AUGUST 3, 2007
Gay-owned Uuality Pictures displays Angela West s
photographs exploring the joys and anxieties associated with
adolescence in small-town Georgia through Sept. 29.
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Nancy King and Mary Kadderly perform jazz music outdoors at queer-
owned Oregon Grape Nursery in West Linn. (6:30pm. 65 S Dollar St. $14
from TicketsWest.)
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In Other Words presents Dirty Queer, an X-rated open mike to celebrate
sexuality and strut your creative stuff! Hosted by renegade writer and poet
Sossity Chiricuzio, it promises to be an evening full of laughter and full-
body shivers. (6:30-9pm. 8 NE Killingsworth St. $1. www.dirtyqueer.com.)
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DJs Girlfriends and Linoleum spin during the queer party Thin Pink Line
every second and fourth Friday at Rotture. (10 pm. 315 SE Third Ave.)
Help raise money for the literary and arts forum Gertrude Press
on Aug. 17 at Q Center.
entertainment at Red Lion Inn. (9 pm-2 am. 205 Coburg Road $25 at the
door, $20 in advance from Hair Virtuoso.)
Girl4Girl Portland throws another party featuring a guest OJ, hot go-go
dancers and serious dancing at Wonder Ballroom. (9 pm-2 am. 128 NE
Russell St. www.girl4girlportland.com.)
SUN • AUG. 12
SAT • AUG. 11
The Adventure Group takes a moderate hike at Angels Rest, which juts
like a balcony above the western Columbia Gorge. Meet outside
Starbucks at Hollywood Fred Meyer. (8 am. 3030 NE Weidler St. Steve
503-762-2385.)
The Adventure Group takes a difficult hike on the Sandy Glacier Volcano
for some great views of the Mount Hood summit. Meet outside Starbucks
at Hollywood Fred Meyer. (8 am. 3030 NE Weidler St. Tom 503-327-4674.)
The Adventure Group takes an easy kayaking trip in Scappoose Bay.
Meet at Scappoose Bay Kayaking in the Scappoose Bay Marina Park in
Warren. (9 am. 57420 Old Portland Road. Evan 503-701-7922.)
The London theater troupe Foolish People will perform during esoZone,
a three-day underground arts and culture festival.
Eugene/Springfield Pride, the region's oldest and largest gath
ering for the queer community, features performances by drag
stars, singer/actor/pianist Rory Stitt and trans rap artist
Katastrophe at Alton Baker Park. (Noon-8 pm.)
University Park United Methodist Church hosts the fourth annu
al North Portland Pride featuring free food, musical performanc
es and leading local political speakers. (Noon-4 pm. 4475 N
Lombard St.)
Design Your Own Reality
Softball in dresses? The Bella Boys softball team presents Bella Drag
Ball 2007— an honest-to-goodness softball game you will never forget—
at Overlook Park. If you plan on playing, please amve early wearing your
favorite dress! Donations benefit the team's trip to the Gay Softball Worid
Series. pm. 1301 N Fremont St.)
Keshet holds a potluck lunch and visits the Hillsboro air show for all who
identify as queer Jews as well as their spouses, partners, significant
others and good friends and family, whether Jewish or queer or not. Bring
a dish and a beverage. (1 pm. David 503-224-7075.)
Karen Carpenter reads from her nonfiction book Innerworkings at In
Other Words. (2-3:30 pm. 8 NE Killingsworth St.)
Portland Art Museum presents a lecture on the life and art of bisexual
Mexican artist Frida Kahlo by art historian Hayden Herrera, who wrote
the narration for the award-winning documentary Portrait of an Artist:
Frida Kahlo. (2 pm. 1219 SW Park Ave. $5 members, $10 nonmembers.)
Celebrate good times! Embers presents L4L PDX for lesbians 40
xiafcr and older. Dance to '50s, '60s, '70s and '80s music, meet, greet,
sweet. (5-9 pm. 110 NW Broadway. $6.)
Club Pynk presents Eugene's first-ever White Party featuring internation
al DJs, male and female go-go dancers, a full bar, food and fashionable
The Sustainable Business Network of Portland hosts a screen
ing of the award-winning documentary The Real Dirt on Fanner
John at Hollywood Theatre, followed by a community dinner at
the Northeast Community Center featunng locally grown food, live music
and special guests "Farmer John" Petersen and director Taggart Siegel
The Zine Machine
The seventh annual Portland Zine Symposium returns Aug. 11 and 12 at Portland State University’s Smith Memorial
Ballroom, 1825 S.W. Broadway.
This annual event is free to the public and a great opportunity to learn more about independent media. It provides attendees
the chance to connect with queer zinesters from the local area and around the world. Although the event is not specifically queer,
many queer people are active in zine making and distribution, and there are always plenty of queer faces in attendance. This years
symposium theme is "Zines? Zines!" and will include tabling where zines will be sold. The weekends events feature a Queer Zine
Panel discussing the unique experiences of queer zinesters. For more information on event times, look for updates at
www.pdxzines.com.
The symposium defines a zine as a “self-published magazine usually produced by one person or a small group of people.” Zines
play a unique role in queer culture and community, explains Jazz McGinnis, a transgender Eugene resident who has been making
zines for the past six years. “Zines are a way for people who don’t normally get their voices out to speak.... Queers especially can
find and express their voices in zines because nobody is holding you back but you.”
McGinnis describes the unique opportunity zines provide for queer people to tell the stories of their lives. “Zines keep things
real, bringing in people’s actual experiences instead of shiny, happy images of Ellen DeGeneres or Rosie O’Donnell.... Zines show
that we’re still here and show the lives that have been pushed aside by larger queer organizations who want to clean us up for straight
hrough
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society."
Beyond the symposium, many queer zines are available for purchase at local bookstores including Powell’s, |n Other Words and
Reading Frenzy. The Independent Publishing Resource Center also provides workshops and information about getting involved in
zine making, and its extensive library includes an impressive collection of queer zines. For more information visit www.iprc.org.
—Sassafras Lowrey
“There’s never been an event like it before,” Nick Pell asserts confidently,
speaking of esoZone, a three-day underground arts and culture festival coming to
Portland from Aug. 10 to 12. Pell—an occultist, writer, editor of the Web site
Key64.net and self-described “local queer bon vivant”—says the best way to
describe the event is as a “designer reality expo,” and he hopes that all who attend
will be permanently changed by the things they witness and take part in.
To that end, the expo will feature futurist rituals, nonhierarchical and inter
active panels, occult art, a dance floor and performances by syndicated television
host Freeman, alternative Internet radio personalities Viking Youth, acclaimed
local performance artist Red King and London theater troupe Foolish People.
Of this last act, Pell says, “I have the sincere conviction that everyone who
witnesses the Foolish People’s magical play will be transformed by it.”
The entire event will culminate in an epic meditation by utopian visionary
artist Paul Laffoley. This curious man, who has been called crazy and likened
to an alien more than once, underwent shock therapy treatments as a child and
suffers from Asperberger’s syndrome (a mild form of autism). Yet for the past
four decades he has single-mindedly developed an utterly unique style of paint
ing that has been exhibited at more than 200 shows worldwide. Pell obviously
holds him in high regard and considers it a major coup to have netted him for
the esoZone expo.
“Laffoley is the biggest name we have,” he says. “There’s a certain notoriety
about him now, but his stuff is more accessible, perhaps, than some of our oth
er artists.”
esoZone is being coordinated by people from online communities all over
the world and locally supported by Portland Occulture, a loose affiliation of
people with an interest in esoteric subjects. There seems to be an overriding
upbeat, optimistic sentiment to the event, looking toward the future and away
from the apocalyptic mindset that pervades much of modem culture, from reli
gious doomsday predictors to nihilistic punk rockers.
“What’s cooler than interacting with a bunch of other weirdoes to talk
about shit that only you can talk about?” Pell asks. “We are programming our
own new reality.”
The festival will take place at Someday Lounge, 125 N.W. Fifth Ave. For
a complete schedule of events, visit www.esozone.com.
—Tony Le Tigre