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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 23, 2018)
Vendors Page 6 1 I O Street Roots • Feb. 23-March 1,2018 « Due to incorrect information provided to Street Roots by the Oregon Secretary of State’s office, the Feb. 16 story “Sign on the crooked line,” included an error on how to remove your name from a petition. Petition signers must contact the chief petitioner of the document, not the Secretary of State’s office, in order to have their names removed. Anyone who believes they were tricked into signing the IP 22 petition and would like to have their name removed should contact Rep. Mike Nearman at rep. mikenearman@oregonlegislature.gov or call his Salem office at 503-986-1423. To file an official complaint, email the Secretary of State’s Elections Division at elections.sos@oregon.gov. The same story originally used an incorrect pronoun for Robin Fisher. Fisher’s preferred pronouns are they, their and them. Street Roots regrets the error. Answers to Page 15 Puzzles P H O T O B Y C A E L IN M IL T K O Aileen McPherson has artwork on exhibit a t Blick A rt Materials on Northwest Glisan Street. SR vendor’s art featured in Portland shop BY CAELIN MILTKO L 9 9 Z 6 t7 17 z z 8 £ 9 L 6 £ S 8 k 6 8 £ z 9 8 3 6 £ 9 1 9 p L z p 9 L 9 9 z t7 L 8 Z. 6 £ £ L t7 6 z z 8 9 9 Z £ 9 1. 8 6 9 z t7 9 6 I- 9 t7 Z £ 8 Z z 8 9 z £ 9 1. 6 Selling her art has always been a way for Aileen to make a little extra pocket money for bills, for the storage unit where she wo years ago, Street Roots vendor keeps her art, and for other day-to-day Aileen McPherson walked into Blick costs. Art Materials on Northwest Glisan Street and asked what she would need to She resides in an RV with her husband. Her primary dream is to have a calm, do to have her art hang in the windows. peaceful, stable home off the Her name was put on a waiting roadside. She hopes having her list, and she recently got the call art showcased in the Blick that she would be Blick’s windows will be a stepping stone featured local artist. toward realizing that dream. T v e been on cloud nine,” “If I sell anything, that’s a hand Aileen said. “It’s a dream. It’s up,” she said. “I can put money reality. It’s like, please don’t let toward my monthly bills, and then this dream fade away; let it keep I’ll be able to actually have some becoming reality.” T w extra money to put into that Aileen began creating art as a savings account.” on cloud child as a way to keep herself These days, Aileen has been occupied and calm. She’s been nine« IF® a focused on writing poetry, and saving her art since the ’90s. dream« It*s her poems are often featured in Seven of the eight pieces she has reality« It's Street Roots. But she’s also using hanging at Blick were created life®, please her art to capture the experience while she was living at Dignity desFt let this of living on the streets. She’s Village in the early 2010s. creating small snapshots of those dream fade “I don’t know exactly how I she sees sleeping outside. would classify them,” Aileen said. away> let It “You know, it’s a person inside, “They are snippets of how I felt. feeep becom but on the outside, it’s just a As (folk rock artist) S.J. Tucker ing reality/" cocoon,” Aileen said. “Be it says, ‘The truth comes down in boxes, blankets or tarps, they are riddles that are safe enough to AILES« hiding inside just trying to stay share.’ I feel my artwork is the warm, rest, sleep, rejuvenate. same way because I consider it And it saddens me.” abstract, yet you can see definite While searching through her forms in it.” artwork to find pieces to exhibit at Blick, The Blick showcase is the first Aileen found that she had several larger opportunity Aileen has had to hang her art sketchbooks and canvases that could be in Portland, but she has previously repurposed. exhibited her art in classrooms. In 2009, “I’m thinking as soon as it starts she sold a few pieces at the coffeeshop warming up and paints will dry properly, I’ll Emerge in Salem. S T A F F W R IT E R IF YOU GO T Aileen McPherson’s art will be exhibited until March 15 at Blick Art Materials, 1115 NW Glisan St., Portland. Blick has business cards available for anyone interested in purchasing one of her pieces. More of her art and poetry can be found online on her website: aidesigns2074. wordpress.com take those snapshots and make them bigger. I make artwork based off what I see. What brings me tears is what I capture,” she said. Most of the art she has hanging at Blick is part of what Aileen refers to as her “one- lines.” These are drawings that she created in a couple of sittings, starting with one basic line that filled the whole sheet of paper, with details added later. She then attaches the paper to a board for stability. She often creates her one-lines, like “The Keep,” as a way to keep herself calm and focused. “By the time I’m done, I feel like I’ve cleared my mind,” she said. “I have a little more focus. It’s not relaxed because I’m really still not sure what that’s supposed to feel like. It’s a form of relaxed.” “Art has always been therapy for me, because no matter what I’m feeling, I can grab a pen and get it out of my head. And if I can’t get it out of my head, it’s a work in progress.”
