April First Friday at Crossroads Art Center

“In Praise of Color” by Brian Purnell and “Hells Canyon and the Wallowas” by Edward J. Pabor

Join Crossroads Carnegie Art Center on First Friday, April 5 for the opening of our April featured show. A duet of photographers, Brian Purnell and Ed Pabor, have unique perspectives and complement each other in this show celebrating Eastern Oregon Landscapes and the indigenous people of the land. The First Friday Reception starts at 5 p.m.; Artist Talk at 5:30 p.m. This exhibit is on display until April 27, 2024.

• Brian Purnell is a Pendleton potter and photographer, who brings an intriguing and colorful show of composite photography as well as rustic pottery to Crossroads. His images evoke the spirit of pow wows in the northwest and are layered with bright and beautiful compositions that stimulate the imagination. Brian works with dark red clay and hand builds pots with a white underglaze that solidifies in the recesses made with loop tools to create a timeless look and feel of unglazed clay.
• Edward J. Pabor is an artist from the Eugene area, exhibiting majestic landscapes with his classic approach to photography. His powerful images display breathtaking views Oregon, and his compositions have a clarity and contrast, balance and boldness that only comes from a photographer who has mastered his craft.

More about the Artists: 
Artist Statement from Brian Purnell
Restless to make new images, I hit upon the idea of making composite photos. The ones on exhibit represent a foray into combining pow wow related images with layers of brilliant, saturated color. I often work on my composites in the morning after a night’s sleep. At that time, I still feel connected to my dreams, and work intuitively, selecting images that seem emotionally compatible. I do not begin with a pictorial end in sight. I stop editing when I feel the image is resolved. Some composites are done in 30 minutes, some hours, some take weeks, some remain unresolved.
Artist Biography
A Pendelton based artist has been honing his compositional eye since the early 1970s when he chose art Education as his career. Now actively retired with over 40 years of experience working with both children and adults, Mr. Purnell continues to teach part time and pursues his long-standing interests in photography and pottery. Purnell works in a broad range of photographic genres, including composites, landscapes, candid environmental portraiture, and street-based social documentation. His main ceramic interest is creating beautifully functional, hand-built ware. Purnell teaches at Pendelton Center for the Arts and operates a home studio. Many collaborative and individual shows have been displayed across Eastern Oregon and Southern Washington.

Artist Statement from Edward J. Pabor
For the last 50 years I have been toting photography gear with me as I have been adventuring, hiking, climbing, and exploring since I was very young. I have been going to the Wallowa Mountains since the 1980s. They used to be Oregon’s best kept secrets. But that secret is getting out. I must have been in Wallowa County more than 20 times before I took my Jeep and camera into Hells Canyon. The first thing I said was, “What’s wrong with me? Why did it take me so long?” The landscape is magnificently stark and barren. The valleys and canyons look like the creator churned and twisted and folded the whole landscape, and just sat back and looked at it. It is both grand and solitarily lonely. A true wilderness, full of wildlife, and bleak to man, and I love it.
Artist Biography
Photography is a Greek word. It means the study of light. I have always been mesmerized by light. “Let there be light,” is the first thing God created. I studied physics and astronomy at Saginaw Valley State College, and I studied light. Light is electro-magnetic energy, and it cannot be still. It must travel in a straight line at 186,000 miles per second. But the early film and photography alchemists devised a way to capture light on film (pixels) and that changed everything. The simplicity of black and white print still amazes me after 53 years.

Crossroads is open Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., with the First Friday show opening continuing until 8 p.m. each month. For additional information please contact Angela Blair, Community Art Director at Crossroads Carnegie Art Center, angela@crossroads-arts.org or 541-523-5369.