The Portland Art Museum has been completely renovated, and the updates are incredible. I have always loved this museum and have fond memories of going there as a child on school field trips and with my grandmother. As I got older, I started going on my own to see the art, especially during their Free Admission Days. Being just a few blocks away from my alma mater, Portland State University, it became a sort of respite after a long day of classes and work.
Several years later, in my late 20s, the museum acquired one of my artworks for its collection. My wife and I had some of our first dates there, and we continue to go there together, sometimes bringing our children. It is an incredible space with beautiful art, but the building definitely needed some updating. But now that construction is complete, this space looks like an entirely new museum. Crisply cosmopolitan, it breathes new air into the city.
We had my mom come over to our home to watch our toddler, and we brought our baby to the museum. There is outdoor parking right next to the museum, and since we were there first thing in the morning, it was wide open. I believe the parking cost was around $8, which isn’t too bad compared to other parts of the city.
As we walked up to the museum, the first thing we noticed was an elegant glass overpass that immediately modernized the space. Once inside, the kind people at reception guided us to their café, where we decided to begin our visit. The Coquelico Cafe is a European-inspired bistro serving food, coffee, and alcohol. My wife ordered a latte, I a macchiato, and we split a cinnamon scone and a chocolate mint crinkle cookie. The food and drinks were delicious, and the service was prompt and cheerful.
From there, we went to see the art. We quickly noticed that the entire space is family-friendly and that we could have easily brought our toddler along. This visual theory of ours was proven true by seeing quite a few toddlers in the museum having fun with their parents. The halls are spacious, and there are several areas, including a large outdoor patio, where they can rest if needed.
The Portland Art Museum clearly understands that family-friendly spaces matter, and they have made this a priority. Furthermore, they have family-centered bathrooms and a fully stocked nursing room. As parents who brought our baby boy along for the outing, we felt that the museum actually wanted all of us here and that we were not a nuisance at all.
We started by looking at the European collection, which is one of my favorite sections in any museum. Adorning their walls are several works by Jean-Honoré Fragonard, a couple of portraits by Milton Avery, and a large self-portrait by the talented Gustave Courbet. There are many more works of art hanging on the walls there, and every one of them is fantastic.
After viewing this section, we went to the new David Hockney exhibition, which runs through the end of July. With more than 200 works by him on display, you are easily able to see not only how his style developed, but how his influence over the art world grew. I really appreciated seeing his landscapes, particularly the ones featuring country houses. They are charming and do not take themselves too seriously, which is a refreshing contrast to the overly self-important art common in galleries and museums. David Hockney is 88 and shows no signs of slowing down.
We then viewed the rest of this spacious museum. After coming here regularly for most of my life, I must say that it feels like a totally new museum and reminds me of the ones I visit in Manhattan. We never once felt crowded or bored, and there are plenty of places to take a seat for a break.
The last portion of the museum we saw, which we were most excited about, was the room full of Mark Rothko’s paintings. This is the artist after whom the renovations are named. Mark Rothko was a Latvian-born American abstract painter who lived in Portland and graduated from Lincoln High School. This room far exceeded our expectations.
Most abstract art looks like decorative wallpaper, but Rothko avoids this trap. His levitating rectangles, thoughtfully painted on canvas, produce a dialogue between the shapes and his bruising colors. These multi-layered hues continuously build up to create both a physical and emotional depth. Mark Rothko created a new type of weather on canvas where gravity is subdued. Having surrounded myself with art my whole life, I know that most of what we see is bad. Rothko reminds us that some of it is good.
After we saw all of the art, we made our way back to the lobby and checked out the gift shop. The items for sale there are fun and intentional, which is a nice contrast to other gift shops that seem to unload unremarkable trinkets constantly. After the gift shop, we each grabbed a coffee and tea for the road from their café and made our way back home.
Art is one of the things that makes us human. The Portland Art Museum creates a space for the entire family to be both inspired and reminded of that.
Alex is a devoted husband and father born and raised in Portland, Oregon. He is a professional artist, author, and advisor for both Yale and Harvard University’s arts departments. His books, ‘Selling Leonardo: The Art World’s Greatest Scandal’ and ‘Holy Ghost: Decoding Leonardo da Vinci’s Final Painting’ are available wherever books are sold.