Arts
Galleries, public art, events and avant-garde institutions fill Portland’s vibrant arts scene.
Arts Events
Portland's arts calendar is packed with festivals, exhibitions and special events year-round.
Arts Attractions
The city's museums and galleries feature work by renowned local and international artists.
Portland Art Museum
The Portland Art Museum is central to the city's cultural district, housing a large and wide-ranging collection of artworks.
Disjecta Contemporary Art Center
The North Portland art center's offerings range from visual art installations to collaborations with bands like the Shins.
Art Galleries
Discover exciting local artists at these galleries located around town.
Performing Arts
Portland's performing arts include music, dance and theater, often combined in unexpected ways.
Portland Theater
Portland has a well-established network of venues and theater companies and an increasingly dynamic and diverse small theater scene.
Dance in Portland
Portland dance has an inventive spirit that welcomes collaborations and often spills beyond the generally accepted boundaries of “dance.”
Children’s Theater
Portland's children's theater companies introduce kids to live theater and teaches them people in costumes are fun, not scary.
Theater Companies
Kick off your exploration of Portland's theater scene with these stellar local companies.
Local Music Scene
Discover Portland through our talented musical artists in a variety of genres.
The Portland Hip-Hop Scene
Take a deep dive into the past, present and future of Portland's hip-hop scene with our expert guide to the best performers, showcases, stores and more.
Classical Music in Portland
Portland's opera, symphony and other companies offer an ongoing lineup of inspiring performances, from timeless works to modern interpretations.
Portland Jazz
In Portland, it's pretty easy to find small venues hosting intimate combos of world-class talent, or bigger, more boffo live shows.
Upcoming Arts Events
Mumvember
During the month of November, Lan Su Chinese Garden will be packed with more than 750 potted chrysanthemums artistically displayed throughout the garden. More than 75 different chrysanthemum varieties will unfurl in all colors, shapes and sizes including: spiders, quills, spoons, regular incurves, irregular incurves, reflexes, semi-doubles, anemones, brush, thistle, exotics and more. Take in…
Noritaka Tatehana: Refashioning Beauty
Portland Japanese Garden presents the art of Noritaka Tatehana in his first-ever North American solo exhibition. Installed in the Pavilion and Tanabe Galleries located within the manicured grounds of the renowned Gardens, Tatehana enchants through his use of traditional symbols of sophistication and beauty with the inclusion of new, never-before-seen artworks created especially for this…
Wild Arts Festival
The Wild Arts Festival is Pacific Northwest’s premier art show and book fair celebrating the natural world. Held each November by the Portland Audubon, the festival attracts nearly 5,000 visitors each year. New for 2019, the popular festival has moved to Pure Space in Portland’s vibrant Pearl District as the festival celebrates its 39th year….
Fertile Ground Festival
See Portland’s newest theater and dance works every January at Portland’s Fertile Ground Festival.
Portland Winter Light Festival
Brighten your February with glowing sculptures and thousands of twinkling lights at the annual Winter Lights Festival.
Volcano! Mount St. Helens in Art
Marking the 40th anniversary of the eruption of Mount Saint Helens, this exhibition explores the overwhelming power of nature and the epic cycles of volcanic destruction and regeneration with stunning photographs, paintings and drawings of the mountain from 1845 to the present day. Curated by Dawson Carr, Ph.D., The Janet and Richard Geary Curator of…
Art and Race Matters: The Career of Robert Colescott
The first comprehensive retrospective of one of America’s most compelling and controversial artists, Art and Race Matters traces the work of Robert Colescott (1925-2009), who established his career in Portland with the support of gallery owner and philanthropist Arlene Schnitzer, then made his mark in the 1970s with a series of deconstructed art-historical masterpieces that…
Design Week Portland
This annual springtime festival showcases Portland’s creative community, with a week full of lectures, design events and open houses.
Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, and Mexican Modernism
Internationally beloved artists Frida Kahlo (1907–1954) and Diego Rivera (1886–1957) played a crucial role in defining and establishing the Avant-Garde cultural movement in Mexico in the early 20th century. Their famously stormy marriage reflected their diverging artistic styles: While Rivera’s art projected itself outward, often in vast murals and concerned itself with the construction of…
To Bear Witness – Extraordinary Lives
To Bear Witness – Extraordinary Lives will capture, share and preserve the stories of 10 to 12 people from varied backgrounds who left their homelands for safe haven in the United States. Although these refugees had survival on their minds when they first arrived, they jump-started their lives with remarkable determination, finding their way in…
Ansel Adams in Our Time
Oct 17, 2020 – Jan 24, 2021 Ansel Adams in Our Time celebrates the visual legacy of the acclaimed American photographer and includes some of his most iconic images, from a symphonic view of snow-dusted peaks in The Tetons and Snake River, Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming (1942) to the sublime Moon and Half Dome,…