Kendra Larson on KBOO

Kendra Larson (work above) will be my guest this coming Tuesday on Art Focus. She has shows up at the George Fox Minthorne Gallery and at Willamette University's Rogers Gallery.

Listen to the interview.

The Edge of Vision

A fabulous photography show here in Portland is "The Edge of Vision" at Lewis and Clark.  Here's the review I wrote for Visual Art Source. 

Brenda Mallory on KBOO

Listen to the interview here.

Brenda Mallory has a big installation down Concourse A at the PDX Airport right now. The piece is called the Mechanics of Hither and Yon. She will be my guest on Art Focus this coming Tuesday, the 31st.

Todd Tubutis of Blue Sky

I had fun with Todd Tubutis of Blue Sky today at KBOO. We talked about the current Robert Frank show  and other exhibitions at the gallery, plus his own path to Blue Sky.

Listen to the interview here.

The Romantic

I've lived in my house for over 8 years, but in some ways it seems like only yesterday that I moved in - until I started getting ready to leave it. For now I can fully assess what happened here.

I made half of Vive Chrome, all of Take Off, all of the Richter Scale and Drape in this house. That’s over 75 paintings.

But what the house really provided was my first truly designated collage studio space. My long collage table never saw a cup of coffee or glass of wine, as in so many art tables of the past. All it held was a big, perfect paper cutter and my work. This studio made all of the Judd Montages, all of the Targets and of course, the Anonymous Women - plus other side projects like Joe is Home Now and friends turning 50. Altogether that’s at least 120 photomontages since I’ve lived here.

And now I’m going. One of the big parts of any move is not just what you sell but what you give away. The past 2 days I’ve been giving away art school paintings to those who will use the stretchers for scruffy projects or for students, this kind of thing. The paintings themselves must go and the whole thing has been a little strange.

That’s not because I think the paintings are good. What I miss is not the work but the person who made them - and “miss” may not be the right word. What I see is the Romantic who made them, who went to the Art Students League, that old building with all that history, where I climbed up to the roof and felt like King of the World. I had dreams of paint so vivid I couldn’t sleep at night. And even though I went to the Met every week to absorb and romance the best of the best, I still had no idea what I was taking on. There’s a lot I could observe about the actual paintings, the subject matter, where they came from but what strikes me most is none of that. It's my relationship with painting itself which feels very different.

Yet that is not the case with collage. Perhaps this is because the vintage aspect of the work never went away. Or the ease and ownership aspect of what I'm doing. I’m still tight emotionally with what I cut and paste - maybe more so than ever. Lately I am cutting from the late 60s and early 70s and that’s not really vintage to me. That’s my girlhood; it’s a Romantic and tender time.

I feel very lucky that it’s all made out of paper. None of those have to be tossed away. The piece above is from about 1982.

Saatchi Collage Showdown Continues

Thanks to everyone who voted for my collage in the Saatchi Collage Showdown. It made it to the next round of judging! There were 1960 submissions and now it is down to 300.

I've made a lot of work I've yet to post here. Above is Anonymous Woman No. 26. This piece was very exciting piece for me to put together. I have loved gold forever - in clothes, in makeup, in paint, in leaf, in fashion, in Byzantine anything. But this woman in particular felt very familiar. She reminds me of my mom in the early 1960s. And I think I've had tops just like this one. I enjoyed combining it with the illuminated manuscript, in general an anonymous art form and where you don't expect to find the Babe.

Anonymous Woman No. 34

These are intense times. There is a house is to be sold, garage sales in the freezing clime to be had and now, colds to be endured. I was all gangbusters but am now in bed with Barbara Pym, someone you can count on. Strange that through all the chaos, I could still make these Anonymous Women.

Todd Tubutis of Blue Sky on KBOO

PLEASE NOTE! Due to illness this interview has been rescheduled for the 24th.


I am looking forward to having Todd Tubutis, the Executive Director of Blue Sky Gallery, as my guest on Art Focus this coming Tuesday, the 17^th. We will cover the current Robert Frank show, Painkiller. From the PR: 

Painkiller is an original exhibition of 48 Polaroid images by groundbreaking photographer Robert Frank taken from the 1970s through the present. Blue Sky closely collaborated with Frank in selecting photographs to be reproduced in a special series of enlarged prints for this show. Considered one of the most influential figures in the history of photography, Frank has redefined the aesthetic of both the still and the moving image via his pictures and films. Blue Sky is proud to present Frank’s work again in Portland, having first shown his photographs in 1981.

Robert Tomlinson on KBOO

Robert Tomlinson will be my guest on Art Focus this week, on January 10th. He currently has a show of mixed media drawings at the Guardino Gallery. He also curated recently the Globe Show at 23 Sandy. I first met him a few years ago when he curated my Lonely Metropolitans into a show in Centralia. Robert does so many things; a half hour will barely scratch the surface.

Saatchi Showdown

I am in the Collage Saatchi Showdown. If you can, please vote for my work. Thanks!

Group Show at Augen

This month Augen Gallery hosts a group show of gallery artists. It opens tomorrow and I have two pieces in it. These particular pieces reveal a little of how I arrive at something. I made them at the same time (2011) and out of the same original image in Life Magazine – a big photo of Garbo. For the Target, I used only a slice of her famous and perfect visage. Then of course I had the leftovers and they stayed on my work table. The great thing about the Anonymous Women is that I may need only bits and pieces to suggest what I wish. I can now see how specific my Targets were – they needed to be recognizable, they had to tell certain stories. I liked all of that and am in fact still making them, but the Anonymous Women not only celebrate the woman, they celebrate the cut. Everything is new.

America in Color

Forwarded to me from Charlie Finch, amazing images from another era. .... some of the first color photographs. You can practically touch and smell from them. I see my grandparents in some of them too.

New Avenues for Youth on KBOO

Listen to the interview here.


Local homeless youth are collaborating with artists and businesses to beautify our town, via New Avenues for Youth.


From the PR: "Billions and Billions of People collaborative art Installation is transforming a construction site into a work of art. With the vision and support from a premier real estate development company, TMT Development, thirty local homeless youth served by New Avenues for Youth had the unique opportunity to work alongside an internationally famed artist, earn a paycheck and feel connected to the city they call home."


That artist would be Chris Johanson. He's going to join me (via phone) - plus the Associate Executive Director Sean Suib and two of the youth participants  - on Art Focus this coming Tuesday, the 3rd of January.

Best Photography Show of 2011

Many thanks to Richard Speer at Willamette Week, who gave the Independent and Brad Carlile the Best Photo Show of 2011.

Body Gesture on KBOO

Listen to the interview here.

Carolee Schneeman - Nude on Tracks D

This coming Tuesday Elizabeth Leach will be my guest on Art Focus. Her gallery is currently showing Body Gesture. I can’t wait for this conversation.

To read the PR for this show is deeply satisfying. There, they said it well, so it doesn’t have to come from this middle-aged woman artist. Still I cannot help but observe how so many practices, mediums and delicious extremities in contemporary art zoom along while the innovators fell into relative obscurity (market share talks).

I saw a lot of cool things rising in the 1970s. At my very tender age, I was more a cheerleader than gang leader. Even so, I made my own version of Woman with a Gun. For years I looked back on the silly piece and thought it trite and insignificant, but no more.

There are no doubt a ton of reasons while the feminist artists didn’t maintain center stage. First, you’ve got to keep your elbows out and that generation didn’t have the cradle-to-grave training to compete (I can attest because while I am younger, I didn’t get it either). But more importantly, the fellows could pick up on the breakthroughs, adding their own twist and saga and it was so much more comfortable and familiar to watch the hero (instead of the heroine), it all just went down easier. Besides, it was the 80s (or the 90s or the new century or etc. etc. etc.) and we didn’t have to address that boring gender identity or disparity issue, did we? More and more the art world embraces and dissects power, stardom and greed and at least on the surface (and at auction, let's not forget), the guys do it better.

I think we’re catching up though.

I don’t know where to start with this exhibition; it’s all so good and there’s so much to read, not just look at. In general I'm not fond of work I must read, not experience, but I make a great exception with Body Gesture. The letters from Andrea Bower, Necessary Reminders from the Past of a Future Choice, truly make you wince. I read every single one.

The exhibition features:

Lynda Benglis
Andrea Bowers
Sophie Calle
Nicole Eisenman
Jenny Holzer
Rachel Lachowicz
Ellen Lesperance
Alice Neel
Elaine Reichek
Martha Rosler
Carolee Schneemann
Amy Sillman
Lorna Simpson
Alexis Smith
Nancy Spero
Mickalene Thomas
Hannah Wilke

My Tree

For reasons too mundane, sad or confusing to mention, I probably will not trim a tree this year. So when I came across this short and sweet reminder at Hyperallergic about the Met's tree (see above), I had to pause. For many years it was the only tree I had. I used to think of it as mine and had no idea at least 5 million other New Yorkers felt the same way. The holidays were a big retail trudge and the upper Museum Mile was the respite. And just as this piece suggests, I avoided Rockefeller Center and walked the extra 30 blocks to the Met.

I am taking a week away from KBOO but when I come back, it will be gangbusters with Body Gesture at Elizabeth Leach. In the meantime, I am collaging small cards, as many as possible. This was how the Anonymous Women broke out actually - they started out as gifts. And then I had to stop giving when I saw the new shift.

Molly Vidor on KBOO

Listen to the interview here.

There are some nice shows up this month, (anytime Eric Stotik shows, it’s a good month) but the paintings of Molly Vidor at PDX are especially delicious. She titled the show perfectly too: Honeydrippers. These are still lifes juicy and shiny, dark and deep, small yet vast and of course satisfyingly loaded with paint. When I did videos on Youtube, we had a conversation over the big pieces in a show called Destroyer. While everyone throws around the term “Rock Star” these days – gee, we all get to be one – Molly Vidor really is. She looked like one at her opening too, really great. She will be my guest on Art Focus this coming Tuesday.

She's the Sky

A woman in the sky, or some part of, can be a Surrealist device. I guess Man Ray’s fabulous lips across the universe is the first image to come to my mind, but I think there must be other examples. In the case of the Anonymous Women however I am not thinking of just sexy dreams and desires, but of how glamorous women function in popular culture, what they hawk and promote, where they are supposed to be. And where they’re not.

Some skies, like the one directly above, are almost too beautiful to use. Almost anyone I put in there would look good, too good and the golden plains gave such an all American feeling. I had to find the beautiful face which would confront the viewer a little differently.

Portland Art Collective on KBOO

Listen to the interview here.

Robin Olsen and Lorraine Jones of the Portland Art Collective will be my guests on Art Focus this coming Tuesday. There’s more than one art world. Portland especially has an art community that goes way before the formal gallery system. I was kind of surprised at how many creatives were in this single, loosely defined community alone, but I shouldn’t be.

The Collective is an eclectic group of 30 women artists who have been meeting at Multnomah Arts Center for eight years, sharing work and opportunities. They work in a variety of mediums including jewelry, fiber, glass, collage, painting, and printmaking.

For the past five years, they have held their annual "Open Doors" show the first weekend in Dec. at Multnomah Arts Center. Instead of purchasing panels to display their art, the group gathered and repurposed 60 old doors, and use those as the focal point of the show.

foreGround on KBOO

Listen to the interview here.

Jeff Jahn has curated foreGround at the Littman Gallery. Artists include Ben Young, Jim Neidhardt, Zach Davis, Arcy Douglass, Jacqueline Ehlis and Matthew Picton. Jahn and Douglass will be my guests on Art Focus this coming Tuesday, the 22nd.

Natalie Wood Targets

Natalie Wood's death is back in the news. It never seemed quite right to me, although I surely don't have enough facts to have an informed opinion. I made work around it instead.

I remember when I first considered the collage above. I was a little uncertain at first about obscuring the target. But if you make as many collages as I have around the target (so far, 58), you're going to find many differents ways to utilize it, including hiding it.

From what I understand, she couldn't swim.
Jeff Jahn had some great things to say about the Wood Targets in particular in this piece in PORT.

The House of Moe

1979 by Randy Moe at the Independent brings my past out of the woodwork. Friends I haven’t seen in many years stop by. They tell the tales of some of the people in this show. For instance, Brian, above in the red, owns a record store in Vancouver, WA. Phil, in the shades, is unfortunately no longer with us.

Ed Casey, looking like a movie star above, is a filmmaker today in NYC. He was sweet enough to come to my opening of reCovered at frosch&portmann this past summer. His latest film, Voyeur, is at festivals right now.And of course Mike King, above, is a very well known graphic artist for the music world. When I knew him in 1979 he made posters – and he still does. I especially love this portrait, the black on black and the treatment of the clothes. What strikes me about the all the styling is how un-styled it was. It's thriftstore as opposed to Westwood, but even in the thrift, it's not like it screams a certain vintage. We all pulled stuff together and people gave us things too, dressed us. That is actually a major way Randy functioned at the time - we called him The House of Moe. He had some of the best gear.

Laurie Danial on KBOO

Listen to the interview here.

My next guest on Art Focus is Laurie Danial, who has a show at Froelick right now. The show is comprised of paintings and prints and is called Control Release Control. I think you can trace the origin of the name by just looking at the work. The paintings reveal a multitude of directions, thoughts, marks, meandering, some hard and some not and very much just letting go. You can feel the play but you also sense the anxiety. The paintings provide ongoing experience, new things to come across. They are generous and not necessarily "quiet" and for this, I'm grateful. She told me the other day that no one is painting like her right now, as if it might not be in trend. But I think there are artists showing in NYC these days who do travel similar ground, or similar processes. It’s a beautiful show.

Disjecta Auction

Tonight is the Disjecta auction. I have donated a diptych - Hot Spot and Van Gogh. They came from the Richter Scale. Sure, you can hang them separately and I painted them separately, but they look cool hung together, horizonally or vertically. These are some great artists contributing this year.

The Middle Ages

The two most recent Anonymous Women couldn't be more different. No. 31 was 70s-like spage age. But No. 32 is from The Middle Ages. The paper was old, thin and sepia toned. I've always liked those cathedrals. I held on to the image, not sure how to use it for years. Well, the paper of the woman is almost just as old. That is sometimes how things happen. The physical materials dictate content to a degree. It is happening more and more, which I enjoy - obviously it's a given with paint. Here, it made the marriage. Plus the fright of course.