Multnomah Arts Center Gallery

On display in the gallery:

A two-person exhibit by Mariane Zenker and Jenn DeMonte, on display February 16-March 23, 2024.

From altered ecosystems to forced global migration, this exhibit invites viewers to consider our changing world. Mariane Zenker creates gorgeously colored paintings on paper. Their richness is an invitation to consider how our appreciation of nature’s beauty means that we may not always recognize the destruction that is also occurring. Zenker’s work is informed by experiences as varied as making mudpies as a child, backpacking in the Shenandoah National Park, studying languages and art, and the way that birdsong in her backyard is slowly diminishing. She uses art-making to help make sense of the world, and her paintings are portals through which viewers may expand their own understanding as well. Jenn DeMonte’s globe-shaped ceramic sculptures are vessels that carry the figures of women and children in flight, and their stories. “Being a daughter of immigrants as well as a mother to children adopted internationally and through foster care, my clay narratives delve into themes of identity and belonging,” says DeMonte. Her work is also shaped by her extensive background in photojournalism and the years she’s spent volunteering in refugee communities.

There will be a reception on Thursday, February 22 from 6 pm to 8 pm. Light refreshments will be served and attendees will have the opportunity to meet both artists.

On display in the lobby exhibition area:

A group exhibition by eight members of Print Arts Northwest, on display from January 12th to March 16th, 2024.

Print Arts Northwest (PAN) is a nonprofit educational organization that was founded in 1980. Printmaking is an art form that is centuries old, and has been utilized in different ways by different cultures all over the world. PAN’s diverse members include many professional artists who work in a wide range of techniques. The exhibition at MAC will include examples of woodcut, copper plate etching, linoleum, screen printing, letterpress, and collagraph prints by eight artists: Gene Flores, Heather Halpern, Jessica Hartman, Gail Owen, David Kessler, Janet Markavage, Jane Pagliarulo, and Erik Sandgren. In keeping with the educational focus of both PAN and MAC, viewers will also have the opportunity to see many of the tools that are used to create these different types of prints.

There will be a reception on Thursday, January 25th from 6 pm to 8 pm. This event is held in conjunction with the reception for the current gallery exhibition by Eleanor Klock and Erick Martinez.

2023-2024 GALLERY SCHEDULE

Jessica Poundstone – archival pigment prints
Leondra Brackett – watercolor paintings and book arts
Exploring the colors, shapes and abundance in nature.
May 5 – June 10, 2023

Tatyana Ostapenko – acrylic paintings
Celebrating the strength & resilience of the Ukrainian people.
June 15 – July 22, 2023

Community Group Exhibit, featuring sculptures by Nyasha Madamombe
“Black History IS History”
July 28 – September 2, 2023

MAC Instructors Exhibit – brilliance in a broad range of media
Celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Center.
September 9 – October 14, 2023

Karen Russo – stoneware sculpture
Jason Greene – acrylic paintings
Meditative, grounding, and spiritual in nature.
October 20 – November 25, 2023

Eleanor Klock – drawings, risograph prints, comics
Erick Leonardo Martinez – ceramic sculpture
Feeling your way through:  growing up in a multicultural household, finding purpose, being human.
January 5 – February 10, 2024

Mariane Zenker – acrylic paintings on paper
Jenn Demonte – ceramic sculpture
A practice in seeing the effects of climate change, from altered ecosystems to forced global migration.
February 16 – March 23, 2024

Maren Salomon – cut paper & mixed media
Jingzi Zhao – photography
Moving work made during the COVID pandemic, creating a vantage point from which to look back and to feel our way forward.
March 29 – May 4, 2024

Lisa Brinkman – ecoprints
Hilary Pfeifer – sculpture made from reclaimed materials
Using what’s at hand to create beauty.
May 10 – June 15, 2024

Community Group Exhibit
This exhibit is curated by the community artists who work with us each year. Their bios can be found below. The theme for 2024 will be announced shortly.
June 21 – July 27, 2024

Arielle Brackett – metalsmithing & mixed media
Britt Block – pastel paintings
An invitation to reverence & rescue – from bees to species facing extinction in the Tillamook Forest.
August 2 – September 7, 2024

Gwynn Goodner  – oil paintings
A heart-full conversation about gun violence.
September 13 – October 19, 2024

Paula Champagne – Illustrations
Betsy McCarthy – fused glass sculpture
Work exploring the intersection of Blackness, nature and rest exhibited with organic sculptural shapes the glow in the light.
October 25 – November 30, 2024

Studio Art Quilt Associates (SAQA) – a juried group exhibit
Biophilia – Threads of Wonder
January 12 – February 24, 2025

Gallery Hours:
Monday - Thursday: 9:00am - 9:30pm
Friday & Saturday: 9:00am - 5:00pm
Sunday: Closed

The Multnomah Arts Center (MAC) Gallery opened in 1982. It serves as an educational venue for the community and a supportive environment for artists to share their work. Artists who show here are residents of Oregon and southern Washington near Portland.

Exhibiting artists are selected by a group jury process each year. The resulting shows reflect the artistic dynamism of the area, with an emphasis on the following:

  • a wide spectrum of media is shown throughout the year
  • diverse subject matter is explored
  • unique perspectives are shared
  • multidisciplinary and intersectional approaches are appreciated

As a community-based gallery, we seek to grow our collective ability to create, connect and share beauty in its many forms. Towards that end, some of the current equity practices at the Multnomah Arts Center Gallery include:

  • We embrace and encourage artists with differences in age, color, ethnicity, race, language, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, family or marital status, gender identity, political affiliation, veteran status, physical and mental ability, and socio-economic status. 
  • We show work by artists based on the merit of their work. Artists who exhibit here may not be represented by commercial galleries, or some do not have formal arts training.
  • Exhibiting artists receive 65% of any sales they make. The remaining 35% is used by our nonprofit organization, The Multnomah Arts Center Association, to support equity and access to arts education through MAC programming.
  • Community artists who are BIPOC, LGBTQIA2S+, immigrant or refugee, and/or disabled are invited to be a part of the group jury each year. Jurors receive an honorarium for their work.
  • The jury helps to identify a theme for a community exhibit each year. This group show is juried through a separate call, and the selection of work is led by the members of the community being called to participate (i.e. the Latinx PDX exhibit of 2022, which was juried by members of that community).
  • The annual Call for Artists encourages the submission of work that expands opportunities for participation by gallery visitors. This might take the form of music by a local musician playing on loop in the gallery, 3D work that is meant to be touched, or a reading by a local poet that includes sign interpretation.
  • Barriers to participation are address by a) ensuring that there is no application fee when submitting work for jurying, b) providing transparency in how decisions are made and who is making them, c) offering access to adaptive supports as needed in the application process, and d) providing translation services when requested (see below). Additionally, we recognize that matting and framing artwork for display can present a significant financial burden to artists when their work requires it and welcome the opportunity to explore possible solutions with those artists.

Our selection committee for our May 2023 – February 2025 exhibit calendar was led by artists and curators Steph Littlebird and Daren Todd.

Daren Todd is a Portland, Oregon based muralist, illustrator and designer. He is also the owner of Art Larger Than Me, a gallery and creative studio serving clients from residential real estate to the commercial film industry. Daren’s work currently focuses on abstract expressionism and graphic portraiture, and the juxtaposition of both styles into cohesive paintings and designs.

Steph Littlebird is an artist, curator, writer, and a member of Oregon’s Grand Ronde Confederated Tribes. She received national recognition as curator of This IS Kalapuyan Land (2020), an exhibition at the Five Oaks Museum in Portland which was featured by ArtNews and PBS NewsHour. Other curatorial projects include Untold Parallels, Mata Art Gallery, L.A. (2020), which re-examined colonial histories of the so-called Philippines and Filipinx-American diaspora, and colonized people Indigenous to “North America.” Most recently, Pʰot-Choch, an exhibition held at Anita, Astoria OR (2021) presented traditional and contemporary art of the original Chinook inhabitants of the North Coast. Her visual work engages issues related to contemporary Indigenous identities, marginalized histories, and responsible land stewardship. Littlebird earned her B.F.A. in Painting and Printmaking from the Pacific Northwest College of Art (PNCA) in Portland.

For more information about MAC’s Gallery and Exhibitions, please contact us at gallery@multnomahartscenter.org.

To view our previous gallery shows, click here.

Forms:

Gallery Policies | Submission Guidelines | Acceptable Media | Gallery Map 

All shows end at 5:00pm on the final date listed