Heather Watkins: Oregonian Gallery Preview

For art in Portland, August is the calm before the storm. In another month, PICA's 10th annual Time-Based Art Festival will electrify the city, as galleries kick off their new programming schedules with typically strong shows. And yet, for such a quiet time, there are a number of intriguing -- and suitably quiet -- shows opening in August, led by Portland artist Heather Watkins' first solo exhibition at PDX Contemporary, "Movement of Objects at Rest." Watkins, whose work shone in the "Interior Margins" group show at the Lumber Room last year, creates chance drawings by methodically pouring ink onto paper, which she manipulates to create spidery forms full of luscious pools and flows. Like a Rorschach test, the fluid sweep of the ink in Watkins' drawings doesn't create a picture of anything per se, but that won't keep you from finding signs of life in these abstract works. PDX Contemporary, 925 N.W. Flanders St., 503-222-0063, pdxcontemporaryart.com, through Sept. 1 [...]

--John Motley

Full text here: http://www.oregonlive.com/art/index.ssf/2012/07/august_gallery_preview_a...