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c3Category — Arts & Culture
Posted inSpring Arts 2025

Tootsie Answers the Call

With a lineup featuring gender-bending roles and progressive themes, Stumptown Stages leans into timely conversations.
Avatar photo Robert Ham

The Mercury covers culture & art because we think all its various forms are—quite plainly—how people understand one another. Conversations about food, music, performance, and “weird” installation art provide touchstones to deepen friendships, create new connections, and better understand one another. If you appreciate the Mercury’s interesting and useful news & culture reporting, consider making […]

Posted inSpring Arts 2025

Portland’s Unexpected Book Corridor

Two of the city’s most beloved literary institutions—Literary Arts and Mother Foucalt’s—just opened bookstores across the street from one another on SE Grand.
Avatar photo Suzette Smith

The Mercury covers culture & art because we think all its various forms are—quite plainly—how people understand one another. Conversations about food, music, performance, and “weird” installation art provide touchstones to deepen friendships, create new connections, and better understand our world. If you appreciate the Mercury’s interesting and useful news & culture reporting, consider making a small monthly contribution […]

Posted inSpring Arts 2025

Swiftly Tilting Portland

Climate journalist Emma Pattee wrote a funny fiction novel that unfolds like a non-fiction nightmare.
Avatar photo Suzette Smith

The Mercury covers culture & art because we think all its various forms are—quite plainly—how people understand one another. Conversations about food, music, performance, and “weird” installation art provide touchstones to deepen friendships, create new connections, and better understand our world. If you appreciate the Mercury’s interesting and useful news & culture reporting, consider making a […]

Posted inSpring Arts 2025

Torrey Peters’ Stag Dance Poses the Right Questions About Gender at the Right Time

A new collection from the author of Detransition, Baby blurs the lines between trans and cis.
Avatar photo Blair Stenvick

The Mercury covers culture & art because we think all its various forms are—quite plainly—how people understand one another. Conversations about food, music, performance, and “weird” installation art provide touchstones to deepen friendships, create new connections, and better understand one another. If you appreciate the Mercury’s interesting and useful news & culture reporting, consider making a small monthly contribution […]

Posted inSpring Arts 2025

Meet the 2025 Mercury Geniuses of Comedy

Ten of Portland’s hottest stand-ups—with special guest Mohanad Elshieky!
Avatar photo Wm. Steven Humphrey

The Mercury covers culture & art because we think all its various forms are—quite plainly—how people understand one another. Conversations about food, music, performance, and “weird” installation art provide touchstones to deepen friendships, create new connections, and better understand one another. If you appreciate the Mercury’s interesting and useful news & culture reporting, consider making […]

Posted inSpring Arts 2025

Your Guide to Spring 2025 Arts Events in Portland

Portland Panorama, TEDxPortland, and More
Avatar photo EverOut Staff

Spring in Portland is a slow unfurl. Cherry blossoms dust the sidewalks, rain gives way to longer stretches of sun, and the city shakes off its winter hibernation. As the season shifts, so does our cultural calendar. This spring, you’ll find a fresh wave of performances, festivals, and big ideas, from Alton Brown Live: Last […]

Posted inTheater & Performance

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf Is Cruel and Perfect From the Start

Portland Center Stage’s breathtaking ensemble cast reveals the ties that bind and cut.
Avatar photo John Rudoff

You’ll find Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? on every list of great American plays. Edward Albee’s 1962 masterpiece of biting remarks and weaponized adultery is vicious and hilarious, timeless and worth your time. But while plenty of companies take on the challenge, Portland Center Stage has mounted a production that puts even the 1966 Academy […]

Posted inHear In Portland

Hear In Portland: Albina Music Trust’s Soul Assembly, Jakki and the Pink Smudge, Keeks’ EP Release

Read all about what’s on the music forecast with Hear In Portland.
Avatar photo Jenni Moore

Between repeatedly streaming the viral, politically-minded hit “HGT (Hostile Government Takeover),” and that soul-shattering, mind-altering performance by Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande that opened the 2025 Oscars, there are a few local updates you will want to check out. In addition to Project Pabst and Pickathon announcing their summer lineups, it’s worth considering copping tickets […]

Posted inMercury Music Picks

Mercury Music Picks: Experimental Film and Performance, Local Album Release Parties, and Lots of Dancable Punk

There’s too much going on this week to even list, sheesh! 
Avatar photo Nolan Parker

Spring is springing, festival announce season is in full swing, and there are so many shows popping off in Portland, it’s bananas! As ever, the Portland Mercury has rounded up what, in our humble opinions, are the best music happenings in town that we believe are worth your time, coin, and attention. Go to as […]

Posted inEverOut

The Top 43 Events in Portland This Week: March 10–16, 2025

Heart, Karen Russell, and More
Avatar photo EverOut Staff

While you work on adjusting your sleep schedule this week, we’ve got the rest of your schedule covered with top-tier event suggestions from Heart to Kelsea Ballerini and from Everybody Reads 2025: Javier Zamora to Karen Russell.  MONDAY FOOD & DRINK Spring Daze: Norah, Unwind, Fossil & Fawn, WildertonJoin Veganizer for this “mind-bending” menu presented […]

Posted inThe Trash Report

THE TRASH REPORT: John Goodman Got Hurt, Post Malone Got Single, and Ray-Gunn’s Bro Put the Cry in Crypto Boy

Let’s hold hands and jump into this pail of garbage-y gossip together!
Avatar photo Elinor Jones

Hello, and welcome to the Trash Report! I am Elinor Jones and I desperately miss the hour we just lost. It was the hour that was going to fix everything, I just know it. This week is going to be super rainy and I’m glad, because every year I think I’m going to learn how […]

Posted inNewsblast!

YOUR SUNDAY READING LIST: City Settles with Attacked Journalists, a Problematic Safety Response Team, and a Reminder to Sell Your Tesla

Avatar photo Wm. Steven Humphrey

GOOD MORNING, SUNDAY! It’s the perfect time to catch up on some of the great reporting and stories the Mercury churned out this week! (PRO TIP: If you despise being “the last to know,” then be one of the first to know by signing up for Mercury newsletters! All the latest stories shipped directly to […]

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