Love for sale

Only the most disenchanted pricks on the planet try to ruin Valentine’s Day. Those poor cross-eyed grinches who, through ego-driven insecurities, have systematically eliminated any chance of uncompromising love from their lives – you know the type. We all have those bitter, lonely friends who declare our annual day of love a simple-minded creation of Hallmark, a corporate invention to keep us spending between Christmas and Easter. You know the way they laugh at our rose bouquets and chocolate-filled hearts, at our diamond tennis bracelets and silky lingerie. The way they call our gestures shallow, unoriginal and plain. Screw those loveless bastards! Show them how powerful a day dedicated to amour can really be. This Valentine’s Day, forego the gift shops and florists and give your hump-bunny something permanent: art. There are all sorts of Valentine’s art events happening this week and I challenge you and your thick-framed, high-water-wearing, sexually frustrated cohorts to mock something so beautiful as PDX art.

Reading Frenzy
921 S.W. Oak St.

There is nothing like Reading Frenzy – anywhere. We are so lucky to have this resource in Portland. And as far as local Valentine’s Day shows go this is the big one, the OG. Reading Frenzy’s 8th Annual Valentine’s Day Invitational has been going on for, like, eight years now, and this one features amazing work by more than a dozen local superstars, including Bwana Spoons, Martin Ontiveros and Cary Bye. This shit is indier than a furry hood and the proceeds go to SCRAP, a local nonprofit promoting art through reuse by offering classes and more unique supplies then you can shake a brush at.

Compound Gallery
107 N.W. Fifth Ave.

Even those dyed-in-the-dunks hipsters at Compound are getting in on the orgy of sales, uh, I mean love. Their auction, crammed in between the amazing “T-boy” show and the “Romance Between 0 and 1,” is a mish-mash of little affordable pieces based around getting you into the pants of your loved one. The work here is a little less exuberant than that at Reading Frenzy, and the prices, artist-dictated I’m sure, seem inconsistent. It’s everything you’d expect and more, though, and with artists like Evan Harris, UNKLbrand, and Guy Burwell, it’s hipper than you and just a little detached. Like your girl.

Junktown at Holocene
Feb. 8, 6 p.m. ?” 12 a.m.
1001 S.E. Morrison St.

Tonight only! Make buying your slappy chap a special something into a party. The amazing art collective, Junktown, is hosting a party and sale tonight at Holocene, featuring a huge range of affordable and awesome work. And since it’s at Holocene there’s going to be music, dancing and booze, booze, booze. Nothing says “I love you” more than bringing home art and regurgitating India House all over the front porch.

Sapphire Hotel
Feb. 11, 11 a.m. ?” 4 p.m.
5008 S.E. Hawthorne Blvd.

On the whole, the Sapphire Hotel is far too glamorous for my taste, but this opportunity to drink in the middle of the day and look at art is too much to miss. Local artists will be setting up shop and hawking their work in hopes of getting you laid. The wide selection of artists represented, including the amazing textile work of Lauren Obenour, makes it worth venturing into such swanky digs with just your ratty Chuck Taylor’s on. They won’t judge.