Before the pandemic happened, nail artist Asa Bree was in what she describes as a “very toxic” salon situation. ”COVID kind of caused that to implode,” she says. “I had a very strong Instagram and social media presence at that time. It occurred to me that it can all crumble very quickly, especially with all […]
Visual Art
Posted inCulture
Portland’s Next Top (Architectural) Model
New installation City of Possibility offers a big picture of the city’s urban planning history via tiny buildings.
In the early 1970s, Portland design reviewers used a miniature (yet massive) model of downtown to consider proposed construction projects. City of Possibility gives Portlanders the rare opportunity to see the 18-foot by 22-foot city in all its glory—along with a bunch of other fascinating models, both literal and conceptual.
Posted inCulture
What Art Goes With Your Job?
Make art, truth, and beauty
work for you for a change.
When I was in preschool, my mom took a writing class at the local community college. Then she took it again. And again. The whole time I was growing up, she was taking some iteration of the class. Her writing crew was an eclectic bunch, very different from the goody two-shoes that she hung out […]
Posted inVisual Art
Beatlemania Through the Eyes of a Beatle
Paul McCartney Photographs 1963–64: Eyes of the Storm provides the ultimate insider’s view of a singular cultural event.
Imagine you’re a Beatle. After years of small, grinding successes in the Liverpool-London music scene, you’re riding a wave of international Beatlemania: screaming girls, luxe hotels, entourages, motorcades, and hundreds of photojournalists. You’re in the eye of a storm—willingly, but a storm nonetheless. A new gorgeously-produced and hung photography exhibit Paul McCartney Photographs 1963–64: Eyes […]
Posted inFall Arts 2024
You Can’t Capture Arlene Schnitzer’s Vast Art Legacy
Fountain of Creativity tries to show how a growing city
and artistic scene developed and evolved.
The Fountain Gallery was a major hub of Portland’s downtown arts scene for much of the mid-20th century. In 1961, Arlene Schnitzer (yes, the same Arlene Schnitzer that the theater is named after) opened the venue, which hosted art shows, lectures, poetry readings, and performances. It wasn’t Portland’s first art gallery, but Arlene and her […]
Posted inTBA
TBA Review: If You Want Solitude, Stay Far Away From Club Alive
Kye Grant’s monthly, genre-fluid event blends participatory art and dance parties.
“The apparel is quite special,” my friend Rose mused. She was right. While awaiting entry into Club Alive, my field of vision swam with humans sporting face gems, organza, velvet bell bottoms, pink pleats, and patent leather. The monthly, genre-fluid performance party helmed by artist-experimenter Kye Grant [who—full disclosure—has written for this publication -eds] has […]
Posted inVisual Art
Carson Ellis Draws a Snapshot of Old Portland in Her New Diary Memoir, One Week in January
While looking through some old boxes a few years ago, Carson Ellis found several pages of diary entries from 2001, documenting her first week living in Portland. The journals detailed the 25-year-old Ellis new life in the city, as she moved into a “scrappy but cheap and fabulous” Southeast Portland warehouse, smoked a lot of […]
Posted inVisual Art
The Mercury’s Time-Based Art Festival Picks
Don’t miss the dance parties, itty bitty music collages, and complete cacophonies—planning your TBA 2024 itinerary is an art form in itself.
In keeping with its perma-tentative title, Portland Institute for Contemporary Art (PICA)’s annual experimental performance fete has regularly seen major shifts with each year’s iteration. But one thing we can always count on is the Time Based Art (TBA) festival’s massive lineup of cutting edge work. Which makes planning your TBA itinerary an art form […]
Posted inTBA
Portland’s Favorite Experimental, Time Based Art Festival Bounces Back
On the TBA 2024 schedule: weird music, Black horror, and an opera about the prime meridian.
The schedule for Portland’s favorite experimental art festival, TBA, dropped this week. After last year’s slow roll out, the fest returns with three weekends of weird music, Black horror, and an opera about the prime meridian.
Is the schedule for PICA’s Time Based Art festival part of the fest? (*°ω°) And other mental gymnastics associated with Portland’s favorite experimental art fete.
Posted inTheater & Performance
Portland Drag Clown Carla Rossi Climbed Jeffery Gibson’s Installation at the 2024 Venice Biennale
Artist Jeffery Gibson invited Carla Rossi to climb his installation on the US pavilion.
The Venice Biennale is one of the most prestigious art exhibitions in the world. So we were pleased as punch to see Portland drag clown Carla Rossi climbing the US pavilion.
https://www.portlandmercury.com/queer-guide-2024/2024/06/13/47253765/a-portland-drag-clown-in-residence-at-the-venice-biennale
Posted inVisual Art
Future Now at Portland Art Museum Unboxes the Future of Sneakers
On March 30th, the Portland Art Museum will raise the curtain on Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicks, a new exhibit about the various futures imaginable for the world’s most versatile sporting footwear. Our city is the touring exhibition’s first stop following its premiere at the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto. This feels appropriate […]
Posted inVisual Art
Spring 2024 Gallery Shows in Portland: A Chorus of Art About Work
Looking at this season of spring gallery shows, we are reminded that art is all at once political, speculative, and personal. At the top of our list are interesting curations: Jeremy Okai Davis presents work by his contemporaries at Nationale, and Morgan Ritter pairs up painstaking hand-punctured cotton abstracts by Ash Wyatt with Jean Isamu […]