First Thursday outdoors

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The sun’s return brought First Thursday back outdoors, and the Vanguard made sure to stop by the Pearl District to check out the monthly street gallery exhibitions.

The Pearl’s First Thursday art walk features a range of arts and crafts displayed by vendors spread along Northwest 13th Avenue between Hoyt and Lovejoy streets.

Starting at 5 p.m., the monthly event stretches into the evening and attracts people from throughout the city. Many visitors walk through and browse, but others come to spend money on works of art ranging from paintings and prints to ceramics, jewelry and even puzzles and puppets.

Local painter Angela Raines was one vendor working the walk, selling prints and originals of her fantastical and dreary bunny-themed works.

“I paint the world as if the bunnies were the people,” she explained. “I basically paint about things I don’t understand, things I love and the things I wish were true.”

Raines, who started showing at street fairs at Northeast Alberta Street’s Last Thursday event, noted that she’s a bit of a newcomer to the downtown fair. As a full member of the fair, which is hosted by the volunteer-based Urban Art Network, she will have a first-priority booth throughout the year.

“This is my first year working downtown,” she said. “When I started on Alberta, I got the street fair fever. But last year I noticed a lot more of a performance vibe there.”

The street gallery doesn’t confine itself to paintings: Vendors also presented works such as wire sculptures, woodcraft displays and hand-designed clothing.

The organizers require prospective vendors to submit hand-crafted works, so all goods are one of a kind or limited edition and created by the artist themselves.

Another artist at the fair was local woodcarver Kent Forrester. Forrester, a retired professor, displays his intensely crafted woodwork puzzles once a month with help from his wife, Marie.

The puzzles come in a variety of shapes and sizes, many carved in exotic woods, and are often inspired by historical works by artists such as Picasso and Escher and Japanese woodblock prints.

“I’m always working on new pieces,” Forrester said. “I’m a bit of an insomniac, so I lie in bed thinking about what I can make next.”

Forrester, who has shown at Portland’s Saturday Market, pointed out that while sales can be light at the Pearl District street gallery, the atmosphere is friendly and nonjudgmental.

“I like it; it’s cheaper than some of the other spaces in town,” he said. “It’s very informal. A lot of people like to walk around and look at things.”

The local businesses also get involved. Many cafes and restaurants along the stretch open their doors, host concurrent events and even play music for patrons in an effort to contribute and attract business.

One coffee company, Nossa Familia, offered samples and tunes for passersby, providing space for partners to also share their own stories and products with potential customers.

“We feel really fortunate to have found such a fantastic location,” said Sarah Smith, Nossa Familia’s vice president of sales and marketing. “The art walk gives us a great opportunity to tell our story.”

The company, a family-operated coffee company that internalizes its entire chain of production, just opened its first retail location along the art walk stretch, Smith noted.

In addition to offering its own wares during the street gallery, Nossa Familia also opens its space for gallery exhibitions, including an upcoming Rapha bicycle exhibit.

Smith pointed out that Nossa Familia wants to join the First Thursday experience by reaching out to visitors. The coffee shop is just one location that brings music to the street gallery, livening the evening.

“People will come in and ask what’s going on,” she said. “The music is definitely a draw for us. We want to be a part of the overall experience.”

The Vanguard ended the night with a visit to Backspace, where Portland-based painter Theodore Holdt displayed his expansive collection of works.

Holdt dominated the coffee shop’s northern wall with an installation of 240 7-inch-by-7-inch paintings, meticulously arranged and titled with the lines of a poem authored by the artist.

“I do a lot of chance operations,” Holdt explained. “I had finished all the work before I titled them. I would pick one out of a box, and the name would just come to me. I randomized them. I have a real attraction to dealing with chance, even in the work itself.”

The result of his titling process, which spanned three days, was a poem that Holdt chose to offer instead of a traditional artist’s statement. The works, individually small, range from sketch-like representations to works of gestural abstraction. Taken as a whole, they pull together to command the space, offering hints of a narrative that asserts the viewer’s complicity in completing the story.

“I kind of like the idea that it’s one big painting,” Holdt said. “Standing back, its kind of a field—almost more of an installation.”

Holdt also showed several larger paintings—intensely detailed pieces with a note of surrealism and a play between abstraction and visual representation. Though he noted a sharper attention to particular detail in the larger works, Holdt also pointed out that each painting emerges from a shared process.

“They start the same way, with a lot of gestural playing,” he said. “From there, I meditate a lot over the work. Some areas end up becoming more defined and others are left more loose. I like the idea that people can read their own meaning into things.”

Holdt asserted that he strives to leave meaning in the hands of onlookers and critics. He pointed out instances of buyers contacting him after having found impressions of their own imaginations in his work.

“I’m not really building a meaning,” he said. “I kind of want to build a living painting. You can look at it every day and see something new.”