KENTREE SPEIRS
UPCOMING EXHIBITIONS
2010
BICA Bend Independent Contemporary Art, Three person exhibition - Bend, Or. June/July
Hanson Howard Gallery, Two person exhibition - Ashland, Or. August
Black Butte Ranch, SOLO exhibition - Sisters, Or. (date yet to be determined)
Gallery 110, Group exhibition - Seattle, Wa. August
Blackfish Gallery, Front window Exhibition and Back room solo show - Portland, Or. September
2011
Blackfish Gallery SOLO show - Portland, Or. - April
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2009
Black Butte Ranch, Sisters, Or.
Blackfish Gallery, Front window Exhibition - Portland, Or.
Blackfish Gallery, Back room solo show - Portland, Or.
2008
Blackfish Gallery, Borderline Series - Portland, Or.
2007
Blackfish Gallery, New Members show, Looking closer series - Portland, Or.
Retail Therapy Gallery, Portrait series - Seattle, WA.
Affinity Gallery, 2006 series - Portland, Or.
2006
Food for Thought gallery, 2006 series, Portland State University - Portland, Or.
Utrecht - Portland, Or.
Poster Garden Gallery - Portland, Or.
2004
National College of Natural Medicine - Portland, Or.
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2010
Blackfish Gallery Group Drawing Show - Portland, Or. January
2009
Blackfish Gallery Backroom Group Show Ð Small Works - Portland, Or.
SAM Seattle Art Museum sales and rental gallery - Seattle, Wa.
Autzen Gallery, PSU Alumni Exhibition juried by Chicago art critic James Yood - Portland, Or.
BICA Bend Independent Contemporary Art, Featured Artist - Bend, Or.
BICA Bend Independent Contemporary Art - Bend, Or.
BICA Bend Independent Contemporary Art - Bend, Or.
Blackfish Gallery, 30th Anniversary Members group show - Portland, Or.
Blackfish Gallery, Group show: Oregon seen - Portland, Or.
Blackfish Gallery, Front room two person show - Portland, Or.
2008
The Art Center, 6th Around Oregon Annual, juror Nancy Lindberg - Corvallis, Or.
Blackfish Gallery Backroom group show - Portland, Or.
Lewis & Clark College, Gender Symposium, Group show - Portland, Or.
Portland's City Hall, Keep Portland Weird Juried show - Portland, Or.
Mt Hood Community Collage, Digital Dimensions, Visual Arts - Portland, Or.
Blackfish Gallery, Window installation - Portland, Or.
Carnegie Art Center, Pacific pacifists show, curator- Anne Bullock - Walla Walla, Wa.
Portland's City Hall, Healthy Living exhibit - Portland, Or.
Portland Center for the Performing Arts, invitational group show - Portland, Or.
Blackfish Gallery, Front room three person show - Portland, Or.
2007
Blackfish Gallery, Blackfish Gallery members group show, backroom - Portland, Or.
Portland Center for the Performing Arts, invitational group show - Portland, Or.
Portland Art Center group show - Portland, Or.
Lewis & Clark College, Multicultural Symposium, Group show - Portland, Or.
ArtCentric, 5th Around Oregon Annual, (jurors Beppu Wiarda Gallery) - Corvallis, Or.
Newport Visual Art Center, Pacific Pacifist group show - Newport, Or.
Blackfish Gallery, Members backroom exhibit, - Portland, Or.
Blackfish Gallery, Pacific Pacifist, - Portland, Or.
The Grey Area Gallery, Modern myths Exhibit, - San Francisco, Ca.
MJ Higgins Gallery, Modern myths Exhibit, - Los Angeles, Ca.
2006
Auzten Gallery: Word and Hand Exhibition of art and poetry, Portland State University - Portland, Or.
High and Low Art Auction. Smith Bldg. Ballroom – Portland, Or.
2005
M K Gallery, Portland State University - Portland, Or.
Food for Thought Gallery: Selected Group Exhibition, 'Air', Portland State University - Portland, Or.
2004
M K Gallery, Portland Sate University - Portland, Or.
CORPORATE AND PUPLIC COLLECTIONS
2006
National College of Natural Medicine, Mural: Shamanism – Portland, Or.
2005
Native American Youth Association (NAYA), public art works – Portland, Or.
COMMISSIONS
2010
David McNally, Commissioned abstract landscape, Maine.
2009
Clouds Hill Farm: ecological drawing - Portland, Or.
Sharon Helms, commissioned First glimpse of Mccleod Ganj,Or.
Kathleen Adams, commissioned painting - Durango, Co.
Patty, Barney Brewton, portrait commission - Spokane, Wa.
Shoshana and Jesse Rapapore, portrait commission - Boston, Ma.
2008
Clouds Hill Farm: ecological drawing - Portland, Or.
Annette Robinson, Ethan study - San Diego, Ca.
Shoshana Spergel and Jesse Rapapore, portrait - Boston, Ma.
2007
Hollis Coulthard, North West Landscape Chronicles - Wheeling, Mo.
Clouds Hill Farm: ecological drawing - Portland, Or.
Dr. Michael Zimmerman, portrait of Cheryl Thoen - Portland, Or.
Cheryl Thoen, portrait of Michael Zimmerman - Portland, Or.
Dr. Kip Kemple, commission bee - Portland, Or
2006
Dr. Joel Agresta, Portrait - Portland, Or.
Clouds Hill Farm: ecological drawing - Portland, Or.
ARTICLES AND PUBLICATIONS
2010
STUDIO VISIT Publication, Summer edition 2010.
STUDIO VISIT Publication, Spring edition 2010.
2009
Nugget News, By Oenta Gentry, Arts and entertainment, Tuesday, August 04, 2009.
Blackutteranch.blogspot.com/, By Katie Williams Executive Assistant,
Tuesday, August 4, 2009, Gallery at the Lodge Black Butte Ranch, Or.
Oregonian,D K Row, Visual Arts Reviews, Issue: Feb 27-March 5, 2009, page: 29
2008
www.artlout.com - magazine
Bug Toast CD cover art - Intersect
2007
Slurve Magazine, www.slurvemag.com
1985
Bites and Stings- a book of natural remidies for the South West, by Peter Bigfoot, Illistrations by Kentree Speris
1986
Catalist Magazine, Cover art,
1983
Wasatch Climbs, by Les Elison and Brian Smoot, Illistrations by Kentree Speirs
TEACHING
2009-present
Private painting and drawing instruction. Portland, Or.
2008
Portland State University, Contemporary Studio Practices, Portland, Or.
2007
Portland State University, Art in K-12 Geology Dept. Portland, Or.
Portland State University, Advanced Painting, Portland, Or.
1990-2000
Reevis School of Self Reliance of Arizona's Superstition Wilderness: instructor: nature observation skills,
self-reliance skills- fire, water, brain-tan buckskin, organic gardening and wild edibles, botanical illustration.
1990-1994
Tree's Art and Survival Summer Camp owner/operator kids' summer camp, ages 7-11 Art and primitive skills
Taos, New Mexico.
EDUCATION
2006
BFA Portland State University, Portland, Or. (summa cum laude)
1984-86
University of Utah, Fine Arts Dept., Salt Lake City, Ut.
BIO
Kentree Speirs was born in Salt Lake City, Utah in 1965. He spent his childhood at play in the mountains and deserts of Utah. When he wasn't exploring nature he was drawing and painting.
In 1983 he attended Utah State University majoring in Forestry. Transferred to the University of Utah in 1984 and enrolled in the Art department. He spent three years studying painting and drawing. In 1986 he left college and traveled until 2002.
His travels initially revolved around mountaineering and wilderness backpacking and evolved into teaching nature awareness skills, primitive skills, and sustainable living skills. During this time he kept sketchbooks and continued to paint. This deep emersion into wild settings has irreversibly informed his paintings.
After sixteen years of nearly constant change, he married and settled in Portland, Oregon where he returned to finish his BFA at Portland State University in painting and drawing. He graduated summa cum laude in 2006. Despite years of formal training with emphasis in classical figurative work, his love of landscape and passion for the abstract and unknown emerged as his present day style.
ARTIST STATEMENT
My artwork has always drawn inspiration from the natural world. I'm awed by the raw beauty and the drama of untamed places, and my heart and mind are drawn to them. Silence is an inspiring presence in remote places, and I work to bring that presence to life in my paintings. Likewise, stillness and movement are intrinsic elements in nature, and their expression is important in my work. Yet I live in an urban world. I spend my days exploring my relationship to the landscapes that I'm in and the landscapes in my memory and imagination.
To begin a painting, I'll pick a color, a shape, a sketch, or perhaps a photograph to serve as a departure point. This inspiration is then consumed by the painting. The properties of color compel the work. I start with one color, then add another and respond to their interaction. Another color brings new interactions. From there, the painting develops its own life as relationships expand, and as the whole begins to express a feeling of place.
I might work on ten paintings simultaneously. In the studio, I surround myself with paintings in various stages of development. I spend long periods looking at their colors, shapes, and the evolving relationships. When I begin to feel a spark, I act to enliven it. I may obliterate surface images, methodically work detail into an area, or repetitiously sculpt marks with paint. I appreciate sweeping gestural paint strokes, thickly applied, as much as thin translucent layering. I enjoy combining different methods of applying paint because it sets up the challenge of resolving their relationship to one another. Compositional structure can come from geometric or organic shapes, but organic shapes predominate, as reflected in nature. Shape and color set the stage for a delicate balance of serendipity and intention. In each proceeding painting, I let chance and intention work together to refine an expression of the world that is always new, yet known, to me.
In the end, it all comes back to creating a provocative assemblage of color and form, expressing, and enlivened by, my relationship to the natural world.