September 2019 Cultural Work Roundup

/// September 2019 ///

It’s one of the most wonderful times of the year in Portland for culture with PICA’s annual TBA festival. Some of our highlights are below. Support artists and cultural workers of color around town this month!

EVENTS

• Sunday, 9/1: 11th Annual Slavic Festival at the Gateway Discovery Park - Throughout the years, hundreds of thousands of people were able to enjoy vibrant cultures of Eastern Europe, as we have provided a platform for dozens of local artists to showcase their skills on stage and off. This event also provides opportunities for local entrepreneurs, business owners, and organizations to directly reach attendees. During last years festival we estimated that over 10,000+ people attended the event. The Slavic Festival reaches a wide demographic of attendees from all over the Pacific Northwest who are interested in different cultures and a multicultural atmosphere. This year, the festival would not have been successful without the contributions and partnerships with corporations, local businesses, and organizations. Fun Summer Free For All events in our cherished parks are made possible through support from Portland General Electric. 10am-10pm, Gateway Discovery Park, 10520 NE Halsey St.
  
• Thursday, 9/5: FESTIVAL Eiko Otake: A Body in Places Exhibition - A Body in Places is the omnibus title of Eiko’s first solo project, which started with her revisiting post-nuclear disaster Fukushima and her twelve hour performance at Philadelphia Station in 2014. Its scale and modes of presentation vary radically and incorporate both performative and non-performative elements. For this incarnation, the artist presents a series of new prints and video works made in residency and in partnership with Joseph Scheer, Aodi Liang, and Rebekah Palov, at the Institute for Electronic Arts at NYSCC (IEA) at NYCC. 6pm-8pm, PNCA Center for Contemporary Art and Culture, 511 NW Broadway. 
• Saturday, 9/7: LATE NIGHT: The Back to School Kiki Ball at TBA - PDXBall presents The Back to School Kiki Ball, a thrilling competition that shows a glimpse of Portland's dynamic Kiki ballroom community. The Kiki ballroom scene is a subculture of the mainstream ballroom world and was created to practice walking or competing in the many ‘categories’ of the international ballroom arena. The theme "Back to School" will influence the decor, competitive categories, and attire of the participants. Spectators and first-time ball attendees are welcome to join in the fun by dressing to the theme. If it is your first time at a ball, you are highly encouraged to attend and cheer on the competitors who have trained for each category. Join us in celebrating a powerful and inspiring community that uplifts and centers queer and trans black, indigenous land, people of color. 10:30pm, PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street. 
• Tuesday, 9/10: FESTIVAL: Roland Dahwen: The Overseas Banquet at TBA - In Roland Dahwen’s film-based installations, sound, image, and texture weave a self-poetics in which memory, social ritual, and political history migrate time and space. The installations spill into choreographed and spontaneous performances that are polyvocal, literary, and digested through food and touch. The Overseas Banquet is one such occasion, an unpredictable “banquet” that celebrates the intimacy and awkwardness of living hybridity in migration’s unendingly in-between psyche. The evening includes food, music, readings, and screenings of Dahwen’s 8mm films. Reservations required. 6:30pm, Mekong Bistro, 8200 NE Siskiyou Street. 
• Thursday - Saturday, 9/12 - 9/14: FESTIVAL: Anthony Hudson/Carla Rossi: Looking for Tiger Lily - Starring Anthony Hudson—the human vessel for Portland’s premiere drag clown Carla Rossi—Looking for Tiger Lily (Solo) utilizes song, dance, drag, and video to put a queer spin on the ancestral tradition of storytelling. Asking what it means for a queer, mixed Native person to experience their heritage through white normative culture as they recount growing up watching the 1960 production of Peter Pan featuring Sondra Lee’s blonde, blue-eyed, 'Indian Princess' Tiger Lily, Anthony (and Carla) draws from a songbook stretching across Disney’s Pocahontas to Cher’s "Half- Breed." Not just autobiography, Looking for Tiger Lily (Solo) is a coming-of-age story that's more than cowboys versus Indians. 6:30pm every night, PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street. 
• Thursday - Saturday, 9/12 - 9/14: FESTIVAL Eiko Otake: The Duet Project: Distance is Malleable - For this engagement, Eiko collaborates with artists of diverse backgrounds and disciplines, both living and dead. Through interdisciplinary performances of her Duet Project: Distance is Malleable at PICA, and an installation of A Body in Places at PNCA gallery, which complement each other, the artists explore the different ways individuals encounter and converse. Her presentation revolves around four themes: how we grapple with cross-generational provocation; environmental and nuclear disaster; the malleability of distances between locations, individuals, and events; and what the dead left us. Performing live with Eiko are choreographer Ishmael Huston-Jones, poet and performing artist Mark Mccloughan, and filmmaker and environmental activist Alexis Moh. 8:30pm every night, PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street. 
• Friday, 9/13 and Saturday, 9/14: WORKSHOP and LATE NIGHT: Feeling of Home with YGB Collective at TBA – Feeling of Home will reconstruct what home and healing can feel like for local, intergenerational Black and Brown artists and communities. In this space we will focus on home and what it feels like for the individual but also what home feels like when we come together as a community. There will be several chances to hang out and heal with us including workshops and a late night event. This late night event will feature art installations from those born & raised in Portland. With video projections, DJ’s, live performances and lounges, it’ll be equal parts grandmother's kitchen on Sunday morning AND your uncle's basements on Friday night. We're letting loose but with people who love you deeply. 10:30 pm at PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street WORKSHOP: *Open to BlPOC+ participants only. Limited to 25 participants. Pre-registration recommended. 10am-12pm, N.E.W. Expressive Works, 810 SE Belmont Street. 
• Friday, 9/13: Creative Capital 2020 Award Application Info Session - Portland – Learn how artists can apply for the Creative Capital Award valued at $100,000, including $50,000 in project funding, and an additional $50,000 in career development services—all dedicated to supporting artists complete their innovative project ideas. The application, opening February 2020, is free and open to artists working in all disciplines across the country. Check out Creative Capital's website for more information about the application and the Creative Capital Award: https://creative-capital.org. 1pm-2pm, Regional Arts & Culture Council, 411 NW Park Ave, Ste 101. 
• Saturday, 9/14 and Sunday 9/15: FESTIVAL: Remember the Star: Takashi Makino’s “Memento Stella” at TBA - Memento Stella is an original phrase I coined to remind me to "remember the stars" and "never forget that we too reside among the stars", as well as the title of a project I started from winter of 2016. Screening of Memento Stella, with original soundtrack by Reinier van Houdt, Sept. 14 and screening of Memento Stella, with live music of Takashi Makino, Sept. 15. West Coast premiere. 4:30pm both dates, OMSI, 1945 SE Water Avenue. 
• Saturday, 9/14: 9th Annual Urban Art Fest - Join LUS at our 9th Annual Urban Art Fest! Live performances, live art and art walk, and show cars! The purpose of this event is to combat the stereotypes and stigmatization of urban art (or street art) by connecting talented youth with their community. We do this by giving youth leadership roles throughout the process of organizing this event, all while, raising the self esteem of talented youth through understanding cultural identity in the arts. It is a time where local artists can connect and build a relationship with one another and it gives the community the opportunity to be educated on the different forms of street art. Hosted at MERIT (MicroEnterprise Resources Initiatives and Training NW). 12pm-7:30 pm, 2640 Portland Road, Salem. 
• Saturday, 9/14: Autumn Moon Lantern Viewing – As a finale to the celebration of the Autumn As a finale to the celebration of the Autumn Moon Festival, Lan Su Chinese Garden presents a special Lantern Viewing Evening beginning at 7 p.m. on Saturday, September 14 after the day-long Autumn Moon Festival in the garden. This event will include mooncake samples, a Chinese calligraphy demonstration, a ribbon dance performance by Yu Long of the Seattle Yu Long Academy and a Fire Poi performance with the Polynesian dance troupe from Teva Oriata. Following the performances, stroll the garden and enjoy the beautiful glow from dozens of hanging lanterns and more than 400 floating lanterns that Lan Su staff will release into Lake Zither! 7pm, Lan Su Chinese Garden. 
• Saturday, 9/14: Artists & Makers of Color Craft Fair! The POC caucus at People’s Food Co-op invites local BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color) artists and makers to apply for our Artists & Makers of Color Craft Fair! Come and vend your artwork, publications, and other magical tools of resilience and resistance that circulate truth and invoke spells of decolonization and collective liberation. 12pm-5pm, The People’s Food Co-op, 3029 SE 21st Ave. 
• Saturday, 9/14: Arte Soleil Block Party: Celebrate Community!! Join Arte Soleil for our Second Annual Block Party. There will be free food and services, art demonstrations, local music, kids activities, door prizes, locally crafted items for sale and much more!
  **Free Brake Light Clinic
  **Register to Vote
  **Franz Bakery is providing Free TREATS
  **Soul Box Project
  Come make a Box or two or three to honor the life of someone who has been lost to gun violence. The Soul Box Project is a national community art project revealing the gunfire epidemic. Participants are counting and honoring each victim with a Soul Box.
  
• Wednesday, 9/18: The Immigrant Story Live – Stories have power. At The Immigrant Story (TIS), we believe the most important ones originate from within the immigrant community — especially during the current political climate.With that in mind, we cordially invite you to The Immigrant Story Live — a chance to experience the power of storytelling. Sponsored by the City of Beaverton, the event features four compelling, contemporary stories told — and lived — by members of our immigrant community. 7pm- 9pm, Beaverton City Library Auditorium, 12375 S.W. 5th St. 
• Thursday, 9/19: E. Jane: Deluxe Dreams chapbook launch – home school is excited to announce our publication of the debut chapbook by E. Jane: Deluxe Dreams or while hiding away I still think of the world while trying to love myself. Deluxe Dreams, is part of home school press, an experiment in publication as part of our 2019 residency with Yale Union, with support from Container Corps. 7pm-9pm, Yale Union, 800 SE 10th Avenue. 
• Friday, 9/27: 14th Annual American Indian Day Celebration– The Northwest Portland Area Indian Health Board presents the 2019 American Indian Day Celebration. This event features vendors, educational booths, food, entertainment and more! For more information visit npaihb.org. 12pm-7pm, Pioneer Courthouse Square. 
• Sunday, 9/29: Hiro’s Table - Presented by the Portland Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), this film is about master chef Hiroji Obayashi and his wife Yasuyo. It’s a story of immigration, following your dream, cooking and all of the joys and sorrows that life entails. Following the film will be Q&A with the director and producer Lynn Hamrick, and Hiroji and Yasuyo Obayashi who now make Portland their home. $10 general admission. 2:30pm, Clinton Street Theater, 2522 SE Clinton St.

OPPORTUNITIES

• Call for East Portland artists – After receiving a grant from Metro, the Community Investment Trust will be incorporating artwork onto the exterior of Plaza 122, a thriving commercial property which provides residents a low-dollar, tangible, and safe opportunity to collectively own a piece of real estate in their own neighborhood. The intention of this project is to create a more welcoming gathering place at Plaza 122 by decorating the building with panels created by East Portland artists of diverse backgrounds. Each artist will be in charge of designing at least one panel that will attach to HVAC units on the outside walls of Plaza 122. The art will be visible from 122nd Avenue, and will help create a community space in Plaza 122’s south parking lot. Find the application here.

• Low cost creative work spaces available at Broad Space, a co-working collective for artists who identify as female or non-binary. Spaces start at $95/month for a hot desk! Email: JeanettePDX@gmail.com for more details and visit BroadspacePDX.com to learn more.

/// More on the Cultural Work Roundup ///

The Cultural Work Roundup is a monthly spotlight on arts and cultural events and opportunities that:

• Directly relate to APANO's cultural work strategies to impact beliefs, actions and policies through centering the voices of those most impacted and silenced, resisting and shifting harmful narratives and ideas, and moving beyond defensive strategies to envisioning alternatives.
• Centralize the voices of Oregon-based Asian and Pacific Islander artists and/or artists of color.

Events may include readings, exhibitions, festivals, openings, and performances. Opportunities may include calls for artistic submissions, grant and funding opportunities, and volunteer opportunities. The deadline for submissions is the third Monday of each month for events and opportunities that fall into the following month. For example, events and opportunities that take place in June are due to APANO by the third Monday in May.



The Cultural Work Roundup will be posted on APANO's website and shared via APANO's digital communications platforms. Events and opportunities will be posted at APANO's discretion based on alignment with our cultural work values. You may submit to the Cultural Work Roundup by filling out our Google Form at bit.ly/culturalworkroundup.



If you have any questions, please contact Cultural Work Coordinator Roshani Thakore at roshani@apano.org. Enjoy!



This programming message brought to you by APANO Communities United Fund a 501(c3) nonprofit organization.