SOUTH WATERFRONT
PORTLAND OREGON

Tim Jennings, GM / Director, and Trevor Lewis, Wholesale Manager, of Mbantua Gallery (Australia) spent two days showing and selling aboriginal artwork at OHSU Center for Health and Healing last week. Partially a fund-raiser for the Heart Research Center, the unique offering drew members from the SWF community, the hospital and greater Portland Community.

It was interesting talking with Tim, who’s spent the last 16+ years passionately creating and growing his business, along with an appreciation for Aboriginal artwork and culture. He is intimately involved in relations with the artists and often part of the trips into the Utopia region every two weeks to collect and catalog work and deliver art supplies. Conditions in the villages are primitive by our standards; and I understand it’s not unlikely a dog, child, wind-blown plant and certainly dirt contribute to the exposed canvas while artists paint on the hard, dry ground.

I am told most Aboriginals in this region don’t read or write, and spoken English is also rare. Passed pictorially and orally their culture and customs revolve around mythology and rituals. Their artwork is an extension of their traditions. Each work of art embodies the artist’s dream and cannot be replicated by any other community member. The gallerists have learned much of the symbolism and are diligent in collecting the story to go along with each piece so that may be passed on to the future collector.

Not unlike the Aboriginal artist’s work, this month’s Artist in Residence program’s guest artist, Dana Lynn Louis, also honors dreams and their contribution to community. As you likely read in Linda K’s blog section, many residents of the South Waterfront generously shared their dreams with Dana, who, in turn, visually interpreted many of them in the from of drawings.

While the artists backgrounds and surroundings could not be more different, I am intrigued by some of the similarities I see between Dana’s beautiful drawings and some of the Aboriginal pieces; like the wonderful balance of delicacy and venerability expressed with in voice of confidence and strength which both seem to share. While the Aboriginal painter’s, varied dot patterns, subtle transitions in color and detail that mysteriously form into unexpected shapes and movement when viewed from afar subtly remind me of Dana’s fine, dramatic lines that are also filled with energy and emotion. From a distance, her works on paper appear very fragile, but up close you feel their strength. Their presence is unmistakable.

I hope you were able to take part in both Dana Lynn Louis’ presentation of works last Saturday evening, as well as the ‘Art from the Dreamtime’ display the preceding Thursday and Friday.

We are fortunate to have this cross-pollination of culture and art down here on the South Waterfront. I welcome your comments.

-hm

This entry was posted on Monday, October 29th, 2007 at 10:38 am and is filed under Art & Design. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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