Portland Spoke – The Official Blog of Travel Portland

Here are some of Portland’s performing arts highlights for March and April (also see music highlights):

“The Whipping Man”
Feb. 26-March 24
Portland Center Stage, 117 N.W. 11th Ave.
The Civil War is suddenly in the national consciousness, thanks to “Lincoln”� and “Django Unchained,”� and this odd and very successful play by Matthew Lopez is set in the aftermath, when a Jewish Confederate returns home, just in time for Passover, to find the family mansion occupied by two former slaves, who were also raised Jewish.

Don Kenneth Mason and Ben Newman in Blood Knot. Photo by Jamie Bosworth.

“Blood Knot”
Feb. 27-March 17
Profile Theatre, 3430 S.E. Belmont St.

Profile Theatre (like the Signature Theatre in New York) chooses one playwright every year to build its season around, and this year’s is the great South African writer, Athol Fugard, whose descriptions of the moral tensions of living under apartheid are among the very best we have.

MOMIX
Feb. 27-March 2
White Bird, Newmark Theatre, 1111 S.W. Broadway

Moses Pendleton, who was a co-founder of the dance acrobats of Pilobolus, formed MOMIX in 1981 to extend his experiments in movement and illusion. Here, the company will perform the kaleidoscopic “Botanica,”� with puppetry by Portland’s Michael Curry (“The Lion King”).

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Here are some of Portland’s classical music highlights for March and April (also see performing arts highlights):

Bang on a Can's Michael Gordon

“When Michael Meets Julia”�
Feb. 28-March 1
Third Angle, Alberta Rose Theater, 3000 N.E. Alberta St.

A band, a festival, an organization and a continuing revolution, New York’s Bang on a Can has, for a quarter-century, reinvigorated classical music with the pulsating rhythms of rock, minimalism and other contemporary sounds.

Bang on a Can's Julie Wolfe

For about the same stretch, Third Angle has showcased some of the most original and accessible music being composed in the classical tradition, so this pairing of Oregon’s finest new music ensemble with the striking music of (and appearances by) two of BOAC’s (married) cofounders, Julia Wolfe and Michael Gordon, is the season’s happiest combination.

“Back in the USSR”�
March 2 (Resonance Ensemble, Agnes Flanagan Chapel, Lewis & Clark College, 0615 S.W. Palatine Hill Road) and March 3 (Yale Union [YU], 800 S.E. 10th Ave.)

One of the city’s finest collections of singers drawn from other top choirs sings seldom-heard sounds, long imprisoned in the Soviet era’s artistic gulag, by Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Arvo Pärt and other Eastern European composers.

March Music Moderne
March 7-23
Various venues

The annual citywide celebration of contemporary music reveals that, despite the musty programming of too many of Portland’s classical institutions, the 20th and 21st centuries have produced a cornucopia of compelling sounds. All 32 concerts, many free or low-cost, are worth checking out; top picks include the preview party potpourri (March 7), Free Marz String Trio (March 8), Arnica Quartet (March 15), Beta Collide (March 16), Third Angle (March 21) and City of Tomorrow Wind Quintet and Northwest New Music (March 23).

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Hikers will tell you there are two kinds of trails: one, where the trek itself is the payoff, and the other, which leads to a grand reward. While you don’t have to lace up any boots to enjoy the North Willamette Wine Trail (April 13-14), the path’s bounty of riches means you can enjoy both the journey and the destination. This weekend-long open house of more than 20 wineries, vineyards, tasting rooms and cellars offers everything from rare bottles to one-of-a-kind demonstrations, all unique to one of the country’s most vibrant winemaking valleys.

Home to around two dozen vintners, North Willamette Valley’s wine country is approximately 20 miles from downtown Portland and boasts both stunning scenery and palate-pleasing wines. The North Willamette Wine Trail Weekend, which runs the second weekend in April each year, is the ideal time to visit the wineries, which range from small boutiques like Ardiri Winery to large estates like Shafer Vineyard Cellars. Winding along the wine trail reveals riches far beyond the vine — food pairings, live music, tours and hands-on activities also abound.

And then there’s the wine. Known for some of the world’s best pinot noir grapes, the valley’s wines — sought after the world over — are abundantly accessible along this route. From new releases to reserve labels, there are tastings aplenty along the trail, with barrel tappings by winemakers a common sight throughout the weekend.

Passes are now available, with options for weekend-long ($45) or Sunday-only tickets ($30).

Stretch it out, lace ‘em up and pump up the volume—because it’s T-minus three months until the Rock ‘n’ Roll Half-Marathon (May 19)! Portland’s stop on this popular series of nationwide road races, a half-marathon that winds from downtown to the east side and back, kicks off the Portland Rose Festival, and advance registration is already underway.

As scenic as it is exciting, this 13.1-miler crosses Stumptown bridges, zig-zags through neighborhoods like Laurelhurst and rocks all over town with more than 10,000 participants getting cheered on at every mile point by bands and fans alike. And while the closed course, with its gradual inclines and pleasant setting, was popular among participants at last year’s inaugural event, what drew even more rave reviews was the convenient coordination of the race expo, starting line and downtown hotels. If you’re all business about your road races, Portland’s Rock ‘n’ Roll is your kind of party.

And this year — because there’s nothing more rock ‘n’ roll than a party boat — the Portland Spirit cruise ship will serve up a continental breakfast and live entertainment for friends and family of runners, giving them up-close views of the race’s bridge crossings from Willamette River. And the boat docks in time for everyone to rock out together at the finish line.

Maybe you’ve seen the viral video of a baby swiping and tapping on a magazine — or what is, to her, a broken iPad. Whether it saddens you that printed pages are becoming incomprehensible, or it excites you that the future is unfolding before our eyes, the video makes one thing clear: Children learn by touching.

This hands-on educational philosophy is employed throughout the Portland Children’s Museum, where an array of exhibits let little fingers poke, prod, grab and grasp complex concepts and toddler-sized tools, so they can learn by doing. From the Clay Studio to the Water Works, they can sculpt and splash, discovering elements of cause and effect while developing motor skills. And by taking part in kinder-sized construction projects in the eco-friendly garage or the “Building Bridgetown” exhibit, they can pick the tools they need to succeed later on, in the real world.

But the sharpest tool kids are developing at the museum is undoubtedly imagination, which plays a central role in Storyland (Feb. 9 – May 5), an exhibit that features favorite children’s books, from the classic Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter to newer favorites like Laura Numeroff’s If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, and encourages early literacy by getting children interested in books, improving their vocabulary and helping them to tell stories of their own. With a setting that looks like it leaped out of the pages of a book itself, the environment is interactive and hands-on — and way more exciting than an iPad.

From masses to operas, films to cartoons, classical music has found a way of evolving with the times. So it should come as no surprise to fans of complex compositions that video games are now yielding some of the most beloved tunes of our times. And like a trip to the ol’ fairy pond, Oregon Symphony’s The Legend of Zelda: Symphony of the Goddesses (March 16) will have heart containers overflowing with 25 years of classic Nintendo musical scores, reviving nostalgia for everyone’s favorite Triforce-powered hero, Link.

A one-night-only adventure at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, this performance is all-ages, multimedia fun, covering theme songs from Hyrule’s dungeons to Kakariko Village — all set to a cinematic video presentation, and arranged into a four-part symphony. The concert, conducted by Eimear Noone and performed by the Oregon Symphony and Pacific Youth Choir, spans games from The Legend of Zelda to Twilight Princess, and has been approved by the games’ original composer, Koji Kondo.

Attendees are encouraged to suit up and represent the vast reaches of Hyrule, with the winning costume taking home the show’s 6-foot window banner, autographed by the conductor. With all those Zeldas, Ganons, fairies and gorons, there’s sure to be plenty of spectacle along with the symphonics. But please leave your ocarinas at home — it’s time to let someone else play.

Heading into this year’s Oscar season, it’s clear that as much ground as women have gained in the film industry in recent years, they still have to campaign hard for the recognition they deserve. This unfortunate truth becomes evident when browsing the 2012 Best Director Academy Award nominees, which include no female filmmakers, despite several strong entrants.

That’s why efforts like the Portland Oregon Women’s Film Festival (March 7-10) are so crucial. For the past five years, this annual event (also known as POWFest) has championed female filmmakers of every genre. Each year, in addition to showing dozens of women-directed movies, hosting social mixers and running topical talks, the festival celebrates an industry luminary. Past featured directors include MacArthur genius grant filmmaker Allison Anders, documentarian Irene Taylor-Brodsky, Little Women’s Gillian Armstrong and Oscar-winner Kathryn Bigelow, who helmed The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty. This year’s icon, Penelope Spheeris, can speak to being both a cult legend and pop icon, with a resume that ranges from The Decline of Western Civilization to Wayne’s World.

This year’s POWfest will grace the screens of Portland’s Hollywood Theatre with shorts, features and documentaries from as far away as New Zealand and Kenya — promising four days of hard-hitting, fantastic female filmmaking. The documentary Wonder Women! The Untold Story of American Superheroines is sure to inspire moviegoers, while the short There’s No Shame in AIDS will likely ground them and encourage them to continue exploring life’s struggles through films directed by women.

Photo by Masonite Burn, via Flickr

When did sports become about performance-enhancing drugs, player strikes, owner lockouts and everything other than the game? Don’t ask the Rose City Rollers — for the past eight years, they’ve been competing with old-fashioned gusto and intensity, all for the love of the game — the game of flat track roller derby.

This all-female, all-volunteer-run league has battled its way to the top of Portland’s sports fandom in recent years, packing venues from the Memorial Coliseum, which accommodates thousands of fans, to the hangar at Oaks Amusement Park, where hundreds squeeze into an intense, intimate space to cheer on the passionate, padded gladiatrices.

The 2013 season is underway, and the ladies’ wheels are already spinning for the next bout, Feb. 22, when Salem’s 8 Wheel Assassins travel upstate to take on the local A-squad, the Guns ‘N’ Rollers. The season runs through Dec. 7 and includes bouts against international foes from Australia and London.

Tickets are available online to see these fast, furious, stunning and bold hometown girls, with names (like “Scarlene,” “Juvie Hall” and “Roarshock Tess”) as colorful as their hairstyles and body art. But to them, image is secondary – winning is everything. So pull up a seat along the track, and grab a beer or glass of wine from the concession stand, because this is how we roll in Portland.

Picture a cartoon devil sitting on a curious kid’s shoulder, egging her on to do something she shouldn’t. Look closer — does that devil have red hair, a beard and nerdy glasses, or perhaps a walrus moustache and a beret? That would make sense, because the moment Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman, the stars of Discovery Channel’s hit show, “Mythbusters,” say “Don’t try this at home” viewers may feel an overwhelming urge to drop some Mentos into a bottle of Diet Coke, and get the soda fountain party started! Thankfully, Portland has a controlled environment where you can safely go hands-on with the science – MythBusters: The Explosive Exhibition at OMSI (Feb. 8 – May 4).

At this exhibit, mad scientists in training can reject others’ reality to substitute their own, putting the scientific method to the test in an array of interactive experiences. At last, there’s a place to drive blindfolded while a navigator voices directions. Finally, there’s a phone booth to try changing clothes like a superhero. And it’s about time you could to calculate which option is wetter: running versus walking in the rain. (That display is sure to be a local favorite.)

With props and gadgets from the show’s set, the all-ages exhibit is enjoyable for fans of the show and science alike, and it’s the perfect place to squeal the MythBusters’ favorite quote: “Let’s do it again!”

Here are some of Portland’s visual highlights for January and February (see performing arts and music highlights):

Photo by Jake Richardson

“In Passing”
Jan. 12-March 3
Disjecta, 8371 N. Interstate Ave.

Chris Fraser creates installations that are extremely hard to describe but very pleasurable to experience, mostly because they traffic in light. “In Passing” is actually a huge camera obscura that creates room-sized abstract art from streaks of refracted light. Disjecta, in Portland’s Kenton neighborhood, is a rough-and-tumble space excellent for this purpose.

“We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live”
Jan. 24-April 27
Museum of Contemporary Craft, 724 N.W. Davis St.

This exhibition features the work of the nine winners of the prestigious Hallie Ford Fellowships in the Visual Arts, mid-career Oregon artists with substantial reputations. The work was chosen through the lens of an essay by Joan Didion, which provides the title, and it includes video and digital photography, oil painting, drawing, sculpture, ceramics and knitting.

A Broad and Expansive Sky--Ancient Rome from Roaming, 2006. Digital chromogenic print, 73 x 61 in. Courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York. (c) Carrie Mae Weems.

Carrie Mae Weems
Feb. 2-May 19
Portland Art Museum, 1219 S.W. Park Ave.

Weems was born in Portland in 1953, leaving after high school to pursue a dance career in San Francisco but soon beginning to take photographs and become a photographer and filmmaker. Her work focuses on gender and race issues in the culture in smart, often humorous ways. This exhibition features both photographs and videos from throughout Weems’ career.

“First Hand: Civil War Era Drawings from the Becker Collection”
Feb. 5-April 20
Cooley Gallery at Reed College, 3203 S.E. Woodstock Blvd.

The Becker collection at Boston College was assembled by illustrator Joseph Becker and includes both his own work and that of other artists who ventured to the battlefields of the Civil War to record what they saw, a powerful and seldom-seen record of the war years. The Cooley Gallery on the campus of Reed College is an intimate space, perfect for drawings and smaller scale work.

First Thursday and First Friday gallery walks
Jan. 3-4 and Feb. 7-8
Various venues

The easiest and best way to plug into Portland’s visual arts scene is by ambling through its two main gallery walks. First Thursday takes place on the west side of the Willamette River and features most of the city’s mainline galleries (Elizabeth Leach, Froelich Gallery, PDX Contemporary, etc.) along with a batch of more experimental places. First Friday occurs on the east side of the Willamette, where the art tends to get edgier and the prices lower.