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The Visual Codec Regional Newswire (Oct.2006)
A weekday aggregate of news, rants, raves, reviews, interviews, and more culled from rags, mags, blogs, slogs, journals, and diaries. In short, your cheat sheet to following the regional visual arts coverage that's worth following.
Tue.Oct.31.2006
Concrete Language (Review)
"Language is hardly a new presence in western art: words have been folded into images for centuries. The last hundred years, however, have revealed much of language's quite separate potential for formalist beauty, material presence, and intellectual provocation..."
Robin Laurence, The Georgia Straight
Crosshatching Pleasure (Reflection)
"Ashbery's poem begins with a straightforward verbal depiction of its subject, then veers into musings about time and perception. The painting makes regular appearances throughout the poem, but always it appears differently in Ashbery's convex mirror..."
Andrew Bleeker, The Stranger
Mon.Oct.30.2006
Knockout Work by a Trio of Young Artists (Review)
"Is Cohen exploiting herself? Hell, yes, and absolutely not. The fact that she can transform her wholesome good looks into heat means she could pass muster in the high-end porn world..."
Regina Hackett, Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Portraits with Personality (Profile)
"Newman usually worked under modest circumstances, bringing his own camera and tripod to his subject's personal environment. The early experiences helped formulate an approach to taking pictures, which included talking extensively to his subjects, learning about them before producing what amounted to a visual, biographical moment. That approach wasn't something Newman invented. But he helped make it common..."
D.K. Row, The Oregonian
Mon.Oct.23.2006 - Fri.Oct.27.2006
Visual Codec Regional Newswire on Hiatus
Fri.Oct.20.2006
Storyeum Has Officially Bit the Dust (News)
"After a drawn out bout of 'maybes' and 'I hope not's, there she goes..."
Heather Cleland, Beyond Robson
Thu.Oct.19.2006
Arty Smarties (Audio Interview)
An interview with the geniuses of Lead Pencil Studio.
Jen Graves, The Stranger
MK Guth: Growing Stories (Review)
"The effect is that the five-minute monologue plays out like a mid-afternoon talk show hostess laying bare her regrets. But in Guth's reworking of a Grimm's fairy tale, she uses Rapunzel's captivity in the tower as a metaphor for willful helplessness and flawed expectations..."
John Motley, The Portland Mercury
Wed.Oct.18.2006
Kyohei Sakaguchi: Zero Yen House (Review)
"Built by the homeless of Tokyo, Osaka, and Nagoya, zero-yen houses employ discarded and found materials, including pieces of wood and corrugated roofing, temple ornaments, blankets, shipping pallets, an umbrella, and those ubiquitous blue tarps..."
Robin Laurence, The Georgia Straight
Laura Russo Toasts 20 Years Atop Portland's Art World (Profile)
"But apart from sharing the virtues of superb craftsmanship and thoughtfulness, the artists in the Russo extravaganza emphasize how and why the gallery has distinguished itself from its peers..."
D.K. Row, The Oregonian
Art World Riveted by 'Runway' (Trend)
"Artists who have cable make room on their couches for those who don't. Unless held early in the evening, art openings aren't happening on Wednesday nights. Nobody would come..."
Regina Hackett, Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Tue.Oct.17.2006
Broken Promises? (News)
"It may be a surprise to learn that Seattle Art Museum has plans to include Native American art in its sculpture park project. Or it once did..."
Sue Peters, Seattle Weekly
Mon.Oct.16.2006
The Goddamn Bears Are Off the Streets (Rant)
"You cannot imagine my delight to read that the noxious Spirit Bear collective passed off as public art is being brought inside. Yes, it has come time for them to be auctioned off to philanthropists whose hearts are better than their eyesight..."
Degan Beley, Beyond Robson
Fri.Oct.13.2006
Chris Johanson to show at PAM (News)
"One of the biggest complaints that I hear about the Portland Art Museum is that they pay no attention to local artists, outside the Oregon Biennial. Sometimes this is a way of complaining that PAM's simply not showing the complainer's own work, but by and large, it is a valid gripe..."
Chas Bowie, Blogtown PDX
Jesse Edwards Breaks all the Rules Except One (Profile)
"Jesse Edwards lives in a downtown studio that is packed with his paintings. They lean in stacks and protrude in piles. His bed is a sack on the floor, which is littered with fast food packaging, art books and objects he uses for his still lifes, including a skull, a skateboard, pop cans, bongs, porn magazines, shredded dolls, a toy cop car and the odd piece of fruit. He has a computer covered in graffiti on a wrecked table beside half an office chair, foam spilling out, that he found on the street. Creature comforts are not his thing..."
Regina Hackett, Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Thu.Oct.12.2006
Chris Crites (Interview)
Our favorite Listings Editor spills all about his 'real' job on an Italian artblog...
Claudio Parentela, The eXTra finGer
Wed.Oct.11.2006
Budgets Cuts Strand Local Arts (News)
"The $4.6 million chopped from the Museums Assistance Program, which provided key funding for special projects and travelling exhibitions developed by institutions ranging from the Vancouver Museum to the Burnaby Art Gallery, is nothing short of 'devastating' to that sector, says Heather Redfern, executive director of the Alliance for Arts and Culture..."
Brian Lynch, The Georgia Straight
Tue.Oct.10.2006
Artstar Radio with Alice Wheeler (Audio Interview)
Listen online or download the archived mp3.
Eva Lake, KPSU Portland
Do-It-Yourself Curators Create Art Opportunities (Trend)
"He asked a variety of hot artist friends to root through storage and donate a piece they didn't plan to sell. The art was available free, but not just anybody could acquire it: In order to participate in the drawing, you had to prove you had been overdrawn at the bank during that year. Hence the title, which upended the usual relationship between money and art..."
Regina Hackett, Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Mon.Oct.09.2006
Massive Change (Rant)
"Just what is it with contemporary curators and their ostentatious promises? Why must they wax lyrical about their exhibitions, pretentiously touting them as the next big thing? Aren't they overdoing it just a little? On the other hand, who can really blame them? Everybody deserves some recognition for hard work, and art does not have the reputation as a source of inspiration for naught. But the slogan, which was plastered on the wall in bold-faced black when I entered the Vancouver Art Gallery (VAG), borders on massive egomania..."
Lara Bullock, F Newsmagazine
Fri.Oct.06.2006
Brightness Falls (Review)
"What Euan Macdonald does is simple: He looks in the other direction. From aboard a helicopter during sunset, he turns his camera to the east, away from the beauty, sense, action, and heroism of the closing eye of the sun. Instead, his camera captures grainy footage slipping from gray to black in nine silent minutes spent flying over fields, houses, and dim sparkling distant lights whose glow becomes almost frantic as the monstrous darkness swallows any earthly object without an electrical twinkle..."
Jen Graves, The Stranger
Thu.Oct.05.2006
Galleries try Landing at Jupiter (Review)
"The fair has been characterized in the past by many smaller, more affordable works, often pinned to the walls without frames. It reflects the youth of Portland's art scene, but also its casual lack of pretension. Yet there were also works here by legendary artists such as Chuck Close, Robert Rauschenberg and William Eggleston..."
Brian Libby, The Oregonian
Wed.Oct.04.2006
A Fine Affair (Review)
"The third time was a charm for the annual AFFAIR @ the Jupiter Hotel (Sept. 29-Oct. 1), Portland's premier contemporary-art fair. Operating like a well-oiled machine, the AFFAIR filled more than 30 rooms at the retro-chic Jupiter Hotel with art in many media from across the country..."
Richard Speer, Willamette Week
Tue.Oct.03.2006
Artstar Radio with Carolyn Cole (Audio Interview)
Listen online or download the archived mp3.
Eva Lake, KPSU Portland
Mon.Oct.02.2006
Paint Hits the Vancouver Art Gallery (Blip)
"Now that art movements have gone from modernist, past post-modernist, and through the many digital realms, sometimes it's nice to have a look back at the basics..."
Degan Beley, Beyond Robson
