Eugene Weekly

Farewell New Zone: The New Zone Gallery opens August’s First Friday ArtWalk with its final show at its downtown location on Broadway (which it has called home for 10 years) with pieces from more than 70 artists, as well as a featured collection — Muses, Dreams and Wanderings — by artist Tom Capri. The come-one, come-all attitude of the gallery and its members has been a bright spot on Eugene’s arts horizon with beloved annual shows like the Salon du People. Continue reading →

Cereal and the City: New York pop artist Michael Albert is coming through Eugene with his traveling exhibition, including workshops, 1:30 to 4 pm Tuesday, Aug. 2, at the Hult Center plaza; FREE. Albert is perhaps best known for his cubist cereal box collages, or cerealisim, and his knack for using junk, from junk mail to old business labels to the Frosted Flakes box that started it all. Continue reading →

If you haven’t seen the work of self-taught local artist Larry Hurst, get thee to Corvallis for an opening reception of his solo exhibit, What He Sees, 4 to 8 pm Thursday, July 21, at the ArtWorks Gallery, 408 S.W. Monroe Street; FREE. His swirling landscapes and remarkable use of color could have been born out of the wild expressionism of the early-20th-century Fauves, while a fellow EW writer told me his paintings looked Van Gogh-y. Either way, his work is a breath of fresh air over the mountains. Continue reading →

How is the American identity defined today? When a certain Fanta-faced presidential nominee is targeting American minorities with threats of deportation or supporting heightened “security” of browner neighborhoods, the question takes on a new urgency. Two artists, Victoria Suescum and Lee Michael Peterson, tackle the question by exploring their identities as Latin@s (the gender neutral term for people of Latin American roots) within American culture in the new ¿Identity? exhibit up through Sept. Continue reading →

Pop surrealism descends on Eugene: Gallery newcomer the Alexi Era Gallery, tucked neatly between downtown and the Whiteaker (at 245 W. 8th Ave.), joins the festivities for First Friday ArtWalk 5:30 to 8 pm Friday, July 1. Owner and curator Aunia Kahn recently relocated the gallery from St. Louis, where it was part of the pop surrealism — a descendent of low-brow art — and new contemporary art movement. This gallery could be a huge boon for the edgier corners of the local art community, as remaining galleries in Eugene tend to show more traditional, safer works. Continue reading →

Purple pages: Storm Entertainment, a Portland-based comic and graphic novel company, has just released the comic book biography Tribute: Prince in honor of the late artist and his June 7 birthday. Michael Frizell wrote the 24-page comic and Ernesto Lovera and Vincenzo Sansone created the art. “His sound and lyrics defined the era for me in ways that Michael Jackson didn’t and, quite frankly, couldn’t,” Frizell says via press release. Continue reading →

With the sun shining more often than not these days, it’s primo mural-painting time. The Whiteaker Community Art Team has a mural going up at 4th and Blair. Half a block north, CALC (Community Alliance of Lane County) is celebrating its 50th anniversary by creating a new mural with the theme of “50 years of struggle for social justice.” Prolific local muralist Bayne Gardner will work with youth to paint that mural in CALC’s front yard, to be debuted during the Whiteaker Art Walk Aug. 26. Continue reading →

The New Zone Gallery announced that it will be leaving its downtown digs at 164 W. Broadway in August after a 10-year run. Steve LaRiccia, New Zone’s treasurer and gallery coordinator, tells EW that the gallery is grateful to Oregon Contemporary Theatre, which has been subsidizing rent. “The owners of the building, Oregon Contemporary Theatre, who have leased us that space, they found a tenant to rent that space for like $3,000 a month,” LaRiccia says, “and we were paying $250.” Continue reading →