August 6 Westside Art Openings

Portland artist Whitney Nye shows large scale collage paintings. Unlike many collage artists, her work has a minimal feeling, repeating small detail into fields of pattern. It has continuity with her last major body of work, while reinventing itself. In this case, the repeat patterns are often just that, sewing patterns, disembodied half sleeves and legs, body panels and the little filler pieces that allow flat fabric to form clothes for curved bodies. In a way it is metaphorical, flat paintings on the wall become multidimensional emotional experiences by the collage of many elements, familiar and novel. The work also includes vintage illustration elements and old books, forming repeating patterns of the familiar repurposed. This work would be at home in the home of any of the many Portland apparel designers; or in a public building art collection of a city focused on attracting and nurturing the apparel business cluster. At Laura Russo Gallery www.laurarusso.com 805 NW 21st



Art reinvents itself and its relevance continuously. The next generation of collectors require emotional resonance and this show is an example, especially with Portland's music world the finely interwoven with the world of visual art. The Art of Touring is a show of photographs documenting the musical road trips of Portland performers. Artists include Alissa Anderson (Vetiver), Hannah Mae Blair, Sharon Cheslow, Mia Clarke (Electrelane), Jem Cohen, Erika Spring Forster (Au Revoir Simone), Rebecca Gates, Emma Gaze (Electrelane), Megan Holmes, Andy Moor (The Ex), Tara Jane Oneil and Jean Smith (Mecca Normal). The show also marks the release of the same named book, a collection of artwork and writing based on firsthand touring experiences, edited by Sara Jaffe (Erase Errata) and Mia Clarke (Electrelane). The visual art, music and literature collaboration is a great strategy for reaching a larger audience. The gallery also sponsors performances by Sara Jaffe (Erase Errata), Tara Jane Oneil, and Julianna Bright (The Golden Bears) on Saturday, August 22. At Fontanelle www.fontanellegallery.com 205 SW Pine



Installationist Kim Ray presents "generation" in the Nines Gallery (inside Blue Sky). Her installation is a Fibonacci spiral of balloons precisely positioned and sized. See them as soon as possible, they are slowly deflating. The spiral occurs naturally in things like pine cones and sunflowers, a beautiful exposition is Sir A'Arcy Wentworth Thompson's "On Growth and Form". Inside Blue Sky Gallery www.blueskygallery.org 122 NW 8th



The Everett Station Lofts are recommended, as always - bounded by NW Everett, Broadway, Flanders and 6th. It is their big all building opening, including upstairs.



Malia Jensen is a Portland-NYC artist from an art family here. She does a good job with idea-based sculpture and video, somewhat quiet, sometimes odd and often hard hitting. She is responsible for the giant beaver in the ad agency lobby and the tree that used to be at Seaplane. See her latest in an all too rare Portland show. At Elizabeth Leach www.elizabethleach.com 417 NW 9th



Trees are one of the things which define our landscape here, they are woven into our psyche. A lot of paper is made from them and it is paper that decays, as do real life trees, unless carefully conserved and valued. The late photographer and curator Terry Toedtemeier drew upon them as subject, along with our geological landscape. Toedtemeier is largely responsible for the photography collection at the Art Museum, see his practiced eye at work in his own photographs. At PDX Contemporary Art www.pdxcontemporaryart.com 925 NW Flanders early close 8PM



Fugaku Sanjūrokkei, Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, is a famous series of wood block prints by Katsushika Hokusai. Others have reprised his subject. Hokusai made his illustrations traveling to farmlands and fishing villiages, capturing peoples' lives in relation to Mt Fuji, a Japanese symbol of immortality. Tokyo artists Rei, Reijiro Mochizuki, and Hooky, Souichiro Fukuda, traveled 34,033km over 131 days, sketching, photographing and painting what they found, everyday lives and landscapes of Japan today. The result is the book Survival Drive, a show at Compound and live painting opening night. The compound show also includes the artists' travels in the last week in Portland making work about here. It all is a lesson in the importance of authenticity in Japanese culture. Learn. At Compound Gallery www.compoundgallery.com 107 NW 5th



The Pulliam Gallery has bright work, perfect for summer, by James Boulton, Brad Brown, Linda Geary, Derek Franklin, Nicholas Nyland, Zina Al-Shukri, Josh Ferris, Matthew Gordon and Maja Ruznic. Some are recently minted MFA's from CCA in SF/Oakland if you are curious about happenings there. At Pulliam Gallery www.pulliamdeffenbaugh.com 929 NW Flanders early close 8PM



Documentary photography with an artistic focus is always fascinating, doubly so when made in times and places we don't go. That would be the case for Ethan Eisenberg's Holyland, exposed between 1994-2005 in the Gaza Strip. The area is very small, 25 miles by 4-8 miles wide with a very large population, one and a half million. It was governed by the Palestinian Authority in that period but occupied by the Israeli army. See for yourself Eisenberg's observations, he also speaks Saturday at 3 at the gallery with Martin Bogren. Bogren shows Ocean, documenting the first visit by Rejastani children to the ocean to swim. At Blue Sky Gallery www.blueskygallery.org 122 NW 8th



This month is a free art history lesson, specifically in photography, at the Charles A. Hartman Gallery. The history of photography has often been the history of painting: landscape and portraits. This show is the portrait branch as illustrated by well known photographers such as Ansel Adams, Diane Arbus, Corey Arnold, Manuel Alvarez Bravo, Harry Callahan, Flor Garduno, Lewis Hine, William Klein, Danny Lyon, Sally Mann, Daido Moriyama, Arnold Newman, W. Eugene Smith, Frederick Sommer, Alfred Stieglitz, Mark Steinmetz and Issei Suda. That covers a wide range in the canon of photographic portraiture, but necessarily a small sample of photographers. Worth seeing. At Charles A. Hartman www.hartmanfineart.net 134 NW 8th



Grassy Knoll gallery continues with a fascinating animation by Yellena James. James constructs fanciful worlds, maybe seascapes. She has collaborated with Fashionbuddha studio and sound designer Radium to create an interactive installation driven by your touch. At Grassy Knoll Gallery www.grassyknollgallery.com 123 NW 2nd



Stumptown downtown on 3rd has a great mixed media show. They win the copywriting award of the month. "What is THIS? Where did it come from? How did it get here? How did I get here to look at it? Does it matter? Is it interesting? None of these answers are available in THIS, a photo series by David Neevel. THIS and more of Neevel's work will not be answering any questions in August at the Downtown Stumptown.

David Neevel is from Oregon. For a while now he has lived in Portland, where he works and eats and worries and feels it and tries hard but sometimes gets so tired and would like a hot dog please and misses you, so much. He got a degree in Physics from the University of Oregon but has forgotten a lot of the details. See more of what he's done or demean him anonymously at www.dickbird.org".

At Stumptown www.stumptowncoffee.com 128 SW 3rd



Longtime Portland photographers Stuart Levy shows Portland landscape panoramas. In Hidden Gems Revealed he mixes it up by making exposures with unusual points of view and light. Named after Stieglitz' famous magazine, the Camerawork gallery has quietly been presenting photo shows for a long, long, long time, it's a great venue if you are a photographer. www.thecameraworkgallery.org 2255 NW Northrup

August 3,15,19 Call for PICA TBA Volunteers

PICA needs a large number of volunteers and some of the jobs can use specialized skills such as building, blogging and photo-video for its TBA festival in September. In exchange for volunteering, you can get free passes to some events. Best, it's a great opportunity to spend time with other creative volunteers and meet the artists. To find out more, go to one of the volunteer orientations: 224 nw 13th #305. August 3, 5:00PM, August 15, 1:00PM or August 19, 5:00PM

August 1 Symphony 1:Travelogue of the Locusts

Portland is home to half the world's rock stars, but lacking a major music school, it maintains an only respectable 21st century and experimental music community. But they are here, and have plenty rainy winter time to get good.

The Creative Music Guild, the PDX Classical Revolution, the Portland Cello Project and the late Music Population Orchestra are notable proponents of new music played on old instruments. Listen once live, and your ears will be forever changed in judging synthetic instrument samples. The technology to create poignant synthetic instrumental sounds, except maybe for a piano, is not yet here. So we are stuck for now with crunchy electro-style samples.

Tonight is your opportunity to break sonic barriers in hearing real instruments in service of new composition. Portland composers Mary Wright and Jody Hughes present their Symphony No. 1: Travelogue of Locusts played by the purpose-built New Portland Chamber Orchestra. It has been a collaboration two years in the making.

In the spirit that chamber music was the experimental pop music of its day, Wright and Hughes are undertaking a beautiful experiment with the players entering and leaving the sound field as they play.

Travelogue of the Locusts comprises twelve movements arranged by the time cycle of our circadian rhythm (that is not the 7 year cicadian rhythm familiar to Midwesterners).

There composers are internationally noted and are worth keeping track of in their development.

At Gallery Homeland www.galleryhomeland.org 2505 SE 11th x Division 7PM and 9 $5-10, kids free

July 31; August 1,7,8 Modern Dance Conduit

Dance performance is often classed as ballet, jazz or modern. Ballet is ballet and is about 500 years old. It has an accepted role in learned childhood experience, like sports. That creates a pipeline and an economic lifeline. It is very expensive to present and company dancers are often salaried. Jazz is rhythmic and chorus oriented, Broadway and backup dance for pop concerts would be examples. It originated with dance brought from Africa by slaves. It's about 200 years old. Modern is everything else. It's extensible and spans reprise of early modernists such as Martha Graham to anything-goes experimentalism.

With a small audience, it is similar to contemporary art, in that audiences stay away for fear of not getting it. In reality, watching it can just be a dream with freedom from interpretation. It is also an interesting audience exercise in how we read non-verbal communication.

Portland has several spaces where modern dance movers congregate: Body Vox Studio, Performance Works Northwest, The Headwaters Studio at Disjecta; and Conduit. Centrally located, Conduit is a long running space for rehearsal, classes and workshops in modern dance, contact improvisation, microtheater. It is a beautiful spot with downtown views and a nice floor for rent.

Conduit needs to raise some funds and so is putting on performances which are an interesting way to sample who is doing what in Portland.

The first weekend, July 31 and August 1, performers include Gavin Larsen from OBT, Gregg Bielemeier, Josie Moseley, the Key Turn Project, Linda Austin, Ben Asriel and Tere Mathern Dance- Saturday only.

The second weekend, August 7 and 8th, the performers are Anne Muller from OBT, POV Dance, Jim McGinn, James Healey, Oslund+Co Dance, Tere Mathern Dance- Friday only and Candace Bouchard & Adrian Fry from OBT- Saturday only.

It all takes place at Conduit Dance www.conduit-pdx.org 918 SW Yamhill, 4th Floor It's a fundraiser: $15-$100, in a small space holding about 30 - so advance tickets are at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/73965

July 23 PNCA MFA Show

The PNCA MFA program is hitting its stride and this is your opportunity to see the results. The show includes: Delaney Allen, Wayne Bund, Cathy Cleaver, Ben Ediger, Matthew Gruber, Allison Halter, Laura Hughes, Sydney Kim, Nathan Langner, Ruth Lantz, Luis Martinez-Rodriguez, Mindy McGovern, Nicole Milchak, Zack Rau, Jane Schiffhauer and Nashoba Temperly. Titled a very pre-bust Egocentric, the show opens at Disjecta www.disjecta.org 8371 N. Interstate opening 6PM-10 Free

July 18-19 (20) Alembic Space Films

Alembic is a performance series organized by performance superstar Linda Austin at pioneer FOPO outpost, Performance Works Northwest. Tonight's instance in the series is Temporary Roadmaps, films curated by Portland filmmaker Karl Lind. The program includes works of Portland artists Ed Mellnik, Stephanie Simek and Adam Keller. At Performance Works Northwest www.performanceworksnw.org 4625 SE 67th Friday and Saturday 8:30PM $8-10


Space is the Place is a low budget cult science fiction film staring experimental musician Sun Ra. Sun Ra began playing in 1940's Chicago. He was the first to use electronic keyboards and was a pioneer in large group improvization - free jazz. His group has been alternately named the Solar Arkestra, the Cosmo Discipline Arkestra, the Blue Universe Arkestra, the Jet Set Omniverse Arkestrathe, the Myth-Science Arkestra, and the Omniverse Arkestra. They perform in elaborate costumes with space mythology themes - Sun Ra claims to be born on Saturn and his birth certificate has never been found.

In the film, Sun Ra establishes a colony for Africans on Saturn then duals a pimp, the Overseer, over a game of cards for the future of the human race. This film is a gem - here is a clip. Recommended for all its weirdness and a look at 1972 on the West Coast.

Film at PSU's 5th Avenue Cinema 510 SW Hall Street
7:00PM, 9:30 Friday and Saturday 3PM Sunday Free PSU students, $2 for other students/seniors, $3 general and free popcorn

July 16 Japan Ignites 14 Sparks of Animated Copyright Perception

Tonight is the night when the superpower of being in many places symultaneously could come in handy.

Portland State University has a program in Japanese theater and tonight workshop students perform Kyogen plays. Kyogen is a form of classical Japanese theater first performed in the 1300's. Often topics are funny parables, think Falstaff. The sound effects are made by voice and part of the play, so for instance there is a vocalization for the sound a saw makes, it sounds nothing like a saw, but it is known to the audiences as the sound of a saw from studying Kyogen in Japanese schools. Often Kyogen was performed between Noh plays to provide a contrast to Noh's formalism. Tonight's performances are The Fortified Beard, Higeyagura and Bosan. The event is at Imago Theater, 17 SE 8th. 7PM Free


Ignite is a series of random short talks, sort of a hipster-geek Toastmaster's elevator pitch originated by O'Reilly, the tech book publisher with the exquisite line drawings of animals on the covers. The 6th Portland instance is tonight. The website details the talks, many surely to be entertaining. At the Bagdad Theater Doors 5:30PM, Program 7. Free


Small and modest is in. That is why the 14 Parcels project is so appealing. An all but completely abandoned and difficult building site in the North part of the South Waterfront will be host to 14 structures, small studios, designed by Portland and international architects. Small and beautiful. Tonight you can hear about it from architect, planner and builder Kevin Cavenaugh, at Design Within Reach. At DWR Portland Studio 1200 NW Everett. 6pm Free


Art Spark is a monthly get together for drinks and networking in the Portland art community. There is a short presentation of 6 minutes by a local art group, but the rest is purely interesting conversation. Tonight for the program filmmaker Andy Blubaugh will set up and film a short scene. The host is the NW Film Center, who are showing a rooftop film, the Marx Brothers 1933 comedy, Duck Soup, later in the same location. On the rooftop of Hotel deLuxe, 729 SW 15th. Art Spark 5pm-7; Film sometime after 8. Free


The PNCA international animation festival, Boundary Crossings, previously noted continues with a discussion of the creative process in animation by an Austin professor of animation and a creative director at LAIKA. At The Lab at Museum of Contemporary Craft, 724 NW Davis 6:30pm Free


Copyright is a sticky wicket. It is becoming increasingly divergent with Disney and others vociferously lobbying for expanded copyright protection, successfully, essentially indefinitely. It is largely ignored by samplers, and viewed askance by China. Meanwhile experts in digital rights management, technical means for controlling copying wonder if it will ever work effectively. In that spirit, "Free Culture: Creating Copyright and Coprighting Creativity" explores copyright and sampling. You, the audience will have the opportunity to remix copyright law in a Twitter mediated cooperative live online editing session. After there will be a discussion led by YACHT and copyright lawyer Peter Shavers. At the University of Oregon White Stag Building, 70 NW Couch Street 6:30pm Free


German printmaker MC Escher has a show at the Portland Art Museum now. In support of the exhibition there is a talk by Richard Taylor, University of Oregon professor of physics, psychology and art. He speaks on fractal patterns in the art of Escher and Jackson Pollock. At the Portland Art Museum www.pam.org 1219 SW Park 6PM $10, free members

July 13-July24 Boundry Crossings Animation Program

PNCA is hosting an international animation institute, Boundary Crossings. There are a variety of public presentations and exhibitions. Details at pnca.edu/boundarycrossings

July 13 Sustainable Building

Portland seeks to export sustainable building and planning as an economic development policy. It is working. An element of that plan is to construct a net-zero building as the center for sustainabilty studies, city and state offices of sustainability and public interest groups in Portland. It is the Oregon Sustainability Center.

We need to turn building around. Indigenous building from our cave dwelling days used renewable material. In rainy Africa adobe bricks of straw, mud and termite mounds form walls that can last nearly indefinitely when covered by well maintained thatched roofs. Those roofs are quieter in the rain than galvanized steel.

Meanwhile current buildings are expensive and have very short lives. The most expensive home parts, bathrooms and kitchens, have only an approximate 15-20 year design life, while their functional life is potentially much, much longer. Building and demolition generates up to a third of solid waste. Cement production creates 5% of global carbon dioxide emissions and is a major source of airborne mercury in Oregon. Building materials consume large amounts of energy in their manufacture. About 40% of energy is used in buildings.

We have a long way for the lives of buildings to become sustainable.

Tonight's talk is on the design of a sustainable building for the sustainability center. Ralph DiNola of Green Building Services and Dennis Wilde of Gerding Edlen Development will present the current design and discuss the challenges resolved and yet to be resolved. It is part of the Bright Lights series sponsored by the local architecture magazine Portland Spaces and the City Club, a thoughtful public interest group.

At Jimmy Mak's, 221 NW 10th. Doors 5:30PM, discussion 6. Free

July 10 Portrait of Portraits and Korean Art

Korean art has a long history, yet the contemporary art of Korea is not well known. The father of video art is Korean Nam Jun Paik. That was then, this is now. Gallery Homeland updates Portland with an up to the minute show by Eun-young Cho, Sahm-kwon Kim, Jihee Kim, Yang-hee Kim, Duk Hwan Jo, Hyunmin Lee, Keum Aeng Seo, Jooahn Kwon, Ji Eun and Joowon Lee. Korean art shows are reaching US and the UK in 2009, echoing the discovery of Chinese art by the West in the mid-1990's. It will be a fascinating opportunity to sample the thoughts of artists living on the fault line of economic change and a divided country with the highest penetration of high speed Internet in the world, far surpassing the United States. It's at Gallery Homeland www.galleryhomeland.org 2505 SE 11th x Division


Long time Portland gallerist, Mark Woolley, turns his eye to curation with a show, Portraits. Included are many artists who have been mentioned here including Holly Andres, Tim Gunther, Stewart Harvey, Wei Hsueh, Jacob Pander, Christopher Rauschenberg, Alicia Rose, Gus Van Sant Terry Toedtemeyer and Carol Yarrow. Many are Portland multi-creatives spanning visual art, music, geology and filmmaking, not a new phenomena in Portland. At WorksoundPDX www.worksoundpdx.com 820 SE Alder


Meanwhile 23 Sandy reprises last Friday's soft opening with the surreal mashup of Chris Haberman's mad tea party - Alice in Wonderland themed painting - and Jessica Spring's horse show. At www.23sandy.com 623 NE 23 x Sandy

July 8 Taco Bell Drawing Club

It is national movement, including here. The next meetup is tonight. The Taco Bell Drawing Club will be held at 725 NE Weidler. Bring pencil and paper. 6PM-7:30 Free

July 2 Westside Art Openings

I always recommend the Everett Lofts for ever changing viewing pleasure. I resist individual listings because they are more time consuming to compile than the time you could devote to just seeing everything. Nonetheless SEA Change has a political installation work about Congo, an African interest of mine.

Based on research by Portlander's Casey Bush and Joshua Seeds, Ryan Burns has created a mediation on mining in Eastern Congo, "Profane Relics--- An Ossuary of the Congo Mineral Wars". That is adjacent to Rwanda and intertwined in the 1994 genocide.

Congo has deposits of gold, diamonds and tantalum ore, all a perverse curse on everyday life. Tantalum is an ingredient in chip capacitors used to manage the characteristics of high speed electrical signals in almost all electronic equipment.

The show opens tonight and is open weekend hours throughout the month. SEA Change hosts a Congolese dinner and public brainstorming session July 11 facilitated by Mercy Corps and Run for Congo Women. One direct solution is expanded recycling of electronics, and the gallery hosts mobile phone recycling this month by Eco-Cell. RSVP for the dinner and discussion at seagallery at gmail.

At SEA Change Gallery seagallery.wordpress.com in the Everett Lofts on the Everett side, corner of NW Broadway opening 6PM-10. Dinner discussion Saturday July 11, 5PM-7, RSVP please. Free


Across the Hall is the space shared by Rod Pulliam and Jane Beebe in the former Pulliam Deffenbaugh gallery space. This month they present a group show Catch All. The show includes Brad Adkins, Monica Angle, Lydia Beebe, Victoria Haven, Philip Iosca, Vanessa Johnson, Jeff Keller, Justin L'Amie, James Lavadour, Raymond Meeks, Vanessa Renwick, Adam Sorensen, Storm Tharp and Marie Watt. At Across the Hall 925 NW Flanders 6PM-8


For some summer excitement Midori Hirose & Joshua Orion Kermiet collaborate in installation at Fontanelle. Fun! At Fontanelle Gallery www.fontanellegallery.com 205 SW Pine


At Compound there is an all woman show Pink Attitude comprising Anneli Olander, Candy Bird, Pink Sublime, Cikita Z, Isa Duval, Msss Kikao, B9 and Fawn Gehweiler. At Compound Gallery www.compoundgallery.com 107 NW 5th


Lorna Nakell who started with illustrated meal paintings has returned to domestic themes in illustration style. See at Beppu Wiarda www.beppugallery.com 319 NW 9th


Dana Dart McClean, Meg Peterson & Brenna Murphy are at Valentines with DJ Cuica spinning Jamaican & Brazilian summer dreams later. At Valentines myspace.com/valentineslifeblood 232 SW Ankeny Art 6PM, party 9:30


Powells has a sure to be odd photo show documenting commune life in 1970's Los Angeles. Cult leader Father Yod, with 14 wives and 100 followers living in a Beverly Hills mansion, drove a Rolls and led a psychadelic band Ya Ho Wa 13, recording limited vinyl pressings sold for $1 at the commune's organic vegetarian restaurant in Laurel Canyon popular with pop luminaries of the time. In 1975, with no training, Yod died in Hawaii on his first hang gliding experience. I am not making this up. The commune carries on as www.yahowha.org. Wednesday the 8th, the commune's documentarians Isis Aquarian and Electricity Aquarian read from a book and show films of the commune's history at 7:30PM At Powell's Books 3rd floor, 10th and W Burnside


Blue Sky has photographs of urban China as noted above and photographs by Amy Stein documenting our interaction with animals, some wild. At Blue Sky Gallery www.blueskygallery.org 122 NW 8th

July 1 China Photos and Motovational Speech

In a participatory prelude to Friday's opening, join in a special "extra credit" event, a book signing, motivational speech and coloring book party by well known artist illustrator Mike Perry. At Grass Hut www.grasshutcorp.com 811 E Burnside 6PM-9


City of Ambition - Fast Forward is a body of photos of Chongqing by Swiss photographer Ferit Kuyas. Chongqing is a very large city in a small province in central China which was the capital in WWII owing to the Japanese invasion. At a population of 32 million, it may surpass Bejing and Shanghai in size by 2020. Kuyas documents that growth of this industrial town set amid mountains incidentally once home to Buddhist monasteries. Tonight Kuyas speaks on his experiences and photography there. At Blue Sky Gallery www.blueskygallery.org 122 NW 8th 6:30PM


The first meeting of the Portland Taco Bell Drawing Club will be held at 725 NE Weidler 5:30PM-7

June 25-26 Water in the Desert Performances

Butoh dance is a recurring interest here. Friday and Saturday is a performance festival of Butoh artists from San Francisco, Seattle, Boulder and Portland along with Portland dancers pursuing independent vectors. It is a perfect opportunity to see butoh in contrast to some related forms. Friday evening Koichi & Hiroko Tamano with their Harupin-Ha Butoh Theatre, Japanese folk dancers from Portland Taiko, PSU’s Kyogen Theatre, Sahomi Tachibana Dancers, Cydney Wilkes and Sheri Brown + Douglas Ridings perform. Saturday it is Mizu Desierto Butoh Theatre, Syzygy Butoh, Christina Braun of SF Butoh Lab, Bad Unkl Sista, Wobbly, Theory1:Dance and Linda K. Johnson.

The Tamanos are very early butoh performers from Japan who worked with the founder of butoh in the 1960's. Forming his own company in Japan in 1972, Koichi Tamano and his wife Hiroko Tamano then came to San Francisco and performed the first butoh performance in the United States in 1976. In 1996 he was named as a national treasure by the Emperor of Japan. The Tamano's have been leading a workshop this week and the students will be incorporated into the performance. This is a very rare opportunity to see them. Kyogen theater provides a touchpoint to another traditional Japanese theater form in contrast. Sahomi Tachibana is a Portland teacher of traditional Japanese dance. Her troupe performs traditional buyo dance. Cydney Wilkes is a gifted Portland performer who has drawn upon landscape for outdoor performances as well as electrifying duets with Mike Barber. For the Festival she has recreated a piece in the style of Mary Wigman, a German expressionist modern dancer who inspired the creators of butoh. Sheri Brown and Douglas Ridings from Seattle started with Joan Laage and have developed powerful solo practices and collaborations.

Mizu Desierto is a gifted performer and excels in creating fantastic performances. She is also a great organizer, even of untrained dancers, and is the creator and organizer of the festival. Syzygy Butoh joins us from Boulder, Colorado. Christina Braun has many years of Duncan training as well as studying with Katsura Kan, Anzu Furukawa, Yoshito and Kazue Ohno, Akira Kasai, and Yumiko Yoshiokao. She is founder of the SF Butoh Lab and organizer of the current SF Butoh Festival. Bad Unkl Sista is a long time collaborator with Mizu Desierto. She is creator of fantastic costumes. Wobbly is a collaboration of partners Eric Ferguson and Yulia Arakelyan who have broken barriers in movement for those beyond the conventional concept of the dancer's body. Theory1:Dance is the creation of Portland dancers Tracy Broyles and Meshi Chavez. Linda K. Johnson is a modern dancer, artist and organizer in Portland's art world.

Details on the performances may be found at waterinthedesertfestival.org. At the Portland Center for the Performing Arts Winningstad Theatre, 1111 SW Broadway. $25 each evening; students, artists & seniors $18; (both nights: $35 available at the PCPA Box office only)

June 25 Floating World Animation Festival

Portland is the Floating World sometimes, yukio. Edo novelist Asai Ryōi describes in his tale, Ukiyo Monogatari, a floating world in which Buddhist transcendence focused on the next life was replaced by a transcendence based upon living this life as if each day was the last. When Ryōi wrote, Kyoto was the capital, a city of creativity, craftsmaship, art, gardens and pleasure, maybe not unlike Portland.

The Floating World is also a comics store here. Tonight they offer an animation festival for your pleasure. There is a continuity between sit down cinema, music visuals and video art and this material spans all. Animators Yoshi Sodeoka, David O Reilly, Bruno Dicolla, Barry Doupe, Kirsten Lepore, Tim & Eric Wareheim, Eric Fensler, Doug Lussenhop, Devin Flynn, Aids 3-D and Hazel Hill produce psychedelic animations. Accompanied by musicians MEGA*CHURCH, Flaspar link and DJ Bobby Dangerous.

At Holocene www.holocene.org 1001 SE Morrison 8:30PM $7

June 25, 26, 27 String Quartets

I am not an expert in Euro-American classical music, but I was lucky to hear a lot working for the music school. It is magical to hear live in a good wood hall, it's a different experience once it passes through a microphone then the chains of compression to something like an MP3. The Guarneri Quartet has been playing together since 1964, with one personnel change, this is their last year. All teach at Curtis, America's finest school of classical music, they have the Philadelphia sound and 45 years of musical mind meld. Their last performance in the Northwest is at Reed College Thursday and Saturday. Friday a documentary film screens, with the quartet in attendance. Presented by Chamber Music Northwest cmnw.org Film at the NW Film Center 8 Friday $10-30, 7PM Performance Thursday and Saturday $10-43 8PM

June 24 French View on Store

Tonight Philippe Blanc speaks his thoughts on "The Strategy of Sur-Distinction: building a cathedral inside the megastore". Blanc is an artist with a mastery of computers in art, from game art to wry comments on our physical computing culture with an installation at Fresh Trouble. Bringing the unique French philosiphical viewpoint to Store for a Month www.storeforamonth.com 1216 SE Division 7PM Free

June 20 Milepost 5 Tea Speaks Lightness and Shadows

Milepost 5 has the graphic photo work of Justin Gorman; paintings by Anthony Conrad and Luke Heinrich; art by Kalina Torino and sculpture by Jessica Weitzel. At Milepost 5 www.milepostfive.com 900 NE 81st (go by MAX) 7PM-9 Free


In the alt-words arena, In Other Words bookstore hosts Michelle Tea. 8 NE Killingsworth 7PM $5-10


Meanwhile 2GQ presents a broad spectrum art event, Light and Shadows, incidental to the Solstace at Yoga Shala. Details at www.2gq.org Event at Yoga Shala N 3808 N. Williams 7PM-midnight $5-20

June 19 Fourteen30 Summer Group Show

Fourteen 30 Contemporary opens its summer group show this evening with Mike Bray, David Corbwtt, Hamlett Dobbins, Alex Felton, Corey Lunn, Jenene Nagy, Devon Oder, Nicholas Pittman, Patrick Rock, Jennifer Shimatsu and Nick Van Woert. It is a big show, meaning limited pieces by each artist. Don't be afraid to inquire about their other works. At Fourteen30 Gallery www.fourteen30.com 1430 SE 3rd 6PM-9 Free

June 18 Vinyl Store Nowhere Words

Stephanie Simek and Adam Keller are brilliant creatives and creators of Rererato, the space where experimental music and an experimental art gallery came together for a time.

Stephanie's art, sculpture, sound and performance facets become one in an event tonight. She has cut a vinyl disk with sounds from the "jungle, lovemaking, space, and hypnotic instructions" and built her own turntable to play it. Eight tone arms with needles connected to contact pickups sample the disk's tracks and are mixed by the artist into a unique soundscape tonight only.

At the FalseFront Studio www.falsefrontstudio.com 4518 NE 32nd 8PM Free


The Store for a Month is a fantastic maze of an arcade with art, small to large, you can afford - or even make in the studio with a collection of art-making material. Proprietor-creator John Brodie talks about the store in the context of Claes Oldenburg’s “The Store”, 1961-62 tonight. www.storeforamonth.com Talk at the Artemis Cafe 1235 SE Division, and visit to the the Store for a Month, 1216 SE Division, after. Talk 6PM, store 7 Free


The Nowhere collective is Matt McCalmont, Brennan Conaway and Charissa Nile, all of whom have done projects at the Center for Land Use Interpretation outpost in Wendover, Utah. It is a little nowhere, but at closer look yields rich creative ingredients. They speak tonight as part of Art Spark, and informal gettogether of creative art world people here. www.portlandartspark.com At Rontoms 600 E Burnside 5PM-7, short talk at 6 Free


Disjecta and Tin House present Arty Words II: music, art and readings by authors. Author and editor Jon Raymond, cofounder of Plazm and author of Half-Life, Livability and Old Joy joins Zak Smith, illustrator, writer for an evening of regional folk tales. Music by Quasi. At Disjecta www.disjecta.org 8371 N. Interstate 7:30PM $7