This year’s Portland Open Studios begins on October 14th, including studio tours of Montavilla artists Tatyana Ostapenko and Josh Gates. Since its founding in 1998, the nonprofit has invited the public into art studios across the city to showcase Portland artists working within their communities. This year’s 25th annual event spans two consecutive weekends, October 14th through the 15th and October 21st through the 22nd. Both neighborhood locations are less than a mile apart, just east of SE 82nd Avenue.

Visual artist Josh Gates paints within his studio at 8423 SE Hawthorne Boulevard using photos of the city as rain-soaked inspirations for his work. He prefers painting lesser-known landmarks that will seem right at home to any resident who walks the streets in their neighborhoods but would be unrecognizable to the average tourist. A Montavilla resident since late 2019, his recent work shifted towards this area as he walks the streets with his camera. “A lot of my inspirations came from things I would find in the area on and around 82nd Avenue and the back streets,” explained Gates.

Gates does not consider himself a photographer, though the camera helps capture moments that will make their way to the canvas. “My style has elements of realism, so sometimes people will say, ‘Oh, I thought it was a photo,’ that’s nice to hear, but it’s not my goal. My goal is to make a painting look like a painting and take advantage of the amazing things that paint can do. I take reference photos because I like being able to work here in the studio, and I like to have references that remind me of where I was and how I was feeling,” remarked Gates. “The natural world resonates with me, where I’ll be outside, and suddenly, the light is striking perfectly against those dark clouds. You get the golden hour light, and it’s only going to last a few seconds. It feels like the silence is deafening because it’s so spectacular that it should be making a sound. So that’s the natural phenomena that I respond to, and I love the way that that interacts with urban environments,” said Gates. He is fond of light’s interaction with rain and post-storm skies in a cityscape. “I like capturing the gray, drizzly days that we get so much here.”

Gates practiced his craft for years, starting in high school, but after a career fundraising for nonprofits, he worked to make it his profession. “I went to college later in life. That really helped me hone my practice and figure out what I most wanted to capture in my work,” said Gates. He explained that the people and facilities at Portland State University helped enhance his work and gave him the skills to establish a full-time practice. Selling his original artwork and prints provides income alongside funds from commissioned work. However, this annual event is a welcomed opportunity to increase an artist’s exposure. “Some months are harder than others. For that reason, for any working artist in Portland who participates in Portland Open Studios, it’s typically the biggest earner of the year,” explained Gates.

Tatyana Ostapenko will greet the public from her 2275 SE 85th Avenue studio during Portland Open Studios for the fourth year in a row. The Ukrainian-American artist creates contemporary paintings and murals, drawing from her experience as a street photographer in Ukraine to find meaningful themes. “The vast majority of my work has to do with history. The history of people who normally don’t make it into official history with a capital H, especially focusing on the experiences and plight of women,” explained Ostapenko. “I’m primarily working with images of elderly women from Ukraine because I get to straddle both of my favorite subjects.” Her work pushes back against the mainstream depiction of women as young, unrealistic objects of beauty. “I want to give representation to people, especially back where I’m from, who have carried so much on their shoulders without any recognition.”

Ostapenko’s process involves pulling from her life or other sources that reinforce her experiences. “I work with photographic references to create my compositions. I have an extensive library. I’m somewhat of a digital hoarder. I have hard drives upon hard drives of images,” said Ostapenko. She incorporates these source images into a digital collage that influences the work. “Most of the paintings that you see will be a combination of multiple photographic references that then further undergo a lot more changes as the painting is being painted.”

Most work displayed during the Portland Open Studios event will show Ostapenko’s work on canvas. However, she has some of her largest work on display year-round, adorning prominent walls. Although principally a studio artist, she comfortably works on large-scale paintings and naturally wants to create murals. Disappointingly, expanding into that work as a woman faced headwinds. So, in 2022, Portland Street Art Alliance launched the Ladies Up Mural Project featuring work by female-identifying artists based in Portland. “If you know much about street art, it’s mainly a boys club, so they did this project called ladies up, and it’s an entire city block worth of murals, all by different female artists,” said Ostapenko. Participating in that project opened up new opportunities, and she continues to add more murals to her portfolio. 

Painting murals can follow a different process than other work, requiring permits and specific directives from clients. Ostapenko is a professional accustomed to working with clients to deliver projects to meet their needs. She rents paintings for real estate staging or creates something unique for a listing. Commission work is a constant, and it takes many forms. Those painting projects can range from capturing a moment in a black-and-white family photo to something more involved and specific. “A client had a memory from when she was 11, and she wanted to capture it exactly. So, we ended up staging elaborate photo shoots. We staged children in very particular positions to have photographic reference to make them look right. I found references to this particular model of a truck because we needed it to be that exact truck in that exact color in this particular location,” recalled Ostapenko.

The annual Portland Open Studios event exposes community members to the artwork created within all corners of the city, often by people who may not have the opportunity to interact with the art world. They have a moment to see the works up close and perhaps buy postcards, prints, or originals. However, making money is not the primary focus of these four days. Real-world access to the artwork can often have a vastly different experience, and there are few places in the neighborhood where people can access art. “It’s important for folks to know that going to see art does not obligate them to buy. Awareness and education is the purpose,” explained Tatyana Ostapenko. Josh Gates, who joined the Portland Open Studios Board last year, echoed that sentiment. For him, the two-weekend event is about encouraging interactions with artists and “seeing their work in person, which is always worth taking the time to do in this day and age where most of the time you’re engaging with artwork on the screen. It’s a really special thing to be able to visit studios and see works in person,” said Gates.

This year, 111 artists will participate in Portland Open Studios. A complete map is available on the group’s website. All studios will open from 10 a.m. through 5 p.m. on October 14th, 15th, 21st, and 22nd. It is free to attend, and the artists will be in their studios to discuss their work.

Article and photos by

Jacob Loeb

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