PRESS
Current
April/May 2004: Where a Modern Zoo and a menagerie of reasonably priced homes plays host to a new species of urban animal by Brian Libby of Portland Monthly
- "For several weeks this past summer, a gigantic warehouse in the traditionally quiet working class neighborhood of St. Johns was the place to see and be seen in the Portland art world. The Modern Zoo, a pioneering assemblege of art exhibits put on by the Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture, has since completed its run. But St. Johns remains a surprisingly vibrant place for young artists and those who love them."
04.15.04: DK's Hot List by DK Row of the Oregonian
- "They came, conquered and partied: Now, they're ready to go at it again. Gavin Shettler and Bryan Suereth, the upstart curators who launched last year's art and social extravaganza, the Modern Zoo, are preparing for Modern Zoo II. They're looking for artists to exhibit in the show slated to open in late July."
1.2.04: (web.archive.org) Showoffs by Joseph Gallivan and Michaela Bancud for the Portland Tribune
- "The two now are accelerating plans to open an ambitious-sounding arts center in Portland to show more of the kind of work seen in St. Johns. They're all about advancing culture now."
12.31.03: (web.archive.org) Electrified Art by Richard Speer for Willamette Week
- "Modern Zoo Lights. The Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture's 100,000-square-foot warehouse full of constantly changing art was criticized for its loose curating and variable quality. But like Walt Whitman's poetry, the Modern Zoo boasted pockets of transcendence amid the surfeit and won points for sheer ambition. Such an undertaking would have been a ballsy move for established institutions, let alone a struggling newbie like PCAC, but the group pulled it off so successfully that its board is now changing the organization's name to the Modern Zoo."
12.26.03: The BUZZ that WAS by staff of the Oregonian
- "They came, they saw, they conquered. Two young men with a dream open the year's most adventurous art show -- "The Modern Zoo" -- filling up 100,000 square feet of the former Columbia Sportswear headquarters with all kinds of art. The show becomes a kind of US Festival of sight and sound as curators Gavin Shettler and Bryan Suereth kick off their new organization, the Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture, with many audacious parties, too."
Disposable, Winter Exhibition 2004
3.5.04: Gallery Listings by the Oregonian Staff
- "Reed Arts Week: The Modern Zoo presents 'Disposable,' a show of six area artists working with large rolls of paper-thin plastic sheeting normally used in the making of disposable diapers."
3.3.04: (web.archive.org) Reed Arts Week by Chas Bowie for the Portland Mercury
- "On Saturday, the entire Reed campus is transformed into a make-shift gallery that has student artwork hanging in almost every building. In the Vollum Lounge, the Modern Zoo returns with Disposable, an exhibition featuring six local artists. Each was given reams of diaper fabric and asked to make sculptures and installations with it. Some great artists are involved, including Bruce Conkle, TJ Norris, and Aili Schmeltz."
3.2.04: (web.archive.org) Short List by the Portland Tribune Staff
- "The Modern Zoo participates in Reed College's Arts Week with a six-artist show. Each participant was given a roll of the kind of plastic sheeting typically used to line disposable diapers and asked to create work that involved the show's theme of 'interaction.' The participating artists include Bruce Conkle, Kaosmosis, Brenda Mallory, TJ Norris, Rob Off and L. Aili Schmeltz."
Process, Fall Exhibition 2003
11.29.03: The End of Process by Heather Irwin for dailypdx.com
- "Portland's newest art fetish is live action art, featuring the hot and heavy artistic performances of some of the city's favorite visionaries. Tonight, Process closes with a flourish as KAOSMOMSIS performs a live collaboration of artists, musicians and performers exploring the relationship between work, time, play and space."
10.29.03: (web.archive.org) Processing Change by Richard Speer for Willamette Week
- "It's a terrific show with lofty goals to match the Holman Building's 24-foot ceilings."
10.24.03: The night the party crowd got serious by DK Row of the Oregonian
- "The art exhibit, which showcased six artists documenting the creative process of six other artists in media ranging from music to multimedia installations, was the primary focus. So was the space, which had attendees looking up and around as if they were wandering in a redwood forest. Most of the several thousand square feet of the Holman Building, in industrial Southeast Portland and apparently used for police drills, according to a PCAC official, went unused, creating an atmosphere of abundant minimalism."
10.17.03: Gallery Guide by the AE Staff of the Oregonian
- "Process: The Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture offers a show that includes elements of a rock opera, theater, film, photography, animation and illustration in a documentation of the creative processes of six Portland-area artists. Opening event 7 p.m.-midnight Fri, Holman Building, 49 S.E. Clay St. The show continues for seven weeks. For hours and special events: www.portlandart.org."
10.16.03: Encore: energy and desire by DK Row of the Oregonian
- "'Process' is the culmination of a long and complex collaborative effort by the participating artists. In March, Shettler and Suereth selected six local artists who, in turn, asked six other artists to observe their working process and to ultimately document it with their own art. Together, artists and corresponding artist-documenters will offer an unconventional meditation on the creative process."
10.16.03: (web.archive.org) Mommie Queerest by Heather Irwin of dailypdx.com
- "The show pairs artists and documentarians to follow the creative process using rock opera, theater, film, photography and animation. The duos include a mix of both established artists and newcomers--what we've come to expect from the PCAC."
08.28.03: (web.archive.org) FALL ARTS GUIDE! by Chas Bowie, Anna Simon, and Justin Wescoat Sanders of the Portland Mercury
- "Now that the colossal Modern Zoo has come to an end, PCAC is homeless once again, but that hasn't stopped them from organizing their next exhibition, Process. The show 'brings together local artists in all disciplines and a documentarian to document their specific artistic process.' Artists include Liz Obert, Damali Ayo, Joe Haege, and Kevin Gilmore, among others."
The Modern Zoo, Summer Exhibition 2003
10.01.03: (web.archive.org) Something Tells Me It's All Happening at The Zoo... by Terri Cohn for stretcher.org
- "The Modern Zoo is a project of Shettler and Suereth's Portland Center for the Advancement for Culture (PCAC), and had its genesis in a convergence of social and cultural factors. As the curators explained, having grown up in a time of corporate build-ups and social breakdowns � including the government, the education system, and financial support for the nonprofit world � they felt the need to infiltrate the existing gallery system in order to re-envision it. Shettler believes the reclaiming of this corporate space to be not only a means to create a new alternative place for art, but also as part of building a 'post-corporate identity.' Their use of the term 'modern' indicates a break with the status quo and declaration of a new artistic direction � a "zoo"� with a variety of individual exhibits. The large number of genres, ideas and works on display reflect the eclecticism of the current artistic environment."
08.28.03: (web.archive.org) Modern Zoo Closing Party and Barbeque by Justin Wescoat Sanders of the Portland Mercury
- "More than anything, the Modern Zoo had a sense of wacky, anything-goes potential (whether it was ever capitalized on or not), a crackling tension, that will be sorely missed around these parts."
08.27.03: News and Hangings by Richard Speer of Willamette Week
- "The Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture is closing its Modern Zoo with a bash featuring the Rob Scheps Big Band and a fashion show. It's your last chance to witness this unruly behemoth of a show, Walt Whitmanesque in its overreaching but occasionally brilliant inclusivity, a true landmark in the Northwest cultural scene."
08.22.03: (web.archive.org) A Zoo With No Cages or Keepers by Michaela Bancud of the Portland Tribune
- "The St. Johns all-you-can-eat art buffet has two weekends left. You'll regret it if you miss it, if only because Portland hasn't seen anything like this in recent memory."
August 2003: Critics Picks: The Modern Zoo by Jon Raymond for ARTFORUM
- "Coming on the heels of the recent Portland survey 'The Best Coast' and alongside the Portland Art Museum's current biennial, 'The Modern Zoo' reflects a regional art scene arriving at some kind of critical mass, communally discovering the intoxicating new emotion called ambition."
08.15.03: All Tomorrow's Parties by DK Row of the Oregonian
- "The curatorial heads at the Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture -- Gavin Shettler and Bryan Suereth -- have aimed for the big prize with their first outing, 'The Modern Zoo.' And while their ambitions outstretch their artistic limbs, they've deservedly caught the public's attention."
08.10.03: Godzilla and the "Modern Zoo" by Morgan Currie for the Oregonian
- "So far, Modern Zoo's main accomplishments seem to be eclecticism, its focus on interactive art and its pairing of energetic little-known artists with more established ones, the last not a small feat in the stratified world of Portland art."
August 2003: We can be heroes: Wagner, Finneran & the Modern Zoo by Jeff Jahn for nwdrizzle.com
- "As an experiment in the emergent complexities of the Portland art scene, the Modern Zoo is a huge success both for PCAC and the scene."
07.30.03: One Review by Richard Speer of Willamette Week
- "The Zoo is a testament to the endlessly intriguing variations in which the creative spirit manifests itself when you give a hundred people free space and free rein. PCAC, which will offer August First Thursday walkers a high-speed boat ferry from downtown up to St. Johns, has changed the Zoo's lineup since its opening and will showcase a newly hung drawing show during August, its last month. Yes, St. Johns is out of the four-quadrant loop, but if you haven't yet taken in this important moment for the Portland art scene, you owe it to yourself to ride the waves and see what PCAC hath wrought."
July/August 2003: Art Orgy by Camela Raymond of The Organ
- "At the opening, with the initial tonnage of art installed, it was hard to give your complete attention to any one thing, even large-scale installations like (David) Eckard's ambiguous torture-pleasure devices and Daniel Duford's Leon Golub-ish wall mural and large clay figure referencing America's military disgraces. The best moments were found, not coincidentally, in quieter, enclosed chambers: Ahren Lutz's room of paintings of death row inmates imprinted with the menus of their last dinners and Melody Owen's interlocking rings of hanging hummingbird feeders."
July 2003: The Modern Zoo by Rhoda London for In & About
- "People were swarming happily all over the building on the evening of the opening event Saturday, June 14. Visitors came from all over Portland. Excitement was running high as people navigated the exhibition spaces, which range from intimate rooms as small as 200 square feet to spaces as large as 10,000 square feet."
06.29.03: A Question of Commitment by DK Row of the Oregonian
- "Artists here are combining advertising and new media principles with painting, sculpture and photography. Independent curators are mounting lectures and events that are themselves artworks. Arts groups such as Charm Bracelet, Red76 and the Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture (which mounted "The Modern Zoo" show) are channeling mind-bending creative energy by artists you've likely never heard of. It's an exhilaratingly diverse artistic landscape that tweaks the traditional with the far-out edgy -- a universe that was captured in the 2002 Whitney Biennial curated by Lawrence Rinder."
06.27.03: Conceptualize This by John Foyston of the Oregonian
- "Even with the work of more than 100 artists and curators in place and several hundred people wandering around during the evening, there was never a sense of crowding, although there was a palpable sense of critical mass having been achieved. Art lived everywhere: at every turning; down every twisting, plastic-sheeted hall; tucked into corners, alcoves and crannies; scrawled or hung on walls; closeted in darkened rooms with the legend 'Meaning Liberation Front' on the glass and constructions of stationary disco balls, conveyor belt parts and wind chimes."
06.25.03: (web.archive.org) Habitat for the Humanities by Stiv Wilson for Willamette Week
- "Though by no means an exhaustive representation of PDX artists, The Modern Zoo serves as a decent crash course in the state of Portland art and its organizations. It'll be interesting to see how the project evolves. As Suereth says, "We've only just begun." It's nice to see a project that begins by capitalizing on one of Portland artists' greatest resources--guts."
06.19.03: (web.archive.org) The Modern Zoo by Chas Bowie of the Portland Mercury
- "Of course, there was art that didn't involve staring at other human beings, the finest of which was a secluded installation by Melody Owen. Dozens of ruby-red hummingbird feeders hung from the ceiling, dramatically lit by two floor lights. The feeders were hung so that they formed two interlocking circles whose individual elements never touched. Neither exclusively visual nor conceptual, Owen's piece rather suggested a dozen haikus of loveliness and neediness."
06.13.03: Rooms With A View by David Row of the Oregonian
- "Shettler and Suereth describe 'The Modern Zoo' as the largest independent art exhibit this side of the Mississippi. They may be right. They've invited dozens of local artists and curators to install art in separate waves. By Saturday about 20 of the building's warren of rooms will be filled with work, including installations using piles of dirt, rooms stacked with shelves of canned foods, fuzzy film and video installations and Abstract Expressionist painting."
06.09.03: (web.archive.org) Convergence on www.dailypdx.com
- "So here's the idea: Portland's contemporary art scene has been bubbling furiously for the past two years or so. Lots of creativity, not a whole lot of organization. PCAC is trying to put together funding, space and focus to allow the artists to do what they do best. And right now, that's the Modern Zoo -- a massive warehouse installation with more than 70 rooms and nearly as many artists."
On PCAC
05.11.03: Out But Not Down by DK Row of the Oregonian
- "And there's plenty of opportunity for bohemian venues exhibiting more exotic fare -- the kind that keeps the established scene on its toes: A newly formed arts organization -- the Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture -- will debut its first show in mid-June."
Spring 2003: A View from Portland by Jeff Jahn for Modern Painters
- "Both anarchic and civic, Portland is connected and accessible from the top to the bottom of the society pages. One can network easily with international writers, artists and curators. Local and national art stalwarts such as [Vera] Katz, Gregory Grenon, Tad Savinar, Rick Bartow, Sandy Roumagoux, Judy Cooke and James Lavadour all provide a yardstick precedent or contrast for the wave of independent work by Nic Walker, Laura Fritz, Chandra Bocci, Dan Ness, James Boulton, Michael Oman-Reagan, Zefrey Throwell, Cynthia Star and Marcello Munoz. The fledgling non-profit Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture (PCAC) has evolved to support this activity."
Spring 2003: (web.archive.org) Gavin Shettler's Gallery Closes; PCAC Opens by Carol McCreary for the Old Town China Town Crier
- "PCAC will provide artists with a much-needed arts center that will initially include: a gallery space for the display of visual art; an event space to host a variety of performance arts including film, theater, music and installation projects; and a resource center to educate and facilitate the research and creation of art." (Pg. 4)
4.30.03: One Review by Richard Speer of the Willamette Week
- "Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture. Conduit provided a conduit for the third in PCAC's quadrant-based "Know Portland" events. This, the Southwest installment, kicked off with a dinner of meats in savory sauces at Persian House (1026 SW Morrison St.), then moved to the Conduit space (918 SW Yamhill St., Suite 401) for a program of modern dance and visual arts ... "
4.26.03: Passing Judgment: A Look at Last Week's Art Events by Richard Speer of the Willamette Week
- "Art, Etc. Know Portland. Borscht and blinis at Restaurant Russia kicked off 'Know Portland--The Southeast Tour,' the second in a series of four quadrant-specific fundraisers for the fledgling Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture. After a few sets of Sergei and Anya Pereverzin's irony-free Russian pop, attendees walked three blocks down Southeast Foster Road to Performance Works NorthWest, where plastic-wigged Linda Austin, a.k.a. "ms. yellow," offered odd but visually witty dance vignettes ... Topping off the evening's Gesamtkunstwerk ambitions, painter Brigitte Dortmund hung the walls with her lavishly textured abstract oils. If this diverse but cohesive experience is any indication of what PCAC is about, it's a most welcome addition to the art scene."
12.13.02: Flying Below the Radar: 12 Emerging Arts Players You Don't Know But Should by DK Row for the Oregonian
- "Right now, these new artist are keeping a low profile, rejecting the idea of bigger. But just as punk rockers evolved into the fraternity of the establishment, so will these arts players. They have to in order to survive and grow. Curators Gavin Shettler and Bryan Suereth, for example, have hatched an ambitious idea - a nonprofit called the Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture, which Shettler and Suereth hope will grow into a full-fledged nonprofit arts institution like PICA, mounting art exhibits and sponsoring regional, national and international artists."
10.30.02: In Search of a Catchier Moniker by Richard Speer of the Willamette Week
- "As Shettler and Suereth envision it, [PCAC] will feature a gallery, a performance space, and the pro bono services of a lawyer to counsel artists on necessary evils like copyright law and taxes ... The Center will also serve to help young artists build portfolios, hook up with gallery owners and otherwise network. 'Portland attracts radical individualists,' Shettler observes, 'which is good but doesn't foster any community. Half the abstract painters in town don't talk to the other half, because they don't know they exist.'"
Current News
Past Exhibitions
Fundraisers
Melissa Logan (melissa@modernzoo.org)
PO Box 6802
Portland, OR 97228-6802
503-317-8498
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