Cabinet
photographic construction, archival inkjet print
59 x 65 inches


Isaac Layman is known for his large format, hyper real images of objects from everyday life. His new body of work includes photographic constructions and curated objects. These works honor the idea of loss and hint through multiple perspectives to the possibility of the afterlife.


Funeral : Photographic Constructions| Isaac Layman
Opening | August 1 | 6-8 PM
August 1 - September 21, 2013
Elizabeth Leach | 417 NW 9th Ave. Portland, OR 97209






Yoonhee Choi | Roya Motamedi


Yoonhee Choi's elegant collages are notable for their unlikely materials. Drafting supplies from her days as an architect and city planner. In her hands, line tape, lettering sets, masking tape, and other supplies transform into expressive marks.

For rePLACING Choi has added delicate graphite lines, some unexpected material choice, and a dramatic shift in scale from 2.5 inches square to 11 x 30 feet.

Each of Roya Motamedi's abstract images is a meditation on place: "Afghanistan, Japan, New York, Mexico and Portland have created structure in me which carries through to my paintings" she says. This will be her first Portland show.

Born to an Afghan archeologist father and a Japanese art historian mother, Motamedi and her family spent time in both parents' homelands. At 18, she departed for college in the U.S. Later, with her husband and son, Motamedi lived in a small town outside Guadalejara, and for the last five years in Portland.

These intimately scaled oil paintings are glimpses into her wayfaring life. In her words "the colors of murals and dry earth at Bamiyan where Buddha once stood; the mossy temple of Kamakura; the sun of Mexico; the dusty road where dogs nap; and the color of now-the quiet gray of Portland".

Motamedi and Choi, share a fascination with place, an affinity for working small, and a playfulness with color and space.

rePLACING| Yoonhee Choi & Roya Motamedi
Opening | August 1 | 6-9 PM
Artist Talk | August 17 | 2-4 PM
August 1 - September 21, 2013
Blackfish Gallery | 420 NW 9th Ave. Portland, OR 97209





& there are more openings this First Thursday !

I received one of those extra excellent emails from RACC's Jeff Hawthorne today, indicating that they have changed the language of their upcoming project grants to specifically, "include curatorial projects."

Here is the new language from the last page of RACC's 2013-14 Project Grant Guidelines: "Visual Art: Projects in which the creation and exhibition of visual art is the primary focus. Objects, installations, site-specific or gallery-oriented works of art within any area of the visual arts which fall outside of commercial viability, are best suited to this category. Special exhibitions, curatorial projects and/or special presentations which expand the context of traditional or contemporary works of art are equally suited to this category. All projects must have a clearly developed plan for a tri-county public component."

This is a very important change and something we critiqued extensively last year as a shortcoming in citywide alternative space support. It is nice to know they are listening. Individuals and organizations both have until August 7th to submit their intent to apply. More info and application links here.

----------------------

You still have a few days to enter the Seattle Art Museum's $15,000 Betty Bowen Awards. What is interesting about the Betty Bowen is they generally try to recognize unrecognized artists who are doing noteworthy things and award smaller prizes to others as the panel sees fit. The deadline is August 1st. True, the $10 fee is a touch lame but it does get your work in front of some good eyes. More info here.

We will have Part II of our Venice coverage coming shortly but till then here are some good stories:

Not surprisingly, Roberta Smith thinks Robert Irwin's scrim piece at the Whitney is the yardstick to measure all other light and space art. I have to agree on Irwin being the best of the lot. Overall, I've experienced in Irwin's work a kind of art that invites the mind to push its perceptual acuity. It is extremely generous, whereas with Turrell, Wheeler etc... I always get this sense of pageantry in production (which is fine, just not my preference). The pageantry is often there with Flavin as well but at least with his work the use of very mundane light fixtures strips away the focus on production values the closer one gets to it. Overall, it bears repeating that Irwin is also the most intelligent human being I have ever met and the only art world denizen art world that can crack my top 10 (art isn't always about intellect... it is about perception, which sounds a lot like something Irwin would say). Basically, Irwin's work allows the viewers greater room for processing, whereas those like Wheeler and Turrell present a more pre-processed experience that owes more to stagecraft.

The unexpected Francis Bacon and Henry Moore connection.

Katherina Fritsch gets more than a little "cocky" in London.

The New York Times is pretty much making it official... it is the summer of Carol Bove. I've always liked her work but it has always had a slightly "curator art" aspect to it.... ie its strategies directly and indirectly point to the "moves" that curators routinely make when installing work. This turns it into a kind of institutional feedback loop, but the recent installation in the unfinished portion of the Highline seems to turn a corner... call it "developer art." The Highline installation seems to tap the palpable real estate potential inherent on the site... which positions Bove's work as a kind of advance survey party. Still, I'm pretty certain it is not some kind of art world Lewis and Clark expedition. For comparison, decades ago Gordon Matta-Clark with his Fake Estates and activities in Soho and Chelsea seems make Bove's worthwhile project appear like a somewhat quainter "reservations only" preview.

Sherrie Levine at PAM

It is the Fourth Friday of the month, which means that the Portland Art Museum will be free from 5:00PM - 8:00PM. It is hot and sunny so what could be nicer than a stroll through the park blocks before or after dinner and a lingering dash into the big art fort? The Sherrie Levine show is gorgeous, the best presented art exhibition in Portland for 2013 to date. An Ed Ruscha exhibition and the wonderfully designed Cyclepedia exhibitions are also must sees.

Walter De Maria's work in the 2013 Venice Biennale (photo Mack McFarland)

Walter De Maria, one of the great artists of the 20th Century has died.

Logically, he will be known for his greatest works such as The Broken Kilometer, The New York Earth Room and The Lightning Field but many who focus on them will miss the intensely deadpan humor you can see in works like High Energy Bar and Certificate in MOMA's collection. In many ways his works operate like games that have no discernible rules for playing them and are prime examples of Post WWII art that sought drain themselves of metaphor. This dislike of metaphor likely sprang from the intense use of it by the Nazis to seize power... and then the adoption of it into cold war schisms. There is a strong thread of Dada in so called minimalist works. Think of it as an oblique objection rather than an object.

Also, I've been to several of his land art pieces and the relentless sublime only adds to the existential humor... a bit like getting lost in the wilderness while getting lost in the art.

De Maria was also a composer and you can listen to his two best known pieces here.

Last week PORT published an interview where Marc Treib and I discuss his work (among other things). I will update this post as info develops.

*Update: The Dia Foundation confirms via tweet and here is the official New York Times obit.

Mandala
two adult sparrows, baby sparrow in nest, dried plants
& mixed media in modified wooden box
9 1/2" x 5 5/8" x 17 1/8"


Ampersand is pleased to present Memory / Magic / Wonder, Matt Hall's second solo show at the gallery. This exhibition consists of mixed media assemblages and large-scale ink on paper drawings. This work explores historic perceptions of the natural world and our sense of wonder & magical phenomena.

His inspiration stems from his childhood fascination with the agility of birds in flight, fish breathing under water & dogs navigating with their sense of smell. Hall's assemblages bring to mind curiosity cabinets of natural history museums, yet on a deeper level they allude to reliquaries. His pieces evoke spiritual practices in which direct interaction with animal parts is thought to transfer magical & totemic powers. Hall has also made a series of intricate drawings in an effort to show the multiple layers of his working experience. He shows a slight glimpse into the horror, strangeness, & magic of his process.



Memory / Magic / Wonder | Matt Hall
Preview Reception with artist | July 24th | 6-10 PM
& open late Last Thursday
July 24 - August 25, 2013
Ampersand Gallery & Fine Books | 2916 NE Alberta St., B, Portland, OR 97211




& there are more openings on the 25th & 26th . . .

The view from Sokol Blosser's new Cloepfil/AWA designed tasting room (all photos Jeff Jahn)

There are a handful of contemporary wineries that have made a major impression upon the architecture world. There is HDM's understated but large earthy pile in Napa, and Calatrava's far more balletic project in Spain, as well as Mario Botta's project in Tuscany.

Last week, at an event inaugurating Sokol Blosser's new tasting room building designed by Brad Cloepfil/AWA I was struck by the fact that Oregon and not just Portland was finally growing up in terms of design. Basically, Cloepfil has taken to punctuating the thesis statement sentences of Oregon's development whenever a new chapter begins to be written (the Pearl District and now wine country). That is a hell of a thing for a single building to accomplish, much less a winery.

Typically, wineries fetish a kind of anachro-tecture by trying to emulate European Gothic or Spanish Mission designs. Since all are derived from agrarian fortresses they seem better suited to shoot arrows or bullets from than drink wine. I suppose it just depends what you are into but the people who frquent here are called wine lovers not wine warriors for a reason... visigoths make horrible guests!

Sokol Blosser's situation is far more refined than that scenario and with their new tasting room it is clear that Cloepfil, who is now perhaps beginning to mature into a potentially great architect knew what was great about wineries... wine, companionship and the bucolic sublime.


Sokol Blosser's new tasting room by Allied Works


....(more)

Ex MOCA Director Jeffrey Deitch

Apparently Jeffrey Deitch has left MOCA and it looks like I was correct in predicting the embattled director would be out of the museum some around June 30th. It was a common sense prediction when major fundraising initiatives were being met without Deitch delivering the news. An official statement should be coming very soon. Honestly, I admire Deitch as a gadfly who challenged the academic and art world status quo but his skills did not synch up well with MOCA's challenges, which required a healer. Both will be better off without one another and I wouldn't be surprised at all if he quit the job. The art market is Deitch's ultimate stage.

Here is a timeline of the MOCA crisis of 2013.

*Update, we were one of the earliest to report this, now LA Weekly has confirmed and The LA Times indicates he indeed is choosing to leave the museum as they are about to reach certain key fundraising goals.

The New York Times was obsessed with outdoor art this weekend with not one but two fine articles. Tis the season.

Is Australia's 2.5 year old art royalties law benefiting indigenous artists.? It sure looks like it. For some reason the USA never ever considers this but as auction prices surge, even for living artists... it makes sense.

The Brooklyn Rail does its annual summer reading list.

Marc Treib

On the occasion of the Portland Japanese Garden's Noguchi exhibition this past May I had the honor of speaking with Marc Treib one of the world's foremost historian/critics on Noguchi, land art and the design of public spaces. He is the author of numerous books including, Noguchi in Paris: The UNESCO Garden (2003), Settings and Stray Paths: Writings on Landscapes and Gardens (2005) and Space Calculated in Seconds (1996). He is Professor of Architecture Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley. This is the final weekend for the Noguchi show (PORT also interviewed its curator) at the Portland Japanese Garden.



Noguchi at the Portland Japanese Garden (photo Jeff Jahn)

JJ: You are in Portland because of your relationship with Noguchi's work and the Japanese Garden's 50th anniversary show. In particular you focus on "the sites", be it a public space or former studio. I've been to the Houston sculpture garden, The Long Island Studio and the California Scenario. I haven't been to the UNESCO or the studio in Japan, which looks amazing. There is something about the Japanese garden format that laid the groundwork for his work which wasn't just object oriented sculpture but an environment for experience that speaks most to me.

MT: The California Scenario is the best one.... (more)

Art Spark is pleased to feature print making studios Atelier Meridian and Flight 64!

The event will include : Letter pressing, pulling screens on different materials, and coming up with abstract and comedic ways to print iconic Portland imagery. Flight 64 will also be celebrating their 10th Anniversary in the PDX community!

Atelier Meridian is a working print studio and artist community in Portland's Lower Albina neighborhood. It is an art studio with 24 hour access to the presses for members and goodwill to artists and the curious who drop in.

Founded in 2003, Flight 64 is a member-run non-profit print studio in the Alberta Arts District. It provides artist the tools they need to develop their work, there are facilities for screenprint, etching, relief and lithography, as well as a community of artists.


An evening of printmaking with Atelier Meridian and Flight 64 | Art Spark
July 18th | 5-7 PM
Vendetta | 14306 N Williams Ave, Portland, OR 97217






Lucy Skaer @ Yale Union


Lucy Skaer's new sculptures commissioned by Yale Union are not loud talkers. They are however overly informed. Put simply, they are lithographic limestone extracted from Iowa in April.

For 370 million years this limestone was considered nothing but rocks. In 1903 Clement Webster, a mining engineer, discovered the lithographic qualities of the stone. All of a sudden the stone had value and the area where the pieces were excavated was made into Lithograph City. For twenty years the slabs were quarried, however when metal printing plate technology developed the quarries closed, and the entire town had folded. The site is marked by rows of telegraph poles tracing what is now a cow pasture.

The terra cotta and lithographic limestone are laden with history and technological significance. They are materials that imply a certain kind of use, able to print checks and deeds, designating value. Today however, quarries mine the stone for its non-lithographic properties. They crush the stone into material for road-building or concrete production, and ignore the flat slabs suitable for printing.


Lucy Skaer
Opening Reception | July 19th | 7-9 PM
July 19 - September 12, 2013
Yale Union | 800 SE 10th Avenue, Portland, OR 97214





& there's more on the 19th and 20th !

Tyler Green reports that the Dia Foundation's three founding members have now publicly come out against the sale of works to fund expansion in Chelsea. This is very significant as the works that are on the chopping block are not minor pieces but works that would be the star of any collection. True, the Dia needs to remain an active and supple catalytic type of arts organization (one that made the Lightning Field and earth room possible) but auctioning off master works isn't the right way to accomplish this. The Dia, like many art nonprofits with a collection is somewhat a victim of its own successes... but let's take this as a time to reflect upon what is at the core of that success, Dia's respect and ongoing support for the intention of the artist that avoids engaging art as commodity at all costs. Historically, the Dia Foundation was the cultural organ that allowed less commercial forms like Land Art take form in middle-late 20th century. Turning its back on this tradition to have a greater physical presence in Chelsea is simply not a good idea. The Dia should fundraise for such physical plant expansion (if necessary) and look for ways to perpetuate the alternative space practices it pioneered in its golden years... rather than replicate Dia Beacon in Chelsea. New York needs the Dia as a catalyst with a history of integrity rather than yet another museum, forever serving its endowment.

Holland Carter reviews California's "State of Mind" at the Bronx Museum but the title also does something as odd as it is "familiar" by stating it is "Not Laid-Back." Well that is a start (the Paul Kos piece was exhibited in Portland last year at PNCA's Feldman Gallery). On the West Coast we get this all of the time from East Coasters. Look, our weather IS generally better but that doesn't mean we are always sunbathing. Having grown up in LA in the mid 70's to early 80's I can vouch for it having never been laid back. True that's what East Coasters did while vacationing but don't confuse the vacation experience with what the natives are doing (inventing world changing personal computers in their garages, pursuing scientific breakthroughs as well as hustling the next great fitness craze). This applies to Portland too, which is frequently described as very "chill" by East Coast publications. In my Portland Tribune Op Ed last year I laid out pretty clearly how there is an intensely moralistic style hedonism at work here that borders on the epicurean if it weren't also concerned with reinventing big picture way that Americans live. The real issue is the fact that places on the West Coast like LA and Portland are often the trendmakers and New York lost its monopoly status way back in the 60's. West Coasters didn't move to California and Oregon Territories because they were lazy and wanted it easier and more relaxing... they came here for freedom and opportunities and thus we should never be surprised when West Coasters are free thinking and opportunistic. Can we move on now?

Carbondale Illinois rediscovers a long lost Frank Lloyd Wright masterpiece.

Travis Nikolai


The Pacific Northwest College of Art MFA in Visual Studies class of 2014 presents an exhibition of works produced at the midpoint of candidates' studies. The work explores concepts of image, language, technology, and contemporary visual culture.

Participating artists:
Sarah Abbott, Stephanie Brachmann, Mary Mac Dahlke, John Dougherty, Mario Gallucci, Thomas Gamble, Jonathan Gann, Michael Horwitz, Leif Lee, Travis Nikolai, Mark Palmen, Anya Roberts-Toney, Lauren Seiffert, Jessie Spiess, Rachel Wolf, Richard York, and Stephanie Yu.



There is another opening in conjunction with Versus, taking place at the Vestibule within Disjecta.

Travis Nikolai's Rendering takes something raw and makes it usable. Waste tissue becomes lard, and raw data is assembled into image. We consume, gain sustenance, and reconstitute ourselves. Rendering, a performative installation, explores the use of digital environments for the purpose of remaking the self. Two bodies present themselves as fantastical forms, and together share a sacrament to crystalize their transformation. This act is an attempt to find kindred spirits, molecular affinity, an effort to bond into a new and tentatively cohesive substance. :)



Versus | PNCA First Year MFA Exhibition
Rendering | Travis Nikolai
July 13th - August 11th, 2013
July 13th | 6-9 PM
Disjecta ( & the Vestibule inside Disjecta ) | 8371 N Interstate Avenue Portland, OR 97217





& there are more openings on Saturday & one on Sunday too !

Stripes No. 2 (Page)
2005
oil and acrylic on paper
11.5" x 17.5", 34 pages bound

Join Portland artist John Brodie at the Portland Art Museum as he talks about his work.

Born in Portland, Brodie has been painting for more than 20 years, with explorations in book art, prints and multiples, mixed media, and sculpture. He was included in Disjecta's PDX2010: A Biennial of Contemporary Art, and from 1996 to 2006 was a member of the 333 Studios. In 2010, he opened Monograph Bookwerks with artist Blair Saxon-Hill. Brodie will have a solo exhibition at the Linfield College Gallery in April 2014. Brodie will discuss his fascination with Oliver Lee Jackson's Untitled No. 6 (1978).


Artist Talk and Happy Hour | John Brodie
July 11th | 6-8 PM | $5 member, $15 non-members, $12 seniors/students
Space is limited. Advance tickets are encouraged; available online or on site.
Portland Art Museum | 1219 SW Park Avenue. Portland, OR 97205






Sa Schloff

The Low-Residency MFA in Visual Studies presents an evening with Visiting Artist Sa Schloff. Sa Schloff's photographic work explores how we live in the present and past simultaneously. Her work has exhibited at The Museum of Contemporary Photography, Houston Center for Photography, Smith College Art Museum and published in The New Yorker, Harper's and Bomb Magazine and awarded a Chicago Arts Assistance Grant, LEF Artist's Grant, St. Botolph Foundation Grant. She received her MFA in photography from the School of the Art Institute and teaches at Columbia College, Chicago.


Visiting Artist Lecture | Sa Schloff
July 11th | 6.30-8.30 PM | Free for All, Open to Public
Museum of Contemporary Craft ~ The Lab | 724 NW Davis St. Portland, OR, 97209




& there are openings too !

Two prominent bloggers, Edward Winkleman and Tyler Green discuss the changing nature of visual art journalism in this worthwhile read. They are also fellow alumni of the 2007 Art in America roundtable on the changing face of digital arts writing.

I agree with Tyler most on one particular part, so much of what is written has become art market reportage and I've noticed that in general Americans have become even less interested in critical thinking than they were in the 80's (which weren't exactly the 40's-60's). Visual art writing has become mostly a brochure for art as product (a restatement of the artist's intent and an expository traveler's report) because that is what the art dealers and auction houses want. Perhaps that is why I've always taken a more British/argumentative approach of probing or testing assumptions and trying to compare the intent vs. outcomes, while expanding the frame of the discussion. I did get my start writing for Modern Painters magazine when it was London based and arguably the best art magazine of the 90's till the early aughts. Later it was sold and moved to NYC. In short, I simply don't write ad copy that masquerades as a critical review and I push PORT's other writers to do the same (even for announcements we prefer a little critical edge).

Overall, the discussion of the market creates a bubble-like complacency that I find disturbing... (more)

We've still got all of that content that was backed up in June heading your way (PORTsters tend to travel during the J months), just hold tight. Till then here are some links.

Peter Plagens asks if art schools can remember the "Great Unmentionable"... TALENT. He rightly points out where some pedagogy devolves into group therapy and how the old fashioned way doesn't work either. In many ways I see art schools as victims of their own ubiquitous success in the art world... spawning a mandarin, "Im ok, you're ok we are all ok," world that just looks for a cursory justification. It is fine but Ive also noticed how every single artist who has achieved lasting relevance has avoided academic group think. Even Beuys (who arguably set this new academia based on relativistic research in motion with his kind of earnest/sham hagiography) was an outlier by design at the Dusseldorf Academy where he was eventually dismissed. Without that tension of being outside the institutional stamp of approval he would not have mattered. What to do then as an artist...? Don't buy into the idea that an art institution actually defines what you or your work, while simultaneously not believing your own internal monologue or clique dialect of peers. Overall, talent is a bit of a misnomer... instead of describing raw ability, it is a kind of perpetual unease, which in certain individuals/groups leads to deeper understanding and facility. Others just tear themselves apart or embrace a kind of mediocrity... not because they are bad or have no talent but because they are simply too satisfied. I've found that all exceptional artists (Beuys, Judd, Smithson even 90's era Damien Hirst) are also exceptionally talented at critical thinking in their own idiomatic ways and it is why descriptive art writing doesn't get artists over the hump of mediocrity. In short, never believe your own spiel.

The Guardian has a review of Hans Ulrich Obrist's never ending Do It series in England.

Christopher Knight reviews the Pacific Rim show at OCMA. Noticeably there isn't a single representative from Portland (which has arguably the most active art scene north of San Francisco). I don't blame the curator Dan Cameron that much though, Portland's scene looks bland (or at least redundant to Seattle as far as home grown talent goes) at the institutional and gallery levels and only takes off in the hyperactive alternative spaces (Plagens reported on the alt scene last year). Without a guide one isn't likely to find it. In other words local curators and galleries need to step up their game in presenting relevant artists rather than a bland regurgitation of the idea that Portland art is purely/stereotypically craft and forest obsessed. We can't expect others from outside to see us as we really are if all we do is present unchallenged stereotypes. This may piss some people off but my argument is very sound. Our awards, museum shows and gallery offerings should be challenging accepted ideas rather than pandering to already held beliefs... especially since so many Portlanders merely write off the local infrastructure and jump directly to the more merit based international stage. In short, there a schism that needs addressing locally before those elsewhere can be expected to register it in large scale survey shows.

partial install of Sticks & Sage at PCC's Northview Gallery

For nearly a decade with high profile appearances in the 2006 Oregon Biennial (the last one at PAM), Haze Gallery (2004), The Art Gym and PICA's TBA Festival (2009)... capped off with a stunning show at Linfield College, Jesse Hayward has made his mark as Portland's most radical painter. His latest, Sticks & Sage at PCC Sylvania seems to be building on his two best shows (Linfield and TBA) setting up the potential to be "the show of the summer" in Portland. It suffices to say we have come to expect a lot from this onetime student of Karl Benjamin and former Sol LeWitt drawing apprentice (as child he helped execute a mural under the master's direction) so take note.

Here's the PR, "Whether it's with painted toothpicks stabbed into amorphous armatures or with hundreds of painted boxes stacked and re-stacked, Jesse Hayward creates art installations that are intended for direct audience manipulation. Utilizing repetition and ritual, he builds and paints objects in his studio that are then re-imagined through a collaborative, installation practice.

For his 2013 Summer Studio Residency at PCC Sylvania, Hayward will convert the North View Gallery into a visual laboratory with his installation, STICKS & SAGE. This project will take advantage of a deceptively simple technology: the zip-tie. Anyone attending the show will be presented a variety of painted sticks with pre-drilled holes and zip-ties with which to build freestanding structures. Again, direct audience participation will define the outcome of this work."


STICKS & SAGE | Saturday, July 6 - September 7
Special Collaborative Event & Opening Reception: Saturday July 6th 5:00 - 8:00PM
Gallery Hours: Monday-Friday 8:00-4:00, Saturday 12:00 - 4:00
The Artist Will Be On-Site Weekly: Saturdays 12:00 - 4:00
THE NORTH VIEW GALLERY | PCC SYLVANIA CAMPUS | 1200 SW 49th Avenue DIRECTIONS: Once on campus, follow signs to the Campus Bookstore. The Gallery is located in the North East corner of the Communications Technology (CT) Building which is directly adjacent to the Campus Bookstore.



detail from Stephanie Simek's Radio Room

This Saturday Place is presenting two artist talks, Stephanie Simek on her Radio Room and Jodi Darby will expound upon Safe & Sound? at 4:30PM at the ever unlikely venue Pioneer Place mall downtown.

Radio Room is literally a room transformed into an AM radio festooned with crystals and other hardware. Whereas, "Safe & Sound? is a documentary video installation by a collective of artists and community organizers concerned the Portland Police Bureau's use of excessive force and other methods of intimidation. Using innovative video and audio presentation methods, Safe & Sound? tells stories about police brutality and resistance to police brutality in the Portland community."


PLACE | third floor of the Pioneer Place Mall (Atrium Bldg)
Artist Talks: Saturday July 6 4:30PM | placepdx@gmail.com
Hours: Thursday - Sunday, 12:00-6:00 PM

Michele Russo
Untitled MR157
acrylic on canvas
70.5" x 60"



Draw, a new exhibiton by Dana Lynn Louis, marks her return to the gallery after several years pursuing a variety of projects in Bamako, Mali. Her latest work is particularly influenced by her time in Mali and her observations while there. She observed that the boundaries between life and death shift and flux, as do the distinction between reality and the imagination. The imagery in her work is suggestive of internal bodily systems and patterns of nature. It is part of her ongoing effort to consider the timeless systems of the body, the natural and constructed world, and their interconnections.


Michele Russo's work is stylistically simple in both form and line. In his work he focused on the human condition and the ideals of man. He explored humanity in both its whimsy and its foibles. He is best known for his paintings of the female nude in a variety of poses and settings. This exhibition presents a series of paintings that focus on paired female figures in a variety of meditative and exuberant poses.



Draw | Dana Lynn Louis
Considering Pairs, Works from the Estate | Michele Russo
July 3 - July 27, 2013
Opening Reception | July 3rd | 5-8 PM
Laura Russo Gallery |805 NW 21st Ave. Portland Oregon 97209







Mason
oil on canvas
20 x 20 inches



Barbara Sternberger's abstract paintings demonstrate her interest in discovering a harmony between her paint application and her lived experiences. The paintings reveal themselves during their making. For Confluence, Sternberger takes her exploration to a new level. She has created her own hand held paints with dry pigments, oil and wax to form an object which she holds and applies directly to the canvas. She then uses a brush to blend the color. It is in this process that a confluence of elements is born: the coming together of the application of color and the blending of the brush.


Christine Bourdette's new exhibition of sculpture and drawings is titled terra mobilis, in recognition of the literal and figurative shifting of the ground beneath our feet. A visit to the Grand Canyon prompted Bourdette to consider the earth's movement, and this state of constant change relates to human uncertainty. These works are Bourdette's mental mappings. These works refer to time passing and our shifting perceptions of such, they are glimpses of slippage, tracings of shifting orientation.



Confluence | Barbara Sternberger
terra mobilis | Christine Bourdette
July 3 - July 27, 2013
Opening Reception | July 3rd | 6-8 PM
Elizabeth Leach Gallery | 417 N.W. 9th Avenue Portland, OR 97209






& more openings for first Wednesday ... because Thursday is the 4th ... HAPPY 4th of July !

Cable stay CRC design, which not chosen

The big news this weekend (broken by the Tribune) was that the much hated Columbia River Crossing is dead. PORT has been on top of this from a design perspective and when they chose the cheapest and tunnel of ugly version instead of the more seismically safe and more elegant cable stay design I predicted the project would be killed.

If a project can't even get those like me who see a need for a well designed and seismically pro-active bridge on board they will have to wait for the Big One or say a 7.6 to damage the existing bridges enough to make a replacement happen. That's sad because people will likely die.

Here are some take-aways:

1)Next time get a major archictect and engineering firm on board, the project is just too complicated for a meat and potatoes design that nobody can buy into. The architect can juggle the massive tangle of interests and find a way to bring that feedback into the design. That would create buy-in. Design isn't about being "fancy", it is about finding elegant solutions to difficult problems and the CRC idea requires top level problem solving... not run of the mill overpass style solutions.

2)This requires a bigger carrot. IE the Federal Government will have to fund at least half to 65% of the project... to bring both states back to the table. 25% simply did not cut it and this is I-5 afterall, the most Important road on the West Coast.

3)The project should show off the incredible stetting and instill pride. It should also be the most seismically robust and environmentally sound solution available today. Right now that is a cable stay design with its greater sway and fewer piers. The clearances should also be high enough so as not to impact upsteam businesses to nearly a billion dollars in mitigation payouts. This should be a job builder not payola.

4)Some of the 170 million that has already been spent is not wasted but the next time the process is undertaken it will require a front door not the back room political dealing approach attempted this failed time.