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    Winter

    The holidays have passed, it is a new year, and we have time to reflect and catch up.  It is time to finalize accounting for last year, reflect on what we did and what we would like to do.  But it is still a busy time to make, the artistic urge does not rest.  So many ideas and not enough time to make them all. We have also been pretty busy with work at Artistic Portland Gallery, which seems like it's own fulltime job sometimes. It is a co-op business, but it has seen a transitional period of artists and the overall feel.

    After a slow year, trying new things that sometimes didn't pan out and changes in what marketplaces we qualified for, we still did ok in the fact that we made lots of people happy and got to share our art with a lot of people. We will be looking for new places to vend this year, so if you know of anything where we would be good fit, let us know. We will be with the Portland Indigenous Marketplace, the Waterfront Blues Festival and likely a few markets at the Vancouver Historical Society.  Beyond that, now is the time when we wait for sign ups to open so we can start planning our year.

    We will be working on all the usual stuff that we make, but expanding to bring new stuff.  More wool paintings from Astrid, acoustic instruments from Brent (including ukuleles, guitars, and more) and more art from the "not so little anymore" one.

    The co-op gallery Artistic Portland Gallery on NE Fremont St. has gone through a few changes as it has come to the end of it's current lease.  It seems like a lot of artists wanted it to close, but there were a few of us who saw it as finally getting established, building community and becoming more than just a place to buy art, so we fought to sign a new lease (five years) and to figure out how not just to keep the doors open, but to make it an even more welcoming and inclusive space for all. We will be focusing on having more classes and events, with a variety of art that is reasonably priced, including lots of stuff that is great if you are looking for small gifts or like us, have a small home with limited space and want some smaller scale art to decorate it.  Of course, some of the artists also have larger scale art if you have a larger home or are looking to decorate a larger space.

    We also hope to make it feel like a third place, one of those places you can just hang out for a bit, be social, drink some coffee or tea, talk to an artist or fellow art lovers, make your own art, or just enjoy the vibe.

    For those of you who live near the gallery, many of the artists there are also your neighbors. Many of the business owners on Fremont St. also live around the area, so while Portland is a pretty big city, it is stuff like that which make it feel like a small community. By supporting each other locally, we can keep this place growing into something nice for everyone.

    Thank you for reading, and hope to see you at some point this year.

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