SOU’WESTER EVENTS!

In this workshop students will be guided in making bath bombs from everyday household items and found materials from the surrounding natural landscape of the Sou’Wester. Using optional scents and/or herbs, students will create a personalized set of bath bombs filled with unique intentions and return home with a set of hand made bath bombs.

Hannon is a white, nb queer creative and care worker who’s been living for nine years in Portland, Or. on the occupied indigenous lands of the Cowlitz, Multnomah, and confederate Tribes of the Grand Ronde. Hannon is a facilitator of introspective space, and creator of Tender Tank, drawing baths meant to be in conversation with each bather’s internal tides. You can learn more on their website: hannonhannonhannon.com or instagram.com/tendertank

Workshop cost $77

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Nick Delffs : Presented by Sou’wester Arts

Nick Delffs grew up in Mendocino County, a lawless stretch of coastline that’s hard to get to and, for many, hard to escape. Nick did — emerging in the early aughts as the frontman for Portland band The Shaky Hands, whose sharp, jittery rock was anchored by Nick’s quavering vocals and questing lyrics. The Shaky Hands were mainstays of Portland on the verge of a major shift, and they rode that shift a while, signing to Kill Rock Stars and touring internationally with some of the bigger names in indie rock. But a hiatus in 2011 became indefinite and Nick Delffs was once again cast into the world: working as a sideman, releasing solo records, doing manual labor, going deeper into his spiritual practices, and, crucially, becoming a father.

Becoming a parent can affect different artists in different ways. Nick rode that change with surpassing grace and maturity. 2017’s Redesign, his first full-length under his own name, reflected the transition. In “Song for Aja”, Nick touched on other concerns familiar to those who follow his work: love of the natural world; longing for spiritual and physical connection; the desire to suffer with meaning and exult with abandon, to embrace somehow the world in its maddening contradictions and find the unity at the core.

Childhood Pastimes, his second release on Mama Bird Recording Co., is both more focused and, despite being technically an EP, more ambitious. It’s a four-song cycle — one song with many movements or four songs that bleed into one another, depending on how you hear it — that can be viewed either as a personal journey or an archetypal passage of a human being through four discrete stages: roughly, the movement from childhood innocence into adolescent adventure (The Escape); the sudden immersion into a life of discovery and excitement (The Dream); the first experience of romantic love, followed by the onset of heartbreak, dissolution, breakdown of self (The Affair); the emergence into a new way of thinking, a fresh perspective that encompasses all the suffering and joy into a balanced whole (The Outside).

Nick plays nearly all of the instruments here and the result is a unified aesthetic, born ultimately of his deep-seated love of rhythm: the thrum and throb of the acoustic guitars, the percussive melodic bang of the elegantly-crafted piano lines, and always, always the insistent, driving drums, propelling the record, and the listener, on this journey as the four tracks bleed into one another, one body, one blood, one beating heart. The concept of four songs that are really one suite of music requires a sure hand, and Nick’s never shakes: the way the songs blend together while retaining their distinctiveness — from the poppy exaltation of “The Escape” to the cold intensity, almost like an acoustic Kraftwerk, of “The Affair” — shows a songwriter and musician who has fully grown into his powers.

Those who have followed Nick’s career may see this as a culmination of years and years of honing and fine-tuning his bountiful gifts, and wonder with delight what might come next. For those who haven’t listened to Nick before, Childhood Pastimes is the perfect entry point, a distillation of what’s come before and the promise of a new beginning.

In this workshop students will learn to shoot in the classic, home movie, analog format and become part of a community of Super 8 and 16mm enthusiasts. Explore the “bucket method” of hand processing your film, and how to care for your negatives.

Stephanie Hough is an experimental filmmaker, production coordinator and director of photography whose work explores repetition, gender, relationships and emotional landscapes. Her films HOW TO FEEL (DV, 2010), HEART (16mm, 2013), SPOOKY ACTION AT A DISTANCE (Super 8, 2016) have screened in the NW Filmmaker’s Festival, Portland International Film Festival, Experimental Film Festival PDX, BendFilm, The Boathouse Microcinema, TriBeca Film Center and more. As an educator with the Northwest Film Center, Pacific University and the PNCA, Hough has a passion for sharing analog film techniques and making learning accessible for all. 

Workshop cost $70
Register for all three Analog Film Workshops for $150

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In this workshop we’ll explore the idea of personal identity through mixed media. Learn how to do packing tape image transfers, create your own collage papers, and then make a grungy mixed media piece of artwork.

Angie Ebba is a queer disabled writer, artist, educator, activist, and performer. She is a published poet and essayist, who teaches and performs across the US. She believes strongly in the power of words and art to help better understand ourselves, build connections and community, and make personal and social change. 

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We often think of the poem, essay, or story as a device that delivers great knowledge, wisdom, or emotional insight, and the writer as an expert craftsman, who, with great skill and complete intention, willfully inscribes those messages onto the page. In contrast, the late (great) author Donald Barthelme defines the writer as “one who, embarking on a task, does not know what to do”.  This workshop takes Barthelme’s definition as its starting point, and is designed to give students hands-on experience in writing without any predetermined outcome in mind–in writing with an eye towards uncertainty, chance, experiment, play, and discovery.  This will be a playful, exercise based workshop and seasoned writers as well as students with little to no experience are equally welcome to participate.

Quinn Gancedo is a writer and educator based in Portland, Oregon.  He is the author of The Nouns (The Cupboard Pamphlet, 2022) and his work has appeared or is forthcoming in Fence, Diagram, Tammy, New Delta Review, and elsewhere.  He has taught creative writing, literature, and DIY bookmaking at the California Institute of the Arts and in various community and youth education settings.  He is a co-founder of Elbow Room, a non-profit arts organization focused on providing material support, mentorship, representation, and space to work, collaborate, and experiment for artists experiencing intellectual and developmental disabilities in Portland.  

Katie Savastano is an artist, educator, and designer out of Portland, Oregon.  From 2011 to 2015 she booked and promoted countless DIY shows in Portland and Eugene under the moniker Small Howl.  Since then she has done design work making merch, album art, and promotional materials for Rock and Roll Camp for Girls, Mississippi Studios, Revolution Hall, Antiquated Future, Black Belt Eagle Scout, and others.  In 2020, she co-founded Elbow Room, a non-profit arts organization dedicated to providing material resources, mentorship, representation, and space to work, collaborate, and experiment for artists experiencing intellectual and developmental disabilities in Portland.

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Ever wondered about the beautiful Japanese prints you find all over the world?  This course is designed to show you the basics of Moku Hanga (Japanese woodblock). Though a more complicated printing technique, this class will take you through a quick crash course covering all the major points, and allow you to pull a few prints yourself. Charles Spitzack (American, Pacific Northwest) was born in 1987 in Minnesota and raised in the Twin Cities. He received a BFA with a focus in Print Arts and Drawing from Cornish College of the Arts and has participated in residencies at Rockland Woods and Mokuhanga Project space. As a Pacific Northwest-based artist, he teaches woodblock printmaking at  Pratt Fine Arts Center and also works as a carpenter, a process that reflects his interest in the physicality of woodblock prints and his ability to find inspiration anywhere. His work has been shown extensively in the Pacific Northwest and internationally. Spitzack is known for his bold, energetic, Mokuhanga-inspired woodblock prints of the human figure, animals, landscapes, urban scenes, and more. His work commonly addresses the plight of the working class, hopelessness in the face of destruction, and humanistic experiences.  Register

Learn about how to use a mixture of concrete to make lightweight and durable jewelry. Students will learn how to make a one part mold and pour the concrete as a casting technique. Afterwards students will sand their concrete and seal them. Students will leave with one finished piece of jewelry!

Arielle Brackett is a metalsmith and educator based in Portland, Oregon. She received her BFA in metals at the Oregon College of Art and Craft in 2017. She has shown nationally and internationally, including Canada, Romania and Russia. Brackett was awarded best in metals at the Colorado Gallery of the Arts and the Art Center of Estes Park and Juror’s Choice Award in Jewelry from CraftForms 2021. She received two scholarships to paint in Le Barroux, France and Grand Junction, Colorado. In May 2016, Brackett was granted a full ride scholarship to attend a two-week glass workshop at the Penland School of Craft. Brackett is published in Society of North American Goldsmiths (SNAG), Jams 2018 and How Art Heals, by Andra Stanton. In 2019, she had a piece in a runway show, Shift in Portland, Oregon. Brackett showed work in SNAG’s Exhibition in Motion in 2019 and 2021.

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Workshop includes relief printmaking demo (linocut), time for sketching and discussion during interactive presentation that situates us on the timeline of activist printmaking from Martin Luther 16th Century to Mexico 20th century to the present. Building upon a 30 year history as stage performer and rock singer, Karim Shuquem creates installations, sculptures, and prints that have relationship with staging, temporality, and process. Shuquem has recently completed the Otis College MFA program and works as an art teacher. Register

Participants will learn the basics of block printing on fabric including designing, carving, and printing. You will troubleshoot common problems in relief printmaking, learn about brands and tools, and leave with finished prints on fabric. Please bring your own fabric item which can include yardage, tshirts, scarves, or anything else that is relatively smooth. Avoid fabrics such as burlap.

Ashley Quick is a visual artist based in the mountain west. Her graphic and often illustrative work represents personal experience and place-based reflections on nature in mediums such as printmaking, illustration, and more recently mural. She shows regularly in Wyoming and Colorado, and has been featured in shows across the country. 

This class is currently full.

Learn the basics of handbuilding with clay and experiment using “nerikomi” techniques – the process of pressing or folding multiple colors of clay to achieve unique surface designs. This class is beginner friendly and includes all the tools you need, clay, glaze, and firing of one or two finished pieces.

Ally Bruser is a former elementary school art teacher, artist, and mother living in southwest Washington, on the unceded territory of the Chinook Nation. Most of her ceramics are handbuilt using nerikomi techniques — the process of pressing and folding multiple colors of clay together then rolling them into slabs. When not making pottery, Ally is working towards making the arts and arts learning experiences more accessible as the Program Manager for Sou’wester Arts. Visit albepottery.squarespace.com or follow @albepottery on instagram to learn more about Ally and her pottery process.

$70