Installation art is perhaps Portland's strongest genre but it is usually up to non profit spaces to make it possible. In the past 10 years there has been an explosion in alternative spaces but it has also been accompanied by a deepening commitment of college galleries to adventurous programming. This week two of Portland's best outlying college spaces are hosting large scale installations by two of Portland's most promising artists, Damien Gilley at PCC Sylvania and Crystal Schenk at Linfield College.


Damien Gilley

Since taking over PCC Sylvania's wonderfully brutalist North View Gallery, director Mark Smith has imbued the program with a sense of adventure (which we experienced last month with Arcy Douglass). This month Damien Gilley, another artist of great expectations takes his turn with Data Systems Plaza, presenting large-scale sculptural works, wall drawings, and architectural structures.

According to the PR: "Data Systems Plaza appropriates and transforms the gallery into a temporary showroom exhibiting sculptural experiences from a fictitious company. Drawing influence from science fiction and technology developments of the early digital era, the works reference an industry that posits advanced, speculative, and futuristic products and phenomena. Within a meandering architectural framework, the works allure the viewer with controlled visual spectacles while rendering the experience of materiality ambiguous. The exhibition aims to expand upon the ephemeral characteristics of information systems through the employment of compartmentalized areas, perceptual structures, and the concept of hidden architecture."

This will also be the last time to catch Gilley stateside for awhile since he will be in residence at ARE Enschede in the Netherlands in summer 2012, culminating with an exhibition at Tetem Kunstruimte.

North View Gallery | Data Systems Plaza
Reception/Artist Talk: Wednesday, April 4, 2-4pm
Dates & Hours: April 3 - 27 | 9am to 5pm, Monday through Friday
Portland Community College Sylvania | CT Building 12000 SW 49th Ave




In the past 5 years Crystal Schenk has shown a penchant for large and more intimate scaled installation work but this restaging of her Master's Thesis work "Artifacts of Memory" at Linfield's epic space will likely be both grander and more intimate than the first version. It's rare that a Portland artist restages student work but this seemed to beg for a fuller realization and because it is spring a show comprised of flowerpetals seems very timely. It is a good time to visit the wine country too.

According to the PR: "Schenk's room-sized installation in the Linfield Gallery embodies the cloud of loss, and like fading memory, lacks defined edges or recognizable forms. The work contains 1,100 magnets covered in pods made from silk flower petals - half the magnets hung from the ceiling and the other half tethered to the floor using nearly invisible wire, with a one-inch gap at eye level. The delicate rising and falling elements create an elegant tension, and the result of the pairing is an ethereal cloud of objects hovering almost magically in space, with a plane of empty space lying between them."

Reception: April 7 3 - 5PM
Dates & Hours: April 2 – May 5 | M-F 9AM to 5PM, and Sat 12 to 5PM
Linfield College | James Miller Fine Arts Center |McMinnville OR | (503) 883-2804