Archive / review

Alyson Provax at Wolff Gallery

Wolff Gallery is featuring the print work of Alyson Provax through the month of June. This is a show you need to see in person because photographs of the prints don’t do them justice.

The show is “a meditation upon the expansiveness of the universe and eerie encounters with the unknown.” There are a number of marbled prints that have a planetary vibe interspersed with some text prints with found phrases such as “I felt the sound more than heard it”. Sounds a bit odd, but when you’re in the gallery it all just works together.

The two highlights were Diagram 50 and Diagram 51, both hanging in the front room. Both are silkscreen monotypes, one on Khadi, the other on St. Armand. Instead of being framed or mounted on birch, these free hang slightly away from the wall with the use of magnets. The papers have a wonderful texture and with the cut outs and layering of the marbled print underneath it creates a floating effect.

The show is wonderfully cohesive without ever seeming too saturated. The variety in the papers and mounting techniques holds your interest as you move through the space and there are just enough of the small text works to shake it up.

Wolff Gallery is located at 618 NW Glisan Street in Portland, Oregon. They are open Friday and Saturday from 1-5 pm. The ALyson Provax show runs through July 3.

Martha Rosler at the Seattle Art Museum

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Red Stripe Kitchen, 1967-72, Martha Rosler

Go check out the Martha Rosler exhibition at the Seattle Art Museum. It’s always a delight to see a fabulous feminist artist who is not only still making relevant work but also completely ahead of her time when looking back on older works.

The exhibition focuses on 2 major works, House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home executed between 1967-1972 and House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home, New Series from 2004-2008. View them on Rosler’s website because they’re quite devastating to see from a country that has erased war images so thoroughly from our news coverage.

There are also a few videos set on low screens with headphones and couches for viewing. The absolute highlight of the show for me was A Budding Gourmet from 1974, which could have come straight out of a foodie magazine today with such great quotes as “will enhance me as a human being”, “make eating into an experience”, “Delicious and exotic (on food in South America)”, and “The Indians are very spiritual”.

It’s almost as if Rosler foresaw the explosion of both eating as morality in 21st century America and the fetishization of “other” cultures which white guys then “elevate”. How many times have you heard that phrase on the ol’ Top Chef Master Chef Pok Pok circuit when referring to the food that women of color typically cook?

Martha Rosler: Below the Surface runs through July 4 at the Seattle Art Museum.

Sherry Markovitz at Greg Kucera Gallery in Seattle

Polar Bear head by Sherry Markovitz at Greg Kucera Gallery

Polar Bear by Sherry Markovitz at Greg Kucera Gallery

I recently had some time in Seattle and was thrilled to visit the Greg Kucera Gallery while I was there. Time to Take a Walk by Sherry Markowitz has just opened and is perfect for an early summer show.

The show is split with a number of large gouache on cotton paintings featuring dogs and three dimensional beaded animal heads. The loose painting style is complemented by the unstretched and unframed cotton, which gives each work a light and airy feeling. The beaded animal heads anchor the show with a feeling of heaviness compared to the breezy paintings.

Welded steel balloon by Edward Wicklander

Edward Wicklander at Greg Kucera Gallery

Don’t miss some gems also currently on display in the back and upstairs. There is a fabulous pair of Edward Wicklander welded steel balloons upstairs, positioned to look like they’ve just floated up from the first floor.

There’s also a great Margie Livingston entitled Crumpled Silver Painting on Shelf in the back room. I love paint as a sculptural material. This one reminds me of the Nancy Lorenz pieces at PDX Contemporary this past month. Livingston has the next show at Greg Kucera Gallery which runs July 7 through August 20. The Seattle Art Fair will be running August 4 through 7 and would be a great weekend to visit.

Greg Kucera Gallery is located at 212 Third Avenue in Seattle Washington and is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10:30 to 5:30.

Ellen Goldschmidt at Blackfish Gallery

Bad Seed, 2016, charcoal and ink pastel on paper

Surrounded by Feeling is the current show by Ellen Goldschmidt at Blackfish Gallery. At first glance I wasn’t too interested in a show of portraits but as I moved through the space to the back of the gallery I was drawn in more and more.

I’m not always a fan of artist statements because they can be overworked to the point of making the art stand in the background. Goldschmidt’s statement, however, completely made this show for me.

While working on “privileging emotion” in a series of portraits she was working on Goldschmidt was reminded of the 2015 show Gods and Heroes at the Portland Art Museum. It featured a section of works from the Expressive Head Competition from the Paris Academy in the 18th century, works that are attempting to depict emotion rather than Goldschmidt’s attempts to inhabit emotion.

I love connections like this. I would never had viewed this show and thought back to the Gods and Heroes exhibit but once she mentioned it my brain was ready to make all sorts of new comparisons and connections. What a difference 250 years can make.

Toward the bottom of her statement, almost as an afterthought, Goldschmidt mentions that many of the drawings are “concerned with my relationship to my older sister and the sibling rivalry that consumed our childhood”. Well then. There’s a story there, but we don’t know it, and now the drawings have a heightened tension as titles like Bad Seed and Sister’s Arm take on a whole new meaning.

Surrounded by Feeling stayed stuck in my head for days and writing about it now I already have Bad Seed back in mind and those questions and connections that make life interesting.

Blackfish Gallery is located at 420 NW 9th Ave in Portland, Oregon and is open from 11-5 Tuesday through Saturday. Surrounded by Feeling by Ellen Goldschmidt runs from May 3-28.

Now I Am Myself Inaugural Show at Wolff Gallery

There’s a new gallery in town with a sweet grand opening show. Now I Am Myself opened at Wolff Gallery on April 7th and features the work of Audra Osborne, Briana Cerezo, Calethia DeConto, Jamila Clarke, and Lauren Crow.

The show as a whole is strong and it’s a treat to see an entire show dedicated to diverse female photographers. How great is it to have a gallery state on their website that their “goal is to broaden the Portland art scene by prioritizing the exhibition of work by traditionally underrepresented artists”? Photos varied in price but there were a number of small works at very reasonable prices for people who want to support artists but can’t drop hundreds on a photo yet.

Lauren Crow’s photos are reminiscent of Nan Goldin’s early works with a hint of Catherine Opie. The lighting used in the small selection of grouped photos has stuck in my head and though not directly related, I keep coming back to the colors of The Gossip’s Standing in the Way of Control (CD version with hotpink case). I dig all those things so I dug these photos too.

Jamila Clark’s photos were a stand out to me. The scenarios are quite composed but manage to stay simple. Something To Cling To and The Shovel kept drawing me back to look at them. Audra Osborne’s Nope had the same effect. Maybe it’s the use of a bright dress in a more muted background? Women presenting themselves with their faces deliberately obscured? A dramatic moment captured with no explanation?

Briana Cerezo has a fabulous series called p l a y i n g h o u s e on her website that is worth checking out in its entirety. Very Robert Gober but flesh instead of wax. They are obviously highly composed but seem effortless in execution, similar to Calethia DeConto‘s photographs in the back room.

In fact, the show for the most part is a breeze. With few exceptions the photos manage to be complex without being overworked in the setup. Here’s a moment. Here’s a moment. I don’t need to marvel at the expense and womanpower it took to set up the scene and lighting and can instead marvel at that moment captured and wonder at the story.

I eagerly await their follow up in early June.

Wolff Gallery is located at 618 NW Glisan Street. Hours are Saturday and Sunday, 1-5 pm with additional hours on first Thursdays from 6-10 pm. Now I Am Myself runs through May 13.