Arts & Culture

Three local businesses (and artists!) to know

In recent newsletters, we’ve been sharing interviews with some amazing local businesses to know series! ICYMI, we’re talking with business owners who are a part of Planned Parenthood Columbia-Willamette’s Shared Window project. It started in 2020 to uplift the community by providing free ad space to small businesses and local artists. With the help of […]

/ August 4, 2022

Local to Know: Trevor Solomon

Let’s get into an interview with a local who is bringing a long roster of lively performances to Portland stages! Today we’re talking to Trevor Solomon, the talent buyer at True West, a concert promoter and event producer in the PNW. If you’ve been to a show at the Aladdin or Roseland Theater or a concert […]

/ July 28, 2022

🤣😂🤣 You had us at photo booth and 🥁 drumline buddies

Crowd work is the off-the-cuff act of talking directly with audience members instead of using scripted and rehearsed bits. It’s not about having a set monologue that you repeat nightly in the hopes of always having the same type of audience be receptive to it. It’s a type of improv, where the audience delivers information […]

/ January 31, 2022

An Interview with Portland Artist Joshua Flint

Joshua Flint’s work is based on images gathered from many sources, such as digitized museum archives, vintage shops, and social media platforms. His oil paintings elegantly blend nostalgia with the modern-day, crisp lines and blurred brushstrokes working together to create suggested narratives of intersecting lives. Using these sources for his paintings allows a certain distance […]

/ January 22, 2022

Portland Artist Eric Wert – a scientific illustrator and still life painter

Eric Wert lives and works in Portland, Oregon. His background as a scientific illustrator is apparent in his incredible attention to detail. But the difference between sheer illustration and fine art is inspiration. Merely to depict something in great detail certainly takes skill but to transcend technical virtuosity one needs to have something to say […]

/ December 16, 2021

20 Questions with Painter J Wesley Willis

J Wesley Willis, a.k.a., John, is a talented oil painter from Portland, Oregon. But wait. The word talented falls way short of the complete eye explosion of beauty you encounter when you look at one of his paintings. The man brings to canvas what Wordsworth brought to the page. But Willis doesn’t believe that creating […]

/ December 14, 2021

Merry Christmas from Elvis the “Not Here in Portland!” Pelvis!

Why did Portland, Oregon ban the playing of Elvis Presley’s version of White Christmas? In what Time magazine would call a crime against Christmas, Elvis Presley released Elvis’ Christmas Album on October 15, 1957. It went to the top ten overnight. It remains the world’s best-selling Christmas album and one of the best-selling albums of […]

/ December 10, 2021

A Baker’s Dozen of Q&As with Portland Artist Judy Wise

Mark making is a term used for the creation of different patterns, lines, textures, and shapes using, well, whatever you can get your hands on. Charcoal, ink, scratching things out with something sharp. What you do with these patterns, lines, textures and shapes determines if you have a still life of an apple or chaos. […]

/ December 8, 2021

And You Thought You Couldn’t Paint – Wrong!

Do you know that the only thing that keeps you from being a painter is the courage to pick up a paintbrush and start fooling around? It’s true. As Pablo Picasso said: “It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.” Of course, those who have spent […]

/ November 23, 2021

Celebrate the Return of Michael Allen Harrison’s “Christmas at The Old Church”

Michael’s “Christmas at The Old Church” is one of the most beloved Portland traditions every holiday season. The native Portlander and renowned pianist returns to celebrate for the 30th anniversary his traditional “Christmas at The Old Church” live December until the 27th. The show is known for Michael’s beautiful, inspirational, innovative Christmas arrangements, the legendary […]

/ November 21, 2021

10 Questions + 1 with Moon and Bike

We caught up with Portland band Moon and Bike (Boone and Michael, the band’s name is a play on words) and asked them 10 questions +1. The duo started writing together during the pandemic and published their debut album in 2020. Their sophomore venture is currently in the works so we asked them the hard […]

/ November 20, 2021

🎥 Five questions with Filmed By Bike Festival’s Cheryl Green

We interviewed a local Portland documentary filmmaker and one of the many excellent directors featured in this year’s Filmed By Bike Festival, Cheryl Green.

/ May 18, 2021

🚴 Filmed By Bike Festival: 5 Questions with Ayleen Crotty

We interviewed Ayleen Crotty, the founder of the Filmed By Bike Festival, a film festival all about cycling stories created by local filmmakers.

/ May 14, 2021

📚 Reading the weird with author Nico Seabright

We’re with Weird Portland United’s secretary and communications manager as well as local children’s book author Nico Seabright.

/ May 12, 2021

✂️ Designing the weird of Portland with Sundari Franklin

Sundari has been a fashion designer for years, and made her mark in Portland in the past three. (📸: Picture courtesy of Sundari Devi Franklin) It’s Wednesday.  And you know what that means: We’re getting weird today. Each week, we’re highlighting and celebrating elements of Portland’s wonderful weirdness in collaboration with the amazing folks at […]

/ March 24, 2021

A Walk through the Weird with artist Cedar Lee

Portland artist Cedar Lee shares the beauty of interweaving the Pacific Northwest’s natural beauty with our city’s desire for sustainability.

/ February 24, 2021

🎁 Bridgeliner’s Very Merry Gift Guide (Extended)

From games to jewelery to sauces, there something with a Portland flair for everybody on this list — and not just for the holiday season.

/ December 7, 2020

Mailbag: ‘Why Are You Shilling for Residential Infill?’

(📸: Mark McClure) “Your constant spewing of YIMBY talking points is too much. The Residential Infill Project was designed by those who will profit off it. The fact that you are shilling it, as though it will actually help with affordable housing, is shameful.” —S.A.  And so the debate begins!  ICYMI, we wrote in Monday’s […]

/ December 17, 2019

How the Alberta Arts District is Trying to Keep its Artists

How do you keep an arts district from losing its artists? That’s an age-old question in gentrifying neighborhoods like the Alberta Arts District, but the nonprofit Alberta Art Works and its executive director Maquette Reeverts think they have an answer — pay artists to do their craft. “That’s how we keep the folks here,” Maquette […]

/ September 18, 2019

Whose Work Is It Anyway? A Bridgeliner Reading List About Invisible Labor

The latest theme for our Bridgeliner Curiosity Club is “hidden work” (aka invisible labor).  And with some help from you, our readers, we’ve put together a list of reading/watching/listening material to get us ready for next month’s dinner discussion. We’re always open to more suggestions, but here’s what we have so far, broken down by […]

/ September 3, 2019