CNAA curator Bonnie Laing-Malcomson was interviewed by Eva Lake on Kboo yesterday. She's obviously still transitioning as she speaks in third person about "curatorial" as if it is a different department... look it's a steep learning curve, which we saw in February with the CNAA lineup. The question is if and how she can grow? The region is simply more engaged, challenging and diverse in its art production strategies... especially Portland (whom PAM needs to stay relevant to... especially when Tate Modern, The Whitney and MoMA have arguably played a bigger role locally).

Seattle's Ambach and Rice gallery is moving to LA. There is definitely room for a new serious gallery in Seattle but there is a lot of competition with Portland galleries also showing Seattle based artists.

The Oregon and Washington Governors have chosen a terrible design for the CRC (like the Marquam bridge, which many Portlanders want to demolish) and I urge everyone to check out this link and write their elected officials about the need for better design thinking rather than simple off the shelf engineering options. Portland's progressive thinking population will probably rise up in protest over this very ill considered choice. The CRC's own Design Advisory Group had much the same to say with this open letter.

Regarding the CRC, ran across this quote yesterday:

"[Robert] Moses realized he was never going to get power through [the] normal democratic process, so he had to figure out a different way to get it. [Moses] realized that building public works is power. A bridge is power because a bridge is money. The bridges that Robert Moses built cost in the hundreds of millions of dollars. A bridge is the contracts that go the politically well connected contractors. A bridge is the legal fees for the lawyers who arrange it. It's insurance premiums. A bridge is bonds.

Whoever Moses selected to be underwriters for these bonds would make guaranteed money in one day. [...] Therefore, if the people of a neighborhood, or their assemblymen or congressmen, or a mayor or a governor tried to stop one of his projects, they would find themselves confronted by immense pressure from the very system they were a part of. [....] A huge public work--a bridge or a tunnel or a great highway----is a source of raw power, if it is used right, and no one ever used power with such ingenuity, and such ruthlessness, as Robert Moses."

------An interview with Robert Caro. New York: An Illustrated History. Alfred A. Knopf, NY 1999

Ring a CRC bell anyone? Thank you for letting me share.