First Thursday at AI of Portland
The Art Institute of Portland put on a great show for their in house gallery this month, curated by Nemo’s own Todd Templeman. On display was the the art of painter and tattoo artist Jacob Redmond, graphic / collage artist Nubby Twiglet, funiture artist Dave Seoane, painter and exhibitionist Dustin Flath a.k.a. “Nudist” and photographer Carlin Sundell. Make sure to stop in if you find yourself in the NW neighborhood of Portland to take a look. Click ahead to view more. (more…)
Great First Thursday Show
Upper Playground is hosting Travis Millard and Mel Kadel for First Thursday this month. They’re work is incredible. This town is really stepping it up in terms of art! Check it out at 23 NW 5th Ave. tonight. Check out more about them on Fecal Face.
Untitled by Travis Millard
Foot Bath by Mel Kadel
Great curation…
The Ones We Love is a project highlighting young and talented photographers from around the world. Each artist contributed six photographs of the person(s) who is most important to them, taken outdoors in a natural setting. The goal of the website is to portray the people who are loved, cherished, and inspirational to these artists, and also showcase the differences and similarities in the photographs each of them took within the same guidelines.
I love the idea of a relational art and making biographical art through the places and people nearest to you.
Goldmine Shithouse in SF
A good friend of Nemo’s, Mr. Jonny Fenix, is a part time collaborator in the art collective Goldmine Shithouse. They get together once in a while and spend a week or two in a debaucherous art-making mode, then have an exhibit. Their latest exhibit, Russian Reduction, happened last week in SF and it sounds like it went very well. Enjoy the pictures and watch the making of Carny Hands.
Lucky you…
So, here’s a little secret (maybe not too much of a secret)… I’m a big nerd. I am into psychoanalytic theory, in particular, trauma and affect theory. I have to say it comes in very handy as a lens with which to view the art and photography I write about on this site. And, if you’re a nerd like me and you’re in the UK right now, you are in luck! You have just a few short days to get to the Camden Arts Centre to view the infamous Chantal Ackerman’s latest installations. She is showing To Walk Next to one’s shoelaces in an Empty Fridge (2004), that she created based on her grandmother’s diaries of the holocaust. What interests me most about this work is her ability to simultaneously present the cathartic telling and witnessing of that traumatic experience in the same frame. She does this by splitting the frame and in one she and her mother read the diary at the kitchen table, while in the other, a reenactment of what they are reading occurs. Visually it represents the fracture that occurs in the psyche after a traumatic experience and on a deeper level, how it effects the generations to come.
The Preservation of Fleeting moments by Adrienne DeBoer @ StudioNemo
Adrienne DeBoer Photo Show at StudioNemo from alex mertz on Vimeo.
On 9/5 StudioNemo was proud to present Adreinne DeBoers “The Preservation of Fleeting Moments”. Adrienne explains that she is compelled to create a memory that will be transformed into the tangible before it is too late. Were excited to have her work on our walls, come in to check it out this month.
First Friday Gallery Show
Friday 09/05/08
6-10PM
1875 SE Belmont Ave.
Please join us for First Friday at Nemo. We are excited to present the work of photographer Adrienne DeBoer. DeBoer explores memories through the topography of her childhood. Her work gives the viewer glimpses into issues of emotion, forgetting, tradition and collective realities. While a dark humor runs through the dreamy landscape, the more tangible reality of disconnection between childhood and adulthood; and the consciousness of city dweller vs. rural inhabitant are present throughout the work.
MOCC in Portland
I am totally in love with the Museum of Contemporary Craft. They have had some great shows since they opened. This one is particularly interesting…
“War Bowl” by Domic Wilcox
Manuf®actured opens this Thursday at MoCC. The exhibition explores the use of “labor-intensive craft practices” to take apart and remold mass produced objects and materials. The wide variety of work examines questions of “overabundance, appropriation, [and] reuse.” MoCC will, as always, stay open for the First Thursday artwalk next week.
Exhibition • August 28, 2008 - January 4, 2009
Lecture • 6:30pm • September 18
Museum of Contemporary Craft • 724 NW Davis • 503.223.2654
Poster show at Nemo
Stapled and Torn showcases some of the most talented poster artists in the NW. Come by and check it out tomorrow Friday August 1st from 6pm-10pm at 1875 SE Belmont.
Roger Ballen Show
Nemo’s photo team took a little field trip yesterday to the opening of the Roger Ballen show, at Quality Pictures. A PhD in Geology led him to South Africa, where he began taking photographs of rural disenfranchised Afrikaners. His work is beautiful, disturbing, darkly humorous, and sad. I think good art makes you feel…happy, sad, uncomfortable, etc. In Ballen’s work discomfort is a primary emotion. You can’t escape the looming question of exploitation and ethics, which in a way, makes his art even more engaging. Does his work spur awareness and action, or is it art for art’s sake- we look, feel and look away?
Incredible Art Show - Eric White
QUALITY PICTURES in Portland, Oregon presents
ERIC WHITE New Paintings - Opening Reception
Thursday, April 3rd, 6-9 pm
On display through May 31st.
QUALITY PICTURES916 NW Hoyt Portland, OR 97209
503.227.5060
http://www.qpca.com/exhibitions/2008_2b
Michael Cogliantry Show
I had the pleasure of going to the Michael Cogliantry opening last night and wanted to share some of the experience. The show was hosted at a relatively new art/music space in pdx called Rererato, around 42nd and Killingsworth. The artists that run the space, Adam Keller and Stephanie Simek, moved to Portland from New Jersey about 6 months ago and from the looks of their myspace page they are more connected in the indie art scene than any old timer in Portland I know. Keep your eye on them; I feel great things to come in the future.
Adam was a close friend of Michael’s in college and subsequently became the subject of many portraits, most notably the disgruntled bellboy (as seen here-http://www.womenshealthmag.com/you-and-improved/tips-for-booking-a-hotel-room).
The highlight of last night’s event -besides the amazing photography, of course- was the white linen suit on display that Michael wore every single day of his travels through India. As witnessed in his photographs, the suit drove approx. 2,000 km in a motorized rickshaw, hiked through a banana plantation, climbed out of a giant dirt hole and suffered the wrath of some delicious dal. Needless to say, the end result is a slightly less white (aka brown) and smelly suit. Michael mentioned to me that towards the end of the trip he was a little embarrassed walking into a hotel with it on. Lucky for me, the suit’s smell was covered by copious amounts of Nag Champa at last night’s festivities. Sadly, I don’t have a photo of the suit from the exhibit.
From Portland, Michael is heading to Nome, Alaska for his next project. Nome is an old gold rush town and the closest US town to Russia. Speculatively, the name came from a misspelling on an old map that beckoned for a town as yet un-”NAME”-ed. Michael told me he’s thinking snowscapes and bar scenes for his next project and noted that his contact in AK offered up helicopters and sled dogs. I can’t wait!