"Rethinking Balch Creek" - November 2nd - December 2nd 2023, at Gallery 114

 You all better SAVE THE DATE...please

I am now a member of an artist collective, Gallery 114 (well I joined them about 1 year ago), and I will be having my first show during the month of November - 2023!

My work is almost complete and ready to hang. I have been painting and sealing frames all week, while I let the last piece in the show, simmer. I'll recheck it Monday, to decide if it is finished.

My choice to focus on Balch Creek in Portland Oregon has led me to an unexpected effort to have the name of the creek changed. This effort has spurred me to read about the history of the area, and sadly, there is not as much information as is appropriate about the Indigenous people who were here FIRST for 16,000 years or longer.

Anyway - I will be writing more.

I have invited 2 of my favorite artists to join me in the exhibit:

Doug Anderson of Hillsboro, Or and Shelly Fredenberg of Eugene, OR.

I know for a fact that our work will play off each other and harmonize!

Here is a sneek-peek.

Symbiotic Union - by Doug Anderson

untitled_1 by Shelly Fredenberg

 

Flowing, dipping and spraying over the basalt - Nancy Helmsworth

a little more insight into my current show...that comes home Monday :(

That's the way it goes...especially if it is an installation. 

It is unlikely someone is going to come along and take the whole display home...but hey, make me an offer.

I made this video to document the work as it only exists this last month.

 - on the installation page - This show had an interactive activity - actually 3x activities to choose from. Please check them out

Of course the thinking is that the exhibit is a conversation starter - I personally don't have even a fraction of the insight about what a forest might mean to a person - so why not invite folks/viewers to share their thoughts - to show the multitude of connections people have with the forests. (not to overlook all the living creatures - but they cannot share).

Why not invite people to write to their elected leaders in support of forest management?

Why not asks viewers to share a special memory about their time in the forest?

So here is the video: the volume is low, so you might need to crank up your computer to hear the explanations.

 

Set up - What does the forest mean to me? What does the forest mean to you?

 Think about it.

The landscape of the Pacific Northwest is continually amazing to me.

I truthfully have gratitude for my decision to move to Oregon and the opportunity to spend lots of time in the mountains and the forest and the rocks and desert. 

It really is amazing...even though the human parts can be pretty frustrating at times.

More soon - 

But here is a video of me setting up last week.

 

No there wasn't an earthquake at the end...just not edited.

take care!

Show!!!!

 

 

I am having lots of fun hanging this show. Why am I hanging it? Well - I am only hanging my Installation. OMG - truthfully, this is so personally insightful and exhausting, but good. 

I have serious gratitude for the chance to take this personal risk and try something new in such a public way.

Here is an early pic of the process.

So much happening.... New Paintings photographed

 Thanks to Dan Kvitka...he does an amazing job.

As I am learning about these deconstructed paintings or better yet, I think of them of extension images. What do I mean - the one painting is just not enough to communicate to breadth of the concept, feeling.

Each one I construct/make/paint is bigger and bolder.

Below...they are shown with the most recent first, as the most recent is usually the one I am most excited about.

 

enjoying the "triptych" or "deconstructed" approach.....

 

more "deconstructed" images - fun to play around with this idea