Art on the Edge of October

Seasons turn and the art rotates.

SUMMERS END...

We loved seeing T. Nyugen's classical paintings on the wall in September. If you fell in love with something you saw last month, visit her site and let her know you saw it on our walls. Also, we had three of her adorable cat paintings last month BUT THERE ARE MORE CATS and we think everybody needs more cats in their lives.

We also had a series of work by local collage artist, poet, and educator Katie Gilmour up in September. Gilmour's work blends the analog and the digital in such a beautiful way. Her sold-out poetry workshop TEXTURE was a wonderful way to use the gallery space and Gilmour guided the budding poets into feeling the world with words.

And I loved taking the opportunity to displaying some of my analog film camera collection and the photos I've taken with them. So many people came in to geek out about their own cameras, and show me their own film photos.

...AND FALL BEGINS

This month we are featuring 69 (69!!!) new watercolors by our represented artist Daemion Lee. A year ago, Lee approached us with a vision: a series of watercolors, painted on site plein air, tracing the flow of water from the drainage tributary behind his home in Salem all the way to the Pacific Ocean. We promised if he painted the work we would hang it, and what an incredible body of work it turned out to be. Hung geographically like the watershed itself, we can follow the flow of water around the gallery. Lee captured not just the landscapes and changing water, but the people, towns, boats, and animals who thrive along and depend on these waterways. Along the Willamette: Plein Air Paintings will be up thru November 15.

We also have new work on the walls from our represented artists: new photography and photo-books by Adrian Kuester, new paintings by Dayna Collins, Kathy Narramore, Patrice Cameron, Heather Jacks and Zachary McRae , new sculpture by Paul Meuse, and new prints by Eric Frey.

Last year, Salem on the Edge participated in a screening of Fall of Freedom. This year, in addition to screening the video as part of the global weekend of events, Salem on the Edge collaborated with local artist Meg Rowe to host a participatory event as part of her ongoing project The Record. Rowe uses reclaimed and repurposed textiles, fiber and objects to interrogate culture and meaning through materials. As a part of an ongoing residency at the Salem Art Association, she continues to build The Record, a hand-stitched material record of over 350 “unacceptable” words now functionally banned from use by federal agencies by the Trump administration. The complete series will contain more than 200 vintage textile pieces that archive words and phrases, from accessible to women and underrepresented, included on one or more federal agencies’ “unacceptable list.” (As of March 2025, 381 words and phrases had been identified as unacceptable to the administration. The list is indexed on pen.org.) Sewists and stitchers with basic hand embroidery skills are invited to help embroider the unacceptable words on domestic linens; share their experiences of stitching and art making; and discuss hand craft as an act of reclamation and resistance. A fully attended public stitching session took place at Salem on the Edge on Oct 3 and we would love to host another one. There will be stitching sessions ongoing at the Salem Art Association as well. To sign up for a session or to donate vintage  decorative textiles, please contact the artist at TheRecord@icloud.com.

We have some other exciting news from of our represented artists. James Hockenhull has a solo show WORDS TO MY STORY current on display in the Salem Art Association's Focus Gallery! Read all about the show here.

Our represented artist Monte Shelton will be showing work in PRAx Open in November. This exhibition emphasizes work that speaks, in any number of conceivable ways, to the places where the contributing artists live and to the importance of community, connection and collaboration.

Our 3rd annual 100 x 100 Group Show Call for Art is open, and so much art is pouring in for our consideration. Submit work to the show here. Submissions will be accepted thru November 1. There is no entry fee for the show and works of any medium, theme, and size will be considered. The 100 x 100 show opens Sunday November 28, with an opening reception from 12-3 on Small Business Saturday with local pop-up guest artists. This show is a favorite with our collectors, new and long-time alike: with over 100 works of art priced at only $100, it's a great way to start or add to your art collection while supporting local artists.

About the new format and newsletter site: you might have noticed this email came to you from a different site and a different format than what you're used to. We are in the progress of migrating our online presence over to Ghost. This has been driven by my increasing frustration with the web hosting and newsletter services we've used for years: the cost for using these services keeps increasing, and the reason for the increase is usually cited as access to new AI features, but the actual functionality of the services significantly decreases with the AI integration. Lack of transparency and control over our data (and what is done with the images we upload), control over what other sites are promoted in our newsletters thru advertising, and steep fees associated with the e-commerce tools we want to offer for our artists had me looking for services that feel more aligned with our values. Ghost is a self-sustainable, non-profit and open source platform that charges us a flat rate no matter how much our sales or reach grows, doesn't push an algorithmic feed on its followers, and isn't laden with AI functions that we didn't ask for or need. We have also started using Humantix to handle ticket sales to all of our classes, workshops and after dark events. All booking fees go towards non-profits and educational programs. As we become increasingly aware that platforms like Facebook and companies like Meta do not always have people and artists best interests at heart, we are choosing to support, and if necessary, create, spaces that do. This feel like a good shift to make.

Since this new blog/newsletter platform gives us more of a journalism/blog style page to work with in addition to our traditional website, my hope is to grow our Ghost site and newsletter into a source for all the visual arts events happening in the Salem area, not just the ones hosted by Salem on the Edge. I want to post interviews with our artists, stream live art performances, share local calls for art, and more. Since Ghost doesn't push our content out into the world, we will still rely on Instagram (for now) and organic marketing efforts to find our people. Thank you for your support and feedback during this transition as we try to "be the change".

I'm looking forward to seeing you in the gallery this month! Art makes life better.