Arts Hound

A new fashion duo is taking the reins of the Whiteaker Block Party Fashion Show this year and they’ve got some tricks up their secondhand sleeves. Briah Izreal and Oblio Stroyman, new owners of the Whit boutique Redoux Parlour, will host a resale runway show with the help of St. Vinnie’s Creative Projects Manager Mitra Chester at 9 pm Saturday, Aug. 2, at the Cornerstone Glass Stage (1068 W. 2nd Ave.) preceded by a performance from the darkwave ensemble Black Magdalene. “We’re not working with designers this year,” Izreal says. Continue reading 

Arts Hound

The Hult Center is reviving its former Wildly Wicked Women of Comedy series, kicking off July 19 with comedian Suzanne Westenhoefer, an LGBT pioneer who starting doing standup in New York City in the early ’90s. Raised in Pennsylvania Amish country, Westenhoefer is definitely a trailblazer: She was the first openly gay comedian to land an HBO special and the first to appear on Late Night with David Letterman. Continue reading 

The Queen of Critters

Shanna Trumbly’s magical world continues with the 2014 Oregon Country Fair poster

Shanna Trumbly was sitting in a cave roasting hotdogs when she saw the hummingbird. The Eugene artist was visiting Yachats with her family and, while on a hike, they had taken shelter from the rain.  “Out of the corner of my eye, I see this little bzzz,” she says, fluttering her hands. “There are no flowers around or anything. It was just like rock walls and the ocean … It was so bizarre because it wasn’t even a place where a hummingbird would be hanging out.” She adds, “Right when it flew off, the rain stopped.” Continue reading 

Summer Strut

Celebrate your body and America with made-in-USA Allihalla swimwear and lingerie

Allison Ditson

Nothing says ’Merica like star-spangled hot pants.  Allison Ditson flips through a stack of her handmade garter shorts and swimwear while Prince’s “I Would Die 4 U” fills her warm attic studio. Fabric is draped over every nook and cranny — in stars and stripes, neons and florals, glittering golds and black mesh — making the cozy space look like the shared dressing room of Wonder Woman, Betty Grable and Katy Perry. Continue reading 

Relative Pursuits

Meet the Beyers — sibling artists featured at Art and the Vineyard

‘Lotus, closed’ by Ian Beyer

Sculptor Ian Beyer tells me with a wry smile that his sister, painter Erika Beyer, is the smart one, what with her dual college degrees in scientific illustration and architecture. This is the sort of affectionate ribbing that commonly passes between siblings; what’s not so common is the level of talent that unifies the Beyers in their separate creative endeavors. Continue reading 

Arts Hound

The sixth annual Degenerate Flame Off, a festival for “functional art glass from the underground,” runs June 27-29 at the Cornerstone Glass campus in the Whit. Sixteen glass artists from across the country will compete in a 10-hour “flame-off” to make the most gnarly art pipe in the categories of Most Creative, People’s Choice and Most Technical. Continue reading 

Pillars of the Community

Artist Esteban Camacho brings an environmental focus to the murals of the WJ Skatepark

Photo by Todd Cooper

Esteban Camacho weaves through the skateboard jungle that is the new WJ Skatepark + Urban Plaza, finding some smooth invisible path while I stumble after him, jumping out of the way of teens on wheels. It’s clear the artist is a seasoned veteran of the site. We sit on a bench carved into a ramp, skateboarders whirring around us. Hands leathery with green paint, Camacho points up at the murals developing on two pillars buttressing I-105.  Continue reading 

The Healing Arts

Eugene’s Tibet Week uses the arts to spread a message of peace

Monks from Drepung Loseling monastery perform sacred music sacred dance June 13.

“Looking at the world today, there is tremendous uncertainty in our lives,” says Venerable Jigme Rinpoche, founder and director at the Palmo Center for Peace and Education. “We’re confronted with difficulty, crisis and challenges. We urgently need the vision and courage to find ways to handle these difficulties, both individually and globally, with deeper acceptance, insight and compassion.”  That’s where the arts come into play.  Continue reading 

Arts Hound

New Zone Gallery is never one to shy away from tough subject matter. Exhibiting 3D work by North Eugene High School sophomores, New Zone presents Strength and Resistance: Art of the Holocaust June 9-28 with an opening reception 4 to 6 pm Friday, June 13.    EW sat in on a soiree hosted by The Gallery at the Watershed at Noisette Pastry Kitchen May 28, where gallery owner Amy Isler Gibson unveiled the Watershed Arts Foundation, a new nonprofit devoted to local contemporary arts education.    Continue reading 

Arts Hound

There are certain artists whose work is like a fingerprint, a signature; their art — in style, technique and content — is unmistakably theirs. Locally, we are lucky to have lots of these artists: Shanna Trumbly, Amy Crehore, Jud Turner, John Jay Cruson, Analee Fuentes and too many others to list here. Continue reading