Visit Museum of Contemporary Craft for free on September 24 with your Smithsonian Museum Day ticket. Explore Nikki McClure, Northwest Modern and 75 Gifts.
In the spirit of Smithsonian Museums, who offer free admission everyday, Museum Day is an annual event hosted by Smithsonian magazine in which participating museums across the country open their doors to anyone presenting a Museum Day Ticket… for free.
The Museum of Contemporary Craft and Pacific Northwest College of Art community is deeply saddened by the passing of Joan Shipley. Her consistent dedication to the local arts community and her unfaltering support of PNCA and Museum of Contemporary Craft made her one of the most valued art patrons in Portland.
Tom Manley, PNCA’s president, in writing to the College community about the news, remarked:
“In losing Joan, we have lost a great community treasure and champion of the arts. Joan exemplified the very best qualities of civic involvement and leadership. Hers was a thoroughly humanist vision and no one worked harder, more gently, more quietly or with greater ultimate effect than she. Speaking on behalf of the College—just one institution of the dozens Joan Shipley helped to make better—and my family, I send our deepest condolences to her husband John and their family at this terribly sad time.”
Joan was no stranger to the PNCA community. She was a board member of Museum of Contemporary Craft (when it was called the Contemporary Crafts Association) from 1975 to 1979. She served as a voluntary interim gallery director during this time, when the Museum was without an appointed director.
President Manley mentioned as well the leadership and generous support of other members of the Shipley family to PNCA, in particular John Shipley who as a past board member helped to guide the school’s transition to the Peal District campus and helped to found the Philip Feldman Gallery and Project Space and Thomas Shipley, John and Joan’s son, who currently serves on the PNCA Board of Governors.
There are hardly any organizations in town with which Joan Shipley did not have direct involvement. In addition to PNCA and Museum of Contemporary Craft, Chamber Music Northwest, Literary Arts, Oregon College of Art and Craft, Portland Institute of Contemporary Art, where Joan was a founding member, and the Sitka Center, to name a few, can attest to the depth of positive contributions the Shipleys have made to the Oregon arts community. In recognition of her efforts, Joan was a recipient of the 2004–2005 Governor’s Arts Award as well as the Portland Art Dealers Association (PADA) Award for Service to the Visual Arts in August 2011.
Shipley’s love of art and her belief that creativity is the gateway to good citizenship are the cornerstones of the legacy she leaves behind. Joan Shipley will be remembered for working endlessly, gently and often anonymously to elevate the prominence of art, culture and civility.
The College will announce plans for a remembrance in honor of Joan once details become known. In addition, PNCA will publish a memorial article about her contributions to the arts community on Untitled in the coming weeks.
The Museum will be open on Sunday, September 4 from 11 am–6 pm for the Labor Day weekend. Bring your whole family to see Nikki McClure, Northwest Modern and 75 Gifts for 75 Years.
Artist-in-Residence Deborah Valoma created a human-scale loom in the Museum during Laurie Herrick: Weaving Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow. Two dancers improvised the choreography in and among the warp.
The installation and performance integrated the sensual, spatial and rhythmic dynamics of weaving and dance. Improvisational movement by Victor Alexander and Yismari Ramos Tellez. Music and sound by Arianna Brame and Petra Valoma.
Deborah Valoma – Longing from Ian Lucero on Vimeo.
Curator Namita Gupta Wiggers was interviewed about being “a banner carrier, a shaper for the contemporary craft world, a crafter of stories about craft (and so much more)” on — Posted on 08/18 at 05:28 PM
Was it really four months ago that I wrote about April springtime in Portland? Well, the fact is, the summer weather is only just arriving with its bright and warming splendor and just in time for the start of the school year at PNCA. We look forward to the return of our PNCA Museum interns and the inquiry and energy that comes from regular tours and visits by classes.
Five months ago, we opened our celebrated Laurie Herrick retrospective exhibition, Weaving Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, which grew and evolved as the weeks went by. As an institution that lives and breathes, we wanted this exhibition to move away from the traditional curatorial practice of presenting a collection of artworks as a static, sometimes calcified grouping of “important art objects.” In this exhibition we sought to inspire in you a sense of query and participation. By incorporating the sounds of a weaving studio into the exhibition and inviting five artists-in-residence to interpret Herrick’s works in projects of their own, the galleries were active, lively and filled with creativity. Because each artist used the craft of weaving as a springboard to investigate different aspects of their own interests, we saw the exhibition expand into all sorts of unusual directions, including installation, dance performance, sound, color theory and industrial design.
We are also pleased that this elegant, incisive and thoughtfully assembled show will travel on to other institutions thanks to support from the Ford Family Foundation and Western States Arts Federation (WESTAF). Weaving Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow travels first to Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington and then on to College of the Redwoods in California,
The Museum is full of energy as three great new exhibitions recently opened. 75 Gifts for 75 Years presents recent acquisitions into the Museum’s collection, thanks to the generosity of collectors, gallerists and curators across the country. These donations and promised gifts fill significant gaps in the Museum’s collection history. Additional support for MoCC during this anniversary year has come through a special challenge grant from the James F. and Marion L. Miller Foundation.
Northwest Modern: Revisiting the Annual Ceramic Exhibitions of 1950–64 jumps back into mid-century ceramics and examines how the Northwest transformed the way we view clay today. Nikki McClure: Cutting Her Own Path, 1996–2011 is the first Museum exhibition to look at the rich, intricate papercuts of Nikki McClure, a Northwest artist who has focused on universal feelings, actions and traditions. The presenting sponsor for both of these exhibitions is Bank of America.
Also, if you are out and about on First Thursday, remember that we are open late and are free to the public so bring your friends on by. And of course if you want to see or to purchase work from the finest artisans working in the Northwest, you need only stop into the Gallery anytime. We invite you to our First Wednesday evening artist reception in the Gallery, a wonderful way to mingle with new and old friends alike.
Finally, with support from Architectural Foundation of Oregon we have commissioned local design firm studio gorm to help us celebrate our 75th continual year of operations with a distinctly unique and visual timeline that you need to see to believe. But isn’t that what visual art is all about?
My, how time flies when you are making history now.
To build a bike is not an easy task.
Oregon Manifest tests a new crop of builders and designers with its second biennial bike design competition, the 2011 Constructor’s Design Challenge. This competition features 34 independent builders from 11 states plus six student teams battling to create the ultimate utility bicycle for the everyday cyclist. The crux of the contest is the Oregon Manifest Field Test, a rigorous road trial assessing the function of each bike in the contest.
After the competition, the winning Constructor’s Design Challenge and the three Creative Collaboration bikes will be displayed in the heart of the Portland art and design community: at the Museum of Contemporary Craft, September 27–October 29, 2011.
A First Thursday opening will be held October 6, 11 am–8 pm.
This year, the bike builders hail from 11 states, from Oregon to Vermont. They include early-generation custom frame builders such as Brian Baylis of Baylis Handmade Cycles, Andy Newlands of Strawberry, Stephen Bilenky of Bilenky Cycle Works, and Cielo by Chris King, plus a number of newer builders, including Ira Ryan Cycles, Hufnagel Cycles, Chapman Cycles and Boxer Bicycles. Also back for 2011 are nine of the 2009 winners, including the 2009 Constructor Design Challenge grand champion Tony Pereira of Pereira Cycles.
Adding to the innovation energy of this year’s Challenge are six teams of design school students. These student teams are working from the same design criteria as the 35 frame makers.
The 2011 student teams are:
Learn more about Oregon Manifest.
Shop from a selection of art, jewelry and home decor by a dozen Portland-based artists in Crafty Wonderland’s Pop-Up, in The Gallery August 4–27. Pillows, birdhouses, earrings and original illustrations are some of the treasures you’ll find.
The seldom-seen sculptural and musical works of R. P. Collier are featured in The Gallery for the month of August. Inspired by African thumb pianos, Collier reclaims materials for his unique, functional pieces.
I Heart Art: Portland and Etsy have teamed up to bring a one-day Hello Etsy satellite conference to Portland on Small Business and Sustainability. Hello Etsy PDX will take place on September 17 at PNCA.
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