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A Fountain of Creativity: Oregon's 20th Century Artists and the Legacy of Arlene Schnitzer - Pt 1 & 2
Jun
28
to May 4
current

A Fountain of Creativity: Oregon's 20th Century Artists and the Legacy of Arlene Schnitzer - Pt 1 & 2

  • Oregon Historical Society (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

During the early twentieth century, the arts community in Oregon was small and,  isolated, and offered offering few opportunities for artists to exhibit and sell their work. While the Portland community valued public engagement with arts and culture, establishing an art museum, symphony, and a public library, local artists were isolated from the wider national art community due to a lack of commercial gallery space to show and sell their work.

Decades later, in 1961, Arlene Schnitzer, along with her mother Helen Director and friend Edna Brigham, started the Fountain Gallery. The commercial art gallery, named after its location near the Skidmore Fountain, became a hub for Pacific Northwest modern artists and helped raise the status of the Portland art scene.

Arlene’s son, Jordan Schnitzer, purchased his first work of art when he was fourteen years old. It was through her and her gallery that his initial acquisition turned into a lifelong pursuit to collect, share, and promote the visual arts. Jordan Schnitzer is now recognized as one of the Top 200 Collectors globally (ARTnews). His collection, one of the most notable in North America, functions as a living archive to preserve art for future generations and share it with the public through groundbreaking exhibitions, publications, and programs.

Arlene Schnitzer was quoted as saying, “A city without an art community has no soul.” Honoring her legacy and influence on the history of Portland, A Fountain of Creativity features a range of bold, evocative, and influential works created by Pacific Northwest artists from the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation — many on public display for the first time. Featuring notable artists such as Louis Bunce, Carl Morris, Hilda Morris, Mike Russo, and Mel Katz, this original trio of exhibitions reflects the enduring legacy of Arlene Schnitzer and the Fountain Gallery and the ways that her work has helped feed the soul of Portland and of arts and culture across the state.

A Fountain of Creativity Parts 1 and 2 are on view at the Oregon Historical Society from June 28, 2024, through January 2, 2025 (Part 1) and November 1, 2024, through May 4, 2025 (Part 2). Part 3 is on view from November 1, 2024, through April 15, 2025, at The Schnitzer Collection exhibition space located at 3033 NW Yeon Avenue in Portland. Admission to The Schnitzer Collection exhibition space is free, and public viewing hours are Tuesday through Friday from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. Educational tours are available upon request; please use this online form to schedule your tour.

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Mel Bochner: Words Mean Everything
Jun
1
to Oct 12
Schnitzer Collection, current

Mel Bochner: Words Mean Everything

  • Schnitzer Collection (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

Get inspired with a new interactive art exhibition that will have you thinking about words like you never have before.  Step inside the world of text-based conceptual art with “Mel Bochner: Words Mean Everything – From the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation”, open at The Schnitzer Collection in Portland June 1 - October 12, 2024. 

“Mel Bochner: Words Mean Everything” is an exciting, thought-provoking celebration of printmaking through renowned artist Mel Bochner’s exploration of language, communication, and meaning. “Throughout his career, Bochner has often played with color and language as a means of examining how we perceive and find meaning in the world around us. His work measures, documents—and even shouts—thoughts, while always conveying an underlying message: What are we thinking and how do we express it?” ARTnews Top 200 Collector Jordan Schnitzer said. 

Bochner is known for his ability to challenge the way we think about through a combination of words, colors, and engineering. His process includes compressing oil paint and paper pulp with 750 tons of force. 

“Mel Bochner: Words Mean Everything” pays homage to the art of printmaking. Through Bochner’s works, the exhibition allows visitors to learn about prints; their artistic value, and the techniques used to create them. 

Bochner’s own journey, from misadventures in his early life to becoming a world-famous artist, adds a touch of humor and humility to the experience. From being fired as a museum guard for falling asleep behind a Louise Nevelson sculpture to talking his way into an art critic position with no prior experience, Bochner’s path to success is as intriguing as his art.

The exhibition features more than 40 of Bochner’s incredible works from the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation, one of the most notable in North America. 

Schnitzer, one of the world’s top art collectors, is known for sharing his private collection with millions by loaning groundbreaking artworks to institutions large and small. The Schnitzer Collection is an extension of that mission. It is a local, educational art space in Portland that showcases uniquely curated exhibitions using pieces from the more than 22,000 works in the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation. 

Throughout its run, the exhibition will feature robust programming including free Saturday events, educational activities, and the opportunity to schedule group tours. 

“Mel Bochner: Words Mean Everything – From the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation” will be open and free to the public June 1 – October 12, 2024, Thursday – Saturday from 12 – 5 p.m. at The Schnitzer Collection.

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Hank Willis Thomas: LOVERULES
Feb
24
to Aug 4
current

Hank Willis Thomas: LOVERULES

  • The Henry Art Gallery (map)
  • Google Calendar ICS

“The most revolutionary thing a person can do is be open to change.” - Hank Willis Thomas

Well known as a conceptual artist and activist, Hank Willis Thomas’s (b. 1976, Plainfield, NJ) practice focuses on themes relating to commodity, identity, media, and popular culture. Though Thomas uses a range of media, his central conceptual tool is photographic, namely, he employs the imagery of popular visual and consumer culture to take on urgent contemporary questions: What is the role of art for civic life? How does visual culture create narratives that shape our notion of who counts in society?

Hank Willis Thomas: LOVERULES - From the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation, spans over 20 years of Thomas’s work—it is one of the largest presentations of the artist’s long-standing career. While not intended as a comprehensive survey, it touches on his most significant practices and themes: the impact of corporate branding, the construction of gender and race, and the struggle for liberty and equality. Individual artworks include photography, print, mixed-media, neon, and sculpture. The exhibition also highlights several series, including Branded and Unbranded: Reflections in Black by Corporate America. In the latter, Thomas strips iconic images drawn from the language of advertising of their text and product, thus highlighting the consistently dehumanizing strategies of corporate media, the commodification of African American identity, and the ways in which dominant cultural tropes shape notions of race and race relations.

Critical awareness, civic engagement, inclusive collaboration, and empathy are among the core invitations of Thomas’s work. Through the mining and reframing of iconic imagery and texts, Thomas connects historical moments of resistance to our lives today. With incisive clarity, he asks us to see and challenge systems of inequality while affirming our shared humanity to shape a better future.

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