Blue Sky Photography Gallery

This was the last stop on my travels around the Pearl and the many art galleries in the area. There was a showing for two artists going on. Fernando Brito and Kent Krugh. Brito’s work was basically crime scene photos in South America but shot within really great landscape pictures. Some were a bit gory, but it was an interesting contrast between great farm scenes or sunsets or a winding dirt road and then you have a body or several with bullet wounds or half covered by tarps. It was a little disturbing.
The second photographer, Kent Krugh shot pictures of many different types of trees. The pictures were overlaid and made them appear ghostly with stark blacks and whites to contrast everything. I enjoyed this work a bit more than the other.
I was told at another gallery that Christopher Rauschenberg, the son of artist Robert Rauschenberg, and photographer in his own right is the founder of Blue Sky. The space is large and I can’t wait to come back to see more great photography here.

This is a gem of a gallery, with a nice mixture of visiting artists and a catalogue of local work. Free and worth stopping by.

A free photography gallery in the heart of Portland I’d suggest visiting this over the 24-​hour Church of Elvis — unless of course you like weird and dysfunction over impressive and inspiring. Featuring the work of Pedro Farias-​Nardi during my visit and particularly interesting subject matter focused on the Ice Industry or «Cold Trade» in the Dominican Republic the only thing limiting the quality of this gallery is the small size; particularly as the staff was especially friendly and knowledgable.

Blue Sky gallery is where Portland photographers hang out. You can learn a lot volunteering for their selection committee which meets to review show proposals from all over the world. The selection committee is younger and more diverse than ever today. The gallery has been doing it since a group of photographers banded together to form this nonprofit gallery in 1975.
Their shows are consistently watched by commercial galleries worldwide for young photographer breakouts, many of whom are snatched up into the art career-​making ecosystem.
They were the motivating force behind Photolucida
which is a very effective way for photographers to advance their career. It’s based here in Portland and draws photographers internationally for portfolio reviews by international curators.
They have a large horizontal file of photographers they represent, many in the region. All the prints in their shows are for sale at fair prices, there is usually a discrete note on the wall with prices, or just ask. They also have a great program for gallery members to get select museum quality prints and print portfolios — a good way to start a collection.
It’s common for the artists to visit and give a talk about their work, always free to listen. The schedule is on their website.
They have a small wall available for anyone to sign up to show for a week and a library of photo books on past shows. There is also a small back gallery, The Nine Gallery, run by artists showing installation art.
Blue Sky is Portland’s best serious photography gallery, arguably best on the West coast. They are not a commercial gallery, so the potential customer — sales dynamic, which can be intimidating, is not there. But it is an excellent place to buy photography and the looking is always free.

Yeeps, I know nothing about art. Let’s just be up front about that now. I can recognize that I like something, or that it stirs some kind of emotion within me, or that it is revolting, and that’s about it. But I can say this: art without snobbery is really the only kind of art I can get down with. And this is what is cool about Blue Sky.
Want to be considered to show your stuff? Write your name on the sign-​up list. Done. No grand jury, stand-​in-​front-​of-​a-​panel of «peers» to judge and rip apart your vision/​technical skill. Full support for the gallery’s goal, which is to educate the public about photography and be a resource as well. They’ve got a great reading room available should you ever want to check out the printed books of shows over the past 20 years.
AKA the Oregon Center for the Photographic Arts, they began with local artists and have expanded nationally. Their mission is to show «artists no one has ever heard of, but will», with 24 shows per year.
The gallery is in that now-​blurry crossover area… is it the Pearl or is it Old Town? Disclaimer: I’m generally allergic to the Pearl, and many of the galleries we stopped into during First Thursday made my skin crawl a little. No offense to the artists, of course, but there’s something about the super-​fake, snobby, silicone crowd that accompanies that makes me very uncomfortable. Blue Sky is nothing like that and has an inclusive, welcoming feel to it. Will definitely check out again.

A non-​profit, largely volunteer-​run gallery, Blue Sky is devoted entirely to photography. Exhibits change monthly, and — Attenzione! budding artists — they offer a non-​juried space to show your work. Just sign up on the clipboard and a wall is all yours for a week.