Adams and Ollman Gallery, the second of two members of the New Art Dealers Alliance www.newartdealers.org, www.adamsandollman.com 418 NW 8th 1PM-4 Free

Natalie Ball collaborates with artist Annelia Hillman in Water:NFS, themed on water problems in the Klamath Basin. The artists speak at 6. Lucy Cotter is a well known curator. This is her last show of her curatorial residency at Oregon Contemporary. It is Proximities, a rehearsal, an archive by Katarina Zdjelar of Serbia. She represented Serbia at the 2009 Venice Biennale. 

At the Oregon Center for Contemporary Art, in the shadow of Paul Bunyan  www.oregoncontemporary.org 8371 N. Interstate Map 5PM-8 Free

A group show, Nobody's Fool, closes tonight. At Carnation Contemporary www.carnationcontemporary.com in the Disjecta building 8371 N Interstate#2. 5PM-8 Free

Bottoms Up by Jeremy LeGrand, and Murmurs by Nathanael Moss, open. The works of each are colorful and graphic. At Well Well Projects www.wellwellprojects.com in the Disjecta building 8371 N. Interstate#1 Map 5PM-8 Free

November 4 Westside Art Openings

November First Thursday is much like October, few in person items. 

Blue Sky is open in person. Likely Blackfish and PDX are open. Leach is live-streaming artist interviews. 

October 23 Night to Dawn

Zena Zezza is an independent project by Sandra Percival who did curatorial work for Yale Union. Continuing the noted Zezza curatorial arc, they present Yang Fudong from Shanghai's Yejiang/The Nightman Cometh to Dawn Breaking.

It opens today in a warehouse downtown. It is not entirely mobility accessible on all floors, contact the organizers if you need that. Zena Zezza zenazezza.org at 1857 Hallock & McMillan building. It is the red door on SW Oak by SW Naito Parkway. 2PM-5 Free

October 22 Mecanica Mechanics

Chris Chandler opens Art-Mecanica. He fits well in Portland's romance with art printmaking birthed by Gordon Gilkey, and the Portland letterpress crowd of the IRPC, the CC Stern Type Foundry and others. Chandler's method is to carve type into large woodblocks, print them, then deconstruct and collage the prints into the final piece. Chandler is the latest Stumptown Coffee Roasters Artist Fellow. At Stumptown www.stumptowncoffee.com 128 SW 3rd 5PM-7 Free

October 20 Vampire Wonders

Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1970) is a slow, surreal, vampire story of the Czech new wave, and based on an earlier Czech novel. It is an art film in monochrome. Akila Fields (Palm Dat) and Noah Bernstein play a live soundtrack. It is part of the Fin de Cinema series, always beautiful. At Holocene 1001 SE Morrison. Proof of vaccination required. Doors 8PM, show 830. $10

October 16 Transmitting Receiving Receiving Transmitting

Michelle Segre is a sculptor-installationist. She has a show, Transmitters and Receivers, opening at the Lumber Room today. A quick take is that her work is Miro-like, crossed with more organic forms than Sarah Sze. It is an interesting selection of a late career artist. At The Lumber Room lumberroom.com 419 SW 9th, above Liz Leach Map 4PM-6 Free

October 9-10 Here and Now

We are a little Covid late to this party, but a new artist group, showing in itinerant spaces, Playground, has an interesting group show, Here and Now. You can see what they are up to with their list of artists: V Maldonado, MK Guth, Dylan Beck, Carl Diehl, Rachel Milstein, Rachel Rodriguez, Sarie Bettineski, Marty Trammell, Crimson Ravarra, Limei Lai, Taylor Evans, Sydney Kattine, Eli West, Shezuet Harger Miller, Subarna Talukder Bose, Julianna Paradisi, Lauren Sinner, Nathan Cooper, Justin Tuttle, Warren Simon, Autumn Cornell, Perry Chandler, Kevin Smith, Ahuva S. Zaslavsky, Tyler Young, Lynn Stephens Massey, and Yasmin Correa. Several of their talks have passed, but this Saturday and Sunday, as the show is closing, has the following schedule of events: Saturday: 2:30PM - Artist Talk - Tyler Young 3PM - Group portrait drawing - Taylor Evens 3:30PM - Live painting - Taylor Evens Sunday: 2:30PM - Artist talk - Warren Simon 3:30PM - Live Music - Cortez Ravarra. See Playground https://playgroundgallery.org 140 NW 4th 11AM-5PM Free

October 9 Travels

The Seattle Asian Art museum is guesting a favorite travel writer, Colin Thubron. I've been fortunate to travel unusual places. I enjoy the great writers on the exerience. We have synapses and neurotransmitters for travel. Thuberon makes full use of those, relating research, amid observations, and wraps it up with a touching emotional experience. His latest work is The Amur River: Between Russia and China on which he speaks. You can join by https://seattleartmuseum.org/visit/calendar/events?EventId=78631 10AM-11:30 Free

October 7 Westside Art Openings

Mapping Utopia by Manal Abu-Shaheen’s are photographs exposed in Beirut, Lebanon. He was born in 1982. The civil war slightly overlapped. Most of the work is urban photography with an ironic and surreal bent admixed with The Yale School. 

Noelle Mason has X-Ray Vision vs. Invisibility. We each have eyes and a gaze. Technical means such as night vision, radar, and infrared sensors are available and they are used to surveil the US border with Mexico. Mason has sampled and recontextualized images from the the US Border Patrol and border vigilantes. She has also commissioned a carpet hand woven in Mexico from a satellite image. Her work was selected by the Critical Mass competition. This show is strongly recommended. Check the video of her gallery talk as available.  

Artist talk 5PM tonight by Noelle Mason. Saturday 11AM by Manal Abu-Shaheen. Registration for the artist talks is required to limit safe attendance. Proof of vaccination required. At Blue Sky Gallery www.blueskygallery.org Map 122 NW 8th early close 6PM-8 Free

 

Michael Brophy has Passage, NW landscape paintings inspired by road trips. Audrey Tulimiero Welch has Damascus: Mapping Place, Home, & Exile, abstract paintings. At Laura Russo Lee Gallery www.russoleegallery.com 805 NW 21st early close 5:30PM-7 Free

Everett Lofts has one opening on a spooky theme tonight at the Chaos Gallery. It's easier for you to see them all than for me to write suggestions. Some close as early as 9PM. At the Everett Lofts 625 NW Everett. Bounded by NW Everett, Broadway, Flanders and 6th Map 6PM-10 Free

The Elizabeth Leach Gallery is doing their opening of Stephen Hayes and Gregg Renfrow on Youtube and Facebook live. Details on thir website. At Elizabeth Leach Gallery www.elizabethleach.com 417 NW 9th Map Free

As far as we can tell, the other usual suspects have continuing shows and/or are open regular hours or by appointment, but not First Thursday evening in Covid time.

October 2 Salt Flood Spooky Lavender

Salt - A Story of the Land & Landscape is a show of aerial photographs by Sandra Chandler of salt evaporation ponds at the edges of the San Francisco Bay. You can get an idea at https://www.salt.photography/gallery/. At the Murdoch Collections 2219 NW Raleigh 3PM-7 Free

Lavender House is a video work at Oregon Contemporary by Sarah Rara themed on the vicissitudes of the landlord-tenant relationship. It is even humorous. The artist, and the curator Asha Bukojemsky, formerly of Portland, and now working in LA, speak at 5:30PM At the Oregon Center for Contemporary Art, in the shadow of Paul Bunyan www.oregoncontemporary.org 8371 N. Interstate Map 5PM-8 Free

Maria Lux has Waiting for the Flood, photographs. She wins the copyright award for "Continuing Lux’s recent work on de-extinction (bringing extinct animals back from the dead), Waiting for the Flood asks how alternative stories, emotions like humor and weirdness, and irreverent approaches to mainstream environmentalism can help us cope with, and perhaps reimagine, what appears to be inevitable." 

At Carnation Contemporary www.carnationcontemporary.com in the Disjecta building 8371 N Interstate#2. 6PM-9 Free

Spooky Season is a group show on that theme curated by Jessie Weitzel Le Grand, who had a recent excellent show at Chefas. Artists include Andrea Alonge, Paolo Puck, Sarah Hughes, Yaloo Ji Yeon, Pam Puck, Dan Lam. Anthony Roberto, Jenny Ollikainen, Jessie Weitzel Lagrand, Jeremy Legrand, and Alyson Provax. The closing show is October 30 with costumes encouraged. At Well Well Projects https://www.wellwellprojects.com/ in the Disjecta building 8371 N. Interstate#1 Map 5PM-8 Free

September 30, October 2, 9, 12, 16, 19, 23, 26 Bourgeois: What is the Shape of This Problem

Louise Bourgeois (1911-2010) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qy7xJhImnLw has worked with large themes of family, the body, death, and the unconscious informed by memories of family problems and WWI from her childhood. This show is prints and collages, while two of her sculptures are on loan to Oregon Contemporary nee Disjecta. Her parents were tapestry restorers, so you will find textile collage, and also a few spiders for which she was known. 

The gallery has invited local artists to respond to her work. On October 12, 19, and 26, artists Srijon Chowdhury, Ellen Lesperance, and Jovencio de la Paz will speak at noon.

It is textile month for many Portland galleries, and there is a participatory weaving studio, good for you and children on Saturdays this month and to see the show. See the calendar and open times on their website. 

At the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at Portland State University https://www.pdx.edu/museum-of-art/ 1855 SW Broadway Free

September 4 Masked

The Portland art world is going into Covid-Delta masked mode for good reason.

It is not our usual interest, but the Pearl District art stands are up this weekend. Blue Sky is open special hours and Converge 45 is on their published hours.

Mia Farrington and Nathan Paul Rice have openings today. At Stephanie Chefas Projects www.stephaniechefas.com 305 SE 3rd Ave #202 - the City Sign Building, formerly a low cost artist space Map. Free 1PM-6 Free masks and social distancing

Tips on Falling has activated. Ursa Nüffer-Rodriguez and Holly Haney has Tips on Them themed on their trans life. Right now, the dream of the Portland 90s is alive in self managed spaces and the LGBT+ community. At Tips on Failing www.failing.exposed 3903 N Michigan Map 7PM-10 Free

Disjecta/Oregon Contemporary has a closing tonight 5PM-8.

August 8 Coming: Becoming, Be Here Now

Barry Johnson, from Federal Way, Washington, opens a show of portraits, Becoming. 

At www.nationale.us 15 SE 22nd Map 1PM-3 Free RSVP requested masks required

August 7 ¡Viva Vivas!

Joy Feasley, Lee M. Hale, Maya Vivas have a group show of abstract paintings, bronze sculptures of plant thorns, and abstract organic shape ceramic sculptures, respectively.

Late career artist Kinke Kooi from the Netherlands has The Grotesk of Raising. It's a mixture of abstract and surreal with a Miami nights palette and forms complementary to Vivas' work.

At Adams and Ollman Gallery, the second of two members of the New Art Dealers Alliance www.newartdealers.org, www.adamsandollman.com 418 NW 8th 11PM-2 Free



A Sometimes Gallery has a colorful show of primarily 2d work, Summer. At a Sometimes Gallery 687 N Tillamook St. Ste C 4PM-8 Free masked and vaxed



Jessie Weitzel Le Grand has a strange and beautiful series of sculptures Limbo Lounge.

The work comes with the copyrighting award of the month, very Invisible Cities.

The works are the "peculiar creations by the citizens of Ny By. Imagined as a potential afterlife or alternate dimension, Ny By is a place governed by rules unlike our own. Le Grand’s sculptures capture the objects and arrangements its citizens celebrate. Each artifact reveals more about this constructed reality you may never see yourself. 

Ny By is a town. Not a town of this world, but another. In Ny By, citizens worship blossoms and sandwiches. They pull threads from the soil and collect geodes on the shore. Life here is a mystery. There is no language, no laws, and no existential crises. Each life form is unique, funny, and content."

At Stephanie Chefas Projects www.stephaniechefas.com 305 SE 3rd Ave #202 - the City Sign Building, formerly a low cost artist space Map. Free 1PM-6 Free masks and social distancing

The Oregon Center for Contemporary Art, nee Disjecta, has a closing reception. It is the show Time Being, curated by Blake Shell, and well worth seeing if you have not yet. It includes ceramic sculptures by Maya Vivas, cofounder of Ori Gallery. It is Maya Vivas month with work at A+O, Eutectic, the Fourteen30 house show in Aurora, and here. 

At 8pm, Maya Vivas will perform A Comlicated Remedy to my Soft Hands.

The adjacent galleries, always recommended, Carnation Contemporary and Well Well are open too. 

At the Oregon Center for Contemporary Art, in the shadow of Paul Bunyan  www.oregoncontemporary.org 8371 N. Interstate Map 5PM-8 Free

August 5 Westside Art Openings

We thought being vaccinated everything would be back to normal in person. But some galleries are still virtual or require masks.


Blue Sky has a survey of the Ingeborg Gerdes. She was a German American photographer making landscape and streetscape work in the Western US. 

Enfant Terrible Bill Will is back in the Nine space, aways recommended.

At Blue Sky Gallery www.blueskygallery.org 122 NW 8th Map 6PM-8 Free


The Stumptown Fellowship is back with paintings by Michelle Ramin in her series Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea. It's oils, loosely themed on the trauma of our BLM realizations, climate, and pandemic. I predict as we process our reckoning, an accompanying exploration of our experience with first arrivers will emerge.

At Stumptown www.stumptowncoffee.com 128 SW 3rd 5PM-7 Free

Monuments and Memorials by Dinh Q. Lê opens tonight at Elizabeth Leach Gallery. Lê's approach of weaving two photographs never tires. This show mixes samples of Cambodia. It is visually pleasing, but heavy matters hide in it. Lonnie Holley has The Influence of Images there too. At Elizabeth Leach Gallery www.elizabethleach.com 417 NW 9th Map As far as we can tell, they are doing a YouTube opening only at 6.

Galleries often observe the dog days of August and mount group shows. It is unknown which are open tonight. PDX Contemporary has Walking, Augen has a group show and Froelick has a group show.

July 18 Waking Walking Mountains

1122 has new digs for their outdoor gallery, including a scrubbed out chicken coup. They are hosting an ambitious show of ceramics and 2d work, Walking Mountains by Erika Rier. As part of the show they are having a paint your own mountain workshop at 1PM, followed by a poetry reading by Allison Cobb, Yukiyo Kawano, Endi Bogue Hartigan, and Jesse Morse at 4. At 1122 Outside Gallery www.1122gallery.com 7629 SE Harrison 1PM-6 Poetry reading is Free.

July 17 Resound Birdcalls

Our beloved eatery Güero Tortas has a side project they love, watchng birds. They have formed it into a birdwatching club meeting weekly. They have an arty membership package too. This afternoon, they meet at the bar for a social. All the information is on their socials and website. Güero Burd Club www.guerotortas.com/birdclub in the club at 200 NE 28th 4PM-6 Meet and Join


Resound by Angélica Maria Millán Lozano and Frankie Krupa Vahdani opens with a reception today. It is mixed media work and a much more eloquent explanation is on the gallery website. At Fuller Rosen Gallery www.fullerrosen.com 1928 NW Lovejoy Map 5PM-8 Free

July 11 5th Dimensional Cookbook

Artist Susan Cianciolo, @5th_dimensional_plain_, brings an exhibition and a book to Portland. The artist has a long established body of work parallel to Portland's conceptual and social practice craft vectors. Her projects have included fashion, social practice embodied by sewing circles, film, and collaborations with her 11 year old. She is a visual artist too, with collage and loose expressive 2d work informed by her early career as a fashion illustrator. The Lumber Room site has a well written capsule on the artist and a catalog of works: lumberroom.com/exhibitions/2021/susan-cianciolo. An artist book, This Cookbook is Made For the 5th Dimension, was commissioned for the show. At The Lumber Room lumberroom.com 419 SW 9th, above Liz Leach Map 2PM-5 Free

July Covid Catchup

A long time ago, I worked in a federal water polution virology research laboratory for the Summer. I learned about viruses, micoplasmas, cell lines, logrithmic titrations, nanopore filters, and sewage in rivers. The most important thing I learned was the inevitability of zoonotic pandemics that would make a dent in the human population. Covid is making a dent, but there are certainly viruses with higher fatality rates, known viruses, and viruses yet to evolve. Viruses are the perfect example of Dawkins' Selfish Gene. We live in the biosphere and we are not immune from it.

I think the human response has been quite good; of course there is room for improvement! We were accidentially lucky that the Bedford Lab and the Seattle Flu Study quickly isolated and sequenced the virus. We were lucky Moderna was already far down the road on mRNA vaccine development. There has been a great outpouring of compassion throughout the world. And the vaccine development was unprecedented.

As for the theories around the Wuhan Lab, it does not matter, because there will always be another zoonotic pandemic in the future.

Now is the time to resume in-person life with the learning we have gained.



Gellery Fourteen30 Contemporary has curated an outstanding show in an outstanding space, Bitter cherry, Bleeding heart. It is in a private residence in Aurora and viewable by appointment. The artists are Joanna Bloom, Iván Carmona, Melanie Flood, John Houck, Jessica Jackson Hutchins, Rainen Knecht, Chris Johanson, Elizabeth Malaska, Lynne Woods Turner and Maya Vivas. It is a collaboration with NO ARCHITECTURE, who designed and built the Courtyard House and surrounding garden. By Fourteen30 Contemporary, the first of two members in Portland of the New Art Dealers Alliance www.newartdealers.org, Fourteen30 Gallery www.fourteen30.com Private visit reservations June 12 – August 15 are available by emailing info@fourteen30.com


In a Landscape piano recitals have resumed. Principal Hunter Noack brings a full size grand piano, and guest artists, to parks and gardens throughout the region. The season runs from June 17 to September 11. Advance tickets are required, the concerts use "silent disco" wireless headphones, and their number is limited. Bring a blanket or sand chairs, or wander as you like throughout the concert. The dates and tickets are listed at www.inalandscape.org/ and many of the events are free or by donation.


We can't catch up every gallery show that has reopened for normal visits. But the new show at Oregon Contemporary - Oregon Center for Contemporary Art, nee Disjecta, is worth a visit. Borrowing some Louise Bourgeois sculptures is a mark of their new ardor. While you are there, you can buy an open edition print by Portland's Arvie Smith for a bargain price of $25. In the same building, Well Well Projects has an ambitious show by Hyun Jung Jung.