Vanessa Renwick: The Oregonian

Consider the refrigerator, the appliance of hope and promise. So handy, so tempting. But in Vanessa Renwick's installation, refrigerators take on new meaning.

Renwick, an innovative Portland filmmaker, wants us to consider that nine times out of 10, wolves fail to catch their prey, according to studies of the gray wolf. To contrast their food challenges with ours, she lines up 10 fridges and asks visitors to open each one, as if they're looking for a snack or a beer. At nine of the fridges, the doors open to video loops of wolves stalking, but not catching, dinner. At the 10th fridge, a wolf finally catches its prey.

Underneath the humor in "Hunting Requires Optimism" lies a message about the food chain, endangered species and the natural world, the core of Renwick's often poetic work.

April is Vanessa Renwick month in Portland and Eugene. Last Sunday, the Chicago-born artist opened 'the go-betweens," a gorgeous multi-media bird installation at Marylhurst University's Art Gym. On Wednesday, she receives the prestigious Bonnie Bronson Fellowship Award at Reed College. The $10,000 award recognizes her work going back to 1981 in experimental and documentary forms, as well as writing, producing films, videos, photography, sculpture and installations. The award goes to one Northwest artist each year.

The rest of the month sees Renwick installations opening at the Portland Museum of Contemporary Art, the Hollywood Theatre and the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art in Eugene. PDX Contemporary Art represents her.

Renwick works out of her northeast Portland home, which she has filled with made and natural art, including a foot-diameter birch limb that leads to a ladder to her second-floor bedroom. On her website, she describes herself as "a naturalist, born, not made: a true barefoot, cinematic rabble rouser, of grand physique, calm pulse and a magnetism that demands the most profound attention."

Filmmaker Miranda July calls her "a powerful influence on me in my twenties."

But like any video artist today, Renwick is also comfortable with technology, including three external hard drives. Part of her mission is to slow people down, says the woman who owns neither a cell phone nor a TV. "I wish people were more in the moment."

For example, viewers of "Medusa Smack" lie in the dark under a jellyfish-shaped canopy, onto which video of jellyfish balletically swell and float. Did you know the name for a collection of jellyfish is a smack of jellyfish?

But part of her mission is to provoke, too, with work such as a three-screen film called "Hope + Prey" about animals trying to find food in wintertime Yellowstone Park. The surprise ending involves an eagle and a coyote and some fresh kill.

Her Marylhurst show is gentler, transforming the Art Gym into a contemplative cathedral by creating stunning images of different birds on six 12-foot arched windows: peregrin, loon, raven, hairy woodpecker, red-wing blackbird and snowy owl. Renwick and five helpers applied colored film to the windowpanes, so that when the sun hits them, black, blue and white shadows mottle the gym floor. At night, inside spotlights allow Marylhurst students to see them as they walk by.

Renwick also brought in hammocks and pillows for viewers to relax while watching a video about the Vaux swifts at Chapman Elementary School. Shot by Eric Edwards, the video shows thousands of swifts flying in a swirling vortex, accompanied by sitar-like drones in Sam Coomes' musical score. As the birds dive into the chimney to roost for the night, the music gathers rock 'n roll heft. The effect is mesmerizing.

Here's where you can see Renwick's work in the next few weeks:

"layover" at Marylhurst University's Art Gym, through May 17. Renwick talks about the window and video installation at 12:30 p.m., May 8. To create the installation, she received an $8,000 Career Opportunity Grant from the Oregon Arts Commission and Ford Family Foundation -- the largest to any artist.

8 p.m., April 19: "Richart" at Portland Museum of Modern Art, 5202 N. Albina Ave. (inside Mississippi Records). A documentary about Richard Tracy, an obsessive artist from Centralia, Wash. who makes collages and fills his yard with eccentric art. Renwick has known Tracy for 20 years. His work is on view now through May 10.

7:30 p.m., April 28: "Howlings – wolf works on stage and screen," Hollywood Theatre, 4122 N.E. Sandy Blvd. Renwick and Deke Weaver, a media artist at the University of Illinois, present video and live performances about wolves.

In Eugene at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, 1430 Johnson Lane, University of Oregon:

April 25-June 29: Renwick's video installations "Hunting Requires Optimism" and "Medusa Smack."

8 p.m., April 26: Screenings of "Hope + Prey," "S.F. HITCH" and "The Land Piranhas."

2 p.m., April 27: Renwick, Weaver, Ted Tosdvine, head of Philosophy and Associate Professor of Philosophy and Environmental Studies at the University of Oregon, and Carla Bengston, U of O Associate Professor in Art and an Associate Member of the Environmental Studies Program, talk about "Art for Endangered Species."

www.oregonlive.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2014/04/portland_rabble_rouse...