Artist Michael Brophy spoke at Portland State University yesterday evening to a packed house. Here's what I heard, once somebody unlocked the doors so Emily and I could sneak into the lecture:
Brophy on how early Oregonian settlers viewed the gigantic trees that used to cover our land: "Large, pernicious weeds."
On his portraits of clearcuts and stumps: "I imagined the landscape as a character that had agency."
On his move into abstraction: "I just wanted to use a really fat brush."
On people: "I think we're integrated into the landscape, as humans, and we always have been."
