November, 2005

Artist Blows Up Images in Nucleo

In the two years since closing his acclaimed Soundvision gallery, visual artist TJ Norris has been taking a close-up look at Portland's industrial underbelly through the macro lens of his digital camera. And Portland has been taking a closer look at Norris, who is showing through Nov. 26 at Chambers Gallery, 207 S.W. Pine St.; appearing in the current issue of Portland Modern along with fellow gay bear Marc Manning; and writing an OregonLive.com column that asks, "Is It Art?" Norris' new exhibit, Nucleo, is the second in a three-part series titled Tribryd, a term he uses to label his "three-part hybrid," the amalgam being namely one of seeing and hearing.

"Music is my metaphor-where I get all my juice, my energy," says Norris, who observes lines in music and sound in surfaces. This connection led him to invite composers to collaborate by creating audio for his visuals. The first part, Genometrics, was shown in 2003 at Soundvision and incorporated sculptural objects interpreting the composers' original soundtracks to Norris' images. Nucleo followed the same method but yielded two dimensional "photo objects" with aural accompaniment. Next year, Infinitus blends the two in video that will dominate an experiential walk-through that Norris hopes to take to Europe, where most of his composer collaborators reside.

Here in Portland, viewers of Nucleo don headphones to hear music tuned to three sets of three glossy discs, each a colorful, intense lambda C-print - a high-resolution abstract homage to old-fashioned pinhole photography. The focus, however, is under the surface, smaller than the eye can see, kind of invisible. A peephole, says Norris, into the unconsciousness. "It's fascinating to imagine a world that exists simultaneously parallel to our universe and that you can't see unless you look deeper," says the 40-year old, who by day manages Oregon Health & Science University's public relations photographic database. "Instead of dealing with peripheral vision, I want you to see a center of something. And to me, there's a complete balance in a circle. It's what I consider a perfect shape. It's very punctuated and very direct." Not unlike the artist, whose portfolio can be seen at www.tjnorris.net. - Timothy Krause