Portland, Oregon, a city more often associated with artisanal coffee and a certain kind of vibe, is making a serious play for the art world's attention. Enter Converge 45, a triennial art exhibition designed to pull the spotlight away from the usual art-hub suspects and firmly onto the 45th parallel, where Portland proudly sits.
Established in 2016 by dealer Elizabeth Leach, it's a clever geographical flex. The latest edition, "Here, To you, Now," is curated by Lumi Tan, who borrowed the title from Ursula K. Le Guin's Always Coming Home. Tan, in a move that both makes sense and sounds like a deep thought you'd have at 2 AM, explains that written language is "there, for anyone, at any time," while spoken language is "here, to you, now." The artists, naturally, run with this, imagining new ways of living while still, you know, existing in the present.
The Art of the Comeback
The show features 28 artists spread across 16 venues, including the Pacific Northwest College of Art and the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art (PICA). Over half of these visionaries are local, because what's a local art scene without actual locals? Some even hail from studios that support artists with intellectual disabilities, adding another layer to the community focus.
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Start Your News DetoxAnd these artists aren't just dropping art bombs from orbit; they're engaging with Portland itself. Linda K. Johnson's piece nods to a past performance right there in the city. Rose Salane's video installation — shown at a local shopping center, because art is everywhere now — features shoes once owned by Princess Diana. Which, if you think about it, is both impressive and slightly terrifying. Patricia Vázquez Gómez's audio installation and book are rooted in her work with local youth learning the Mayan language, which is about as grounded in the present as you can get.
Portland, like many cities, has had its share of challenges — rising rents, limited arts funding, the usual suspects. But Lumi Tan's deep dive into the local arts community revealed a collective yearning for a "comeback." Converge 45 is clearly here to help light that particular fire. Because apparently that's where we are now: art as urban revival.
