Unlike other out-of-town residencies, my Portland art-gig can’t be totally immersive. “Home” is a demanding domain, with squawking and squeaky wheels like dentist appointments, toilet emergencies, flower arranging, vacuuming, socializing, and those ever-present to-do lists.
Thus, while I was at the new studio space every day last week for an hour or so, I did only one, awful plein air painting on Monday (sunny and above 40 degrees; no wind). Tuesday was busy, so I showed up, but had to get ready for my crit group meeting in the evening, and Wednesday the weather turned … well, it turned….
Instead of being a cheerful dry 47 degrees, it was suddenly 35, sunny, and windy. Very very windy. Windy enough to cause certain kinds of casualties at the Res.
The half-dressed manikin that stands beside the Christmas tree at the door to the loading dock (the door through which I enter to get to the Res studio) met with a wild wind gust:
The body on the dock, approached by the dog paws’ trail — footprints of the perp?
[“The Res”, by the way, is now a house term referring to the art residency studio as well as the Eastside Industrial District; around the house we had to find an abbreviated way to talk about where I was headed, and while this isn’t a reservation for Native Americans, it has a certain feel of a delimited space, with definite boundaries: hence, the res.]
While I didn’t do much art, I did spend a bit of time getting the res space ready to paint in: light bulbs, space heater, paper towels, broom. On my walk to the res on Wednesday, I picked a few dandelions and put them into a vase I found in the warehouse:
It’s one way to make the space feel more like someone cares.
On the advice of a friend and at the insistence of Jer, the res studio also includes a crow bar. As the space is in a wooden warehouse on a 2nd floor mezzanine level at the furthest corner away from the loading dock door, it seemed like having a plan for escape in case of a fire might be useful. The crowbar will break out the window, should that become necessary; I haven’t quite sorted out how I’m going to get to the pavement 2 stories below. Hopefully I won’t have to figure it out.
In addition to sorting out the indoor space, I spent a lot of time walking and photographing the outdoor spaces where I hope to paint. The Portland Store Fixtures building is not prepossessing as a painting motif: it will probably become one of my surreal-esque efforts. In fact, the really bad painting I did on Monday was a first futile attempt to grab the space in a painting. Alas, it ran away from me, fast. Now that I’ve got that out of my system, I can proceed to paint something I can paint.
I’m fascinated by a cluster of buildings a block away from the Fixtures store. I think it’s part of the Zycon Stamping Plant — a sign calls it Stamping Plant 5. The buildings looks like they’ve been there since about 1890, they are various sizes and a few, mostly rectangular, shapes, they sit at a steep angle in an irregular, paved parking space, and the large pipes that end in a funnel is a scene made to be painted:
No photo I’ve taken does justice to the entire space, which is exactly why I want to capture it in pigment on canvas.
I’ve already started a large canvas of the underside of the Hawthorne Bridge and the tunnel it makes to the river and downtown Portland on the west side. Out the studio window is another view of that street (also mostly unphotographable). It shows various highways, including interstate 5 as it crosses the river, and classic old industrial rooftops:
In fact, the windows themselves have a certain poignancy. Rembrandt did superb paintings that include rough indoor spaces; maybe I can emulate his subject matter, if not his genius:
Kat (one of the owners of Portland Store Fixtures) dropped by on Friday to see what I was up to. She had read the first residency post and told me I was welcome to paint in the (warmer) main warehouse, with all the manikins, provided I was courteous and stayed out of the way of customers and moving machinery. She also said if I had friends who wanted to join me that that would be fine. So, those of you who need to sketch figures and don’t have access to Roman statues….
And oh, yes, I mis-identified a structure in the first post. I said this building was next to the Portland Store Fixtures’ loading dock:
Actually the building above is a block away, on 3rd Street, possibly part of the Stamping Plant. The Portland Store Fixtures loading dock is much more upscale:
On the way home from the res on Thursday, I captured this photo in my camera. Just part of the experience of starting out on a new journey:
Next week the weather is to be foul, so indoor painting may be the only painting possible. TTYL –June
juneunderwood.com 
9 responses to “Portland Store Fixtures Residency: Post 2”
Oh, you made me laugh with the crowbar story. I remember well, lying in bed at night in my new townhouse rental, second floor, one exit only which could easily be blocked in case of fire, and wondering how I could safely reach the ground through the window. I envisioned tying bedsheets together but couldn’t think what to anchor them to. And then there was that 60 lb labrador – how would I lower HER to the ground? In light of day, I even stood outside looking up at the window trying to envision the space between my feet and the ground should I be hanging from the sill by my fingertips. Decided a broken bone or two would be acceptable considering the alternative. Luckily, I never had to test it out.
If Jer is really concerned, he’ll get you one of those roll-up ladders you can hook over the sill and unfurl. And no, I never got myself one although I thought about it often.
Short of the fact that this kind of residency doesn’t give you full immersion, I can see this area is full of the kind of fodder that creates the wonderful June cityscapes. Soldier on!
Hey thanks, Sheila, I’ve actually contemplated one of those ladders. We may have to invest. Like you, I couldn’t figure out what I’d tie a rope to (bed sheets not being much of an option), so the hooking ladder is an option. Thus far, I haven’t spent enough time in the space to get too freaked. It is so funky, it’s definitely charming.
And of course, one reason for less than full immersion is that I can invent lots of distractions and procrastinations. But they will have to disappear, or my anxieties will rise up and bounce off my nose. So I will soldier on. But with next week’s weather, it may involve photographs and sketching on canvas without much hope of making real paintings.
Boy, you got me. I figured the “flower arranging” was the same kind of fantasy as “vacuuming” (huh? You brought a broom with you? That would have never occurred to me. You’re not as housekeeperly hopeless as I am, it seems). Then again, Artistic Procrastination has gotten many a space tidied up.
What does it say about me that I think your flower arrangement in front of the window would make a very cool painting?
Flower arranging, vacuuming — needs will as needs must! The broom was essential because when the guys hooked up the electricity, they drilled lots of holes in various directions and left bits and pieces of the materials as well as the wood/wallboard flakes behind, both in the studio and in the room below. Warehouse electricians don’t do janitorial.
Sweeping did give me a little more procrastination time, of course, but it was also sort of necessary.
The still life in the window? Well, of course you’d and iPat would like that. But isn’t it a bit too, um, still for you? I fear it is for me, unless, of course, I’m procrastinating.
I’m drawn to its grunge-ness and potential flatness. You know-Marsden Hartley-ish.
Oh yeah, Marsden…. Do you have a book on him? I need more than web visuals.
Warehouse electricians aren’t the only kind that don’t do janitorial. Could never figure why they don’t feel compelled, especially since they get paid so well. Minor rant that. 😉
It seems like I remember going through that part of Portland looking for a brewery called Hair of the Dog one time about, oh, 8 or 9 years ago… have you seen that place?
Hair of the Dog is on about the 010 block of Yamhill — two blocks north and a block west. Very nearby, in fact. That area has changed drastically, though, as some of the older plants have been abandoned and then turned into “spaces’ — office spaces, creative spaces, even a restaurant and an art gallery (or perhaps these have come and gone). Anyway, I’m sure you were here in a past life — I can feel your presence:-)