By Bob Hicks
Here’s the thing: If you’re an invading general with a roving eye, never invite a beautiful woman from the enemy city into your tent and then get so rip-roaring drunk you pass out.
Holofernes, this post’s for you.
Two intriguingly intertwined shows opened yesterday at the Portland Art Museum — The Bible Illustrated, maverick cartoonist [...]
For the past few months, since he left The Oregonian, Scatter founder Barry Johnson has been exploring the territory of starting an online home for good, groundbreaking arts journalism in Portland.
As a first step he’s set up a new site, Portland Arts Watch, which continues and expands on his old Portland Arts Watch print and [...]
By Bob Hicks
Well, it’s celebration season again — and not just because the Puddletown rains are threatening to finally go away (although they’ll surely come another day).
No, we’re talking about theater awards season. The Tony Awards, Broadway’s commerce-driven annual extravaganza, are Sunday night. And on Monday night at the Crystal Ballroom, Portland’s far more laid-back [...]
By Laura Grimes
You’re stuck with me. Sorry about that, but it can’t be helped. Mr. Scatter had a wee bit of oral surgery and he’s either high or sleeping. Either condition would produce an interesting blog post, but it ain’t happening.
Like that wasn’t enough, the Small Large Smelly Boy came home from school smelling like [...]
By Bob Hicks
Some Scatterers may remember this story, from way back in February, when Oregon was searching for a new poet laureate to replace Lawson Fusao Inada, who had filled two terms and was departing gracefully.
Mr. Scatter suggested in The Oregonian that, historically speaking, the best qualifications might include a good beard (or at least [...]
By Bob Hicks
On Saturday night, tucked between a Friday night chocolate truffle-making soiree and a groaningly good Sunday night dim sum dinner (the Scatters bought places at both convivial tables last month at the estimable Portland Taiko’s annual benefit banquet) Mr. Scatter trekked to the studios of Polaris Dance Theatre for another benefit fund-raising event.
This [...]
By Laura Grimes
Mr. Scatter: What’s a dirty dog ball doing in the dishwasher?
Mrs. Scatter: Um … getting clean.
Mr. Scatter: We don’t have a dog.
Mrs. Scatter: That’s why it needs to get clean.
*
OK, I confess. I completely took poetic license with that dialogue. In other words, it didn’t happen. Which is exactly what makes [...]
By Bob Hicks
William Tell and Robin Hood were fair hands at them. In war, they can be crucial to battle strategies. But in the art world, it was Kenneth Noland who took targets off the practice range and put ‘em on the map.
“Yes, I love him. I love him. I’ve always loved him,” Portland artist [...]
By Laura Grimes
It’s raining and the sky is pretty much a solid dull gray. Gray upon gray. Rain upon rain. End upon end. But the sky doesn’t have to be that dull.
The Pantsless Brother must have seen something different out his window. He sent me this note:
I’m looking out at the sky over the water [...]
By Bob Hicks
We live in an age of miracles so commonplace we rarely think to marvel at them. On a quiet cloudy afternoon Mr. Scatter is standing in his kitchen, balancing on a floor made of oak chopped down and milled and planed almost a century ago, but looking new because it’s protected [...]