Brenda Mallory for the PDX Window Project
Our whirlwind First Thursday found us dodging raindrops, never making it to half of our visual art to-do list. We started in the depths of the Gerding Theater at the Armory where Manya Shapiro’s wire dresses (mostly knit wire) hung in the Studio Theater lobby. At the Art Institute we spied through peepholes to see art by TJ Norris, Scott Wayne Indiana and others. TJ gave us a card for the show he’s curating at NAAU in April and told us not to miss Brenda Mallory performing in the PDX Window Project (we did miss her but saw evidence).
Manya Shapiro
At Elizabeth Leach Gallery Matt McCormick’s oversized projections of faded or abandoned roadside wonders of the American West were beautiful, sky-full, melancholy in their record of big hopefulness, and we’re so grateful to say: non-ironic (as would not have been the case in so many other hands). Hear Jack Kerouac speak the words, “But I want to be sincere.”
artist, curator, writer TJ Norris with Paul Adams at Art Institute
McCormick was in Moscow (the Moscow, not Idaho), but WW arts critic Richard Speer was there with a copy of the piece he’d just written on the Portland arts for art ltd. McCormick’s work will have to be revisited when the gallery is quiet as is the case with Alchemy, an installation by Christine Wallers and Steve Peters at the Portland Art Center. Last night the audio component of the installation of suspended brass bowls was obscured by a roomful of art tourists. We’re all for the end of Silence in the Face of Art, but an audio piece has its own set of rules. Which is why the Light & Sound gallery at PAC is becoming one of our favorite spots. A small, second floor space with protruding pipes that Gavin Shettler et al were going to use for storage, Light & Sound, thankfully, is one of the only places in PDX to “see” the kind of work you need to be able to hear.
WHAT TO DO NOW?