Michael Kimmelman had this fascinating article about an artist in Houston who literally build's community in The New York Times. Kimmelman will be in Portland on February 18th at the Portland Art Museum.

Also, in the NYT's there is an article on Thom Mayne's softer side. Port brought you that side a few weeks ago in this review of his new courthouse in Eugene.

Tyler Green reports that Anne Truitt is finally getting her retrospective, might I gently suggest that the Portland Art Museum as the home of the Clement Greenberg collection and (with at least 1 great Truitt) be one of the tour stops? Yeah, I'm officially freaked out that we like too many of the same artists; Bavington, Still, Smithson, Judd, Ruscha, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and Truitt. My love of Damien Hirst, Sue DeBeer, Karen Kilimnik, Elizabeth Peyton, Basquiat, Fischli & Weiss and Richard Tuttle might be divergent points though... at least I hope.

Last, but hardly least, Jerry Saltz has an excellent review of both John Currin and Gregory Crewdson on Artnet. Two artists who have been becoming overly tame, crowd-pleasing entertainers as of late. It's good to see them address the problem but are their solutions enough? Instead of statement shows these are shows designed to reposition them before the assumed statement shows come.