Disjecta Contemporary Art Center

Original shows and innovative programming captivate at this North Portland destination.

Updated Nov. 29, 2019 Kenton

Molly Woodstock

Molly Woodstock has been writing and editing content for Travel Portland since 2014. Read More

Sleeping through an art show isn’t typically a good sign — unless Disjecta is involved. The North Portland contemporary art center hosts an annual Quiet Music Festival where musical acts encourage the audience to nod off. All the better for “creating your own REM music videos.”

Rest assured that with Disjecta involved, the arts are wide awake in Portland.

Such innovative programming has helped the organization, founded in 2000, nab national attention, with outlets like the Huffington Post referring to the event as “the music festival for people who hate music festivals.”

Originally run out of an abandoned Masonic lodge, the group has graduated to a lofty, 12,000-square-foot (1,115 sq m) space in Portland’s Kenton neighborhood. Disjecta has distinguished itself by amassing a wide portfolio of offerings — some 500 shows since 2003 — that range from visual art installations to collaborations with bands like the Shins to the ambitious Portland Biennial, which will draw up to 5,500 spectators for two months’ worth of symposia, exhibitions and talks from July-September 2016.

Disjecta’s Curator-in-Residence program is a first in the region, inviting visiting artists to create a series of exhibitions and events. This season’s curator is Mexico City-based curator and writer, Michelle Fiedler. Starting Sept. 2016, Fiedler presents a variety of multi-media exhibits like A Composition of Intimate and Public Truths and the pop culture-inspired Oh Time Your Gilded Pages.

Arts, Museums & History