E. Dan Barker, artist

E. Dan Barker, the first person to ever walk up to me at a gallery, and in an 'auw shucks'- manner said, "I really like your artwork." E-Dan, as he is known to his friends, is participating in a unique one-week exhibit in Portland, OR, beginning on December 9th, and running until Dec 16th. There will be an opening reception AND a closing reception on the two dates mentioned above. The Mark Woolley Wonder Gallery hosts the exhibition space, for this one week display of the Springdale Art Network, of which E-Dan is part of it all! The unique MWWG's exhibition space is located at 128 NE Russell St., in PDX. Apparently a new curator named Jeremy Tucker, is responsible for this exhibition, as is Chris Tymoshuk _ and as the curator, Jeremy embodies a motivating story of his own beginnings in the art world... more interesting details to follow.

The emerging art collecting class of the Pacific Northwest are WELL advised to take notice of E-Dan's work. His paintings are SO relevant that it is intriguing, no one group of art collectors has begun widely collecting from his expansive oeuvre in the over thirty-five years that he has been painting! Ironically, this is because an artist is "so of his time, that he is ahead of his time..."

E-Dan Barker, will be showing his most recent direction of abstract workings. Paintings that are filled with powerfully thought-out approaches to the influences left to us by the great modern-era predecessors; work that is rife with social commentary! If thinking is what you shy away from, don't look at this powerful painter's messages. You will will not walk away from this outspoken visual conversation without some on ya!

32 NW 5th Avenue, Portland, Oregon 97209 | Wednesday - Sunday 12-6pm | info@portlandart.org | 503.236.3322

PAC is excited to be in the Willamette Week’s Give!Guide 2007. This is a Holiday fundraiser that expires on December 31st! The Give!Guide facilitates year-end giving to a cross-section of Portland area non-profit organizations. We have been doing very well during this challenging time but we still need your help.

This is an opportunity where every donation large or small makes a huge difference. Willamette Week gives you great goodies for any donation $25 or more so tell your friends. The organization that receives the most donations is awarded an additional $1000, help PAC be that organization!

For a $25 donation you get: a booklet of Tri-Met tickets; a card good at SmartPark locations downtown; a coupon entitling the bearer to a free cup of Stumptown French press coffee; a voucher for free samples at Kiehl’s; and discount cards at Cinema 21, Powell’s, Music Millennium, Mio Gelato, River City Bikes, Dragontree Spa, and Flexcar.

The race starts tomorrow! Pass this along to friends and family. Help build the momentum! This is a fun and easy way to get involved. All you have to do is click the link below, follow the instructions and sit back and know you made a difference.

Join The Fun!

Thank you Willamette Week and to all of those who have recently made donations and become members. We sincerely appreciate your support.

To donate or for more information about the Give!Guide go to: www.wweek.com/giveguide.

PAC is a gallery and resource center for the contemporary visual arts. We showcase new art that pushes the boundaries of both form and content from local and national artists at all stages of their careers. PAC’s mission is to facilitate a dialogue between contemporary visual art and the community. As a hub for the arts, PAC is a vibrant element in the literal and cultural center of Portland with up to six exhibitions monthly. As an emerging institution, PAC bridges the gap between the commercial galleries and the Portland Art Museum with its unique and dynamic programming.

Artists all, bring your funding issues forth and rally in support around your community art center

32 NW 5th Avenue, Portland, Oregon 97209 | Wednesday - Sunday 12-6pm | info@portlandart.org | 503.236.3322

Dear Friend of PAC,

Portland Art Center has reached a critical point in its fiscal abilities. At this juncture, the organization has exceeded in programing and community resources, yet financial support has not kept pace with the growth and successes of PAC.
In the short term, we need to raise $40,000 by January 1st, and at PAC we feel a responsibility to our community to be transparent concerning this current situation.
In our efforts to overcome this real obstacle in time, we are presently in negotiations with potential donors who may help PAC through what we are committed to as a momentary challenge. At the heart of these negotiations, is our strong plan for implementing fiscal stability for PAC in 2008 and well into the future.
The current exhibition fund raiser, "PDX Panels," scheduled for December will continue as planned in our commitment to PAC's ability to overcome what we firmly believe is only a brief barrier in the continued success and longevity of growth and development of your community art center.

In the urgency of this situation, please feel free to contact us with contributions as soon as possible, all inquiries concerning the challenge of the day, and your helpful input on implementing long-term development programming for the fiscal robustness of the future of PAC.

Professionally yours,

The staff, PAC Board, and Volunteers

Become a MEMBER of Portland Art Center


Remember First Thursday is tonight, 11/01/07!

Home for the Holidays?

Since making money is the first priority of any self-respecting human being, without adequate support outside of one's self, I have taken on a temporary job for the holiday season. At first offer, it appeared to promise to pay relatively decently, and at a rate I could accept for the time being. The hours also appeared to be something worth doing, but they don't quite seem to be stacking up. At first I thought this might be pretty nice really, yet now I think is it in reality?
Since, I also have a slim shelter resource where my housing needs are concerned, I would very much like to be able to save my earnings for the time-being. Will this be a first in many, many years, or is it not going to make even the barest cut?
For now, the goals stated in the last two posts may be on hold because current employment represents another turn that will require imagination, to correlate it to the goal of employment in the curatorial world of art.
It is too much on my shoulders alone, being thrown from one off-beat, distracting frustration to the next. I sure wish I had a reasonable network of friends and acquaintances.

So far, this all is adding up to the ludicrous. Even so, I must keep on... plug, plug, plug.

The Artist, created in Adobe Illustrator, 2006

My own responses to an imagined availability from PAM

Since it has been more than a week from my last post, I would really like to just move forward and give myself the opportunity to develop the solutions already in my open letter, with an offer to assist PAM's development department_ by researching and writing a grant that brings artists in as residents, docents, teachers/trainers, to expand their programming and fill in the gaps or extend the dreams of the museum, or to meet their needs, or to fulfill their short or long-range planning.

• I will follow that up with doing the research to learn what the goals and dreams of the museum are, as well as where their strengths and weaknesses are, in accomplishing these goals, etc.

• Interviewing teachers, fine art directors, or their docents are good ways to find out stuff.

• Then, I may make an appointment with PAM’s Director of Development to outline or brainstorm this in person, and leave my résumé.

• Finally I will find a need, and offer to work one day a week or more, if I choose, for free so that I can get a feel for this environment to see if I’d really like to work there!

My assessment is, this is all about having a mutually respectful chance to be heard and seen when applying in the first place.

study after T.H. Benton, prisma colour

An open letter of inquiry for the new Director of the Portland Art Museum

I am a new artist in transition to the Portland area since June of this year, having moved from another Western Oregon town in the Mid-Willamette Valley. I have been planning on this move for many years while I have been a full-time single parent. During those years, I accomplished many tasks in order to develop the skills I would need for my new life. It is with the help of friends, that I was finally able to afford my epic moment early this summer.
Upon arriving to the city, one of the first contacts I made was to the Portland Art Museum because this is the institution in which I really want to be employed and pursue my art career.
Yet, as a result of the quality of my employment inquiry experiences, through the website initially, and as well as in person by phone, thus far_ I write this as an open letter from my blog to Brian Ferriso, Director of the Portland Art Museum.

My inquiry is this: why, as a new artist to Portland, would I want to be ultimately negatively impacted by something of a standardized statement: that the PAM is inundated daily by too many artists seeking employment within her walls?
I hope that you very carefully consider that as an outsider and new arrival_ my perspective may offer fresh consideration that is worth your time.

What I think is that here is an institution on the verge of its own success, yet this institution is perhaps inattentively engaged in an unwitting habit of throwing away its own riches!

The obvious solution seems to me_ IF one is inundated with an overflow of offers to help then, why not assign a currently motivated administrator to apply for the size grant that would provide the funds to HIRE all of us educated, motivated, intelligent, and talented 'inundators?'

We can do the menial tasks within the institution to free up the talent at the top, so that you can all get on with the success of the Portland Art Museum, and assert her potential for a real change! Personally, this is my motivation for being employed at the PAM.

Innovatively invest in your institution's success, Mr Ferriso. We are living in times in which it truly takes all of us, to participate in the process of how everything in American society moves successfully toward a quality of life that is again people-centered.

I hope that I will hear back directly from you, very soon!


L'orgie du printemps, oil

The road to resettling

Having one's own room; home; a place one can lock and unlock the door_ is everything.

Land of Plenty Series, oil