James Lavadour lives and works on the Umatilla Reservation near Pendleton, Oregon. He begins each day in the studio, rising before the sun, to get started on work. Just when the sun begins to rise, the Artist leaves his studio to go for a walk or a drive to witness the land waking up. Although Lavadour’s paintings are not based on direct observation, the time spent looking, hearing, and feeling the natural world that surrounds him—his Native land— deeply informs his work.
Lavadour speaks about being one with the land. His physical, process-oriented practice is one that yields abstract expressionist paintings; accumulations of marks through addition and subtraction are acts of nature in the same way that geological events are acts of nature.
In this exhibition, a spectacular and monumental grid painting, composed of eighteen panels, “EXPECTING RAIN,” is one of, if not the most ambitious and accomplished works of his career. In addition to this major work, the exhibition includes six new single-panel works and one diptych. All of the work in the show will be documented in an exhibition catalog that will be made available in the coming weeks.
James Lavadour: EXPECTING RAIN
Exhibition Dates: September 30 – October 31, 2020
PDX CONTEMPORARY ART
925 NW Flanders Street
Portland, OR 97209
Hours: 10:00 am – 4:00 pm Wednesday – Saturday, or by appointment
James Lavadour is one of our greatest living artists. How I wish I could fill my home with his paintings. They are so alive!