'BARDO PROJECT: OREGON' art exhibition October 2-26, 2024

Portland Arts Collective is pleased to announce Bardo Project: Oregon, Legacy Collaborations by Marne Lucas, featuring works by late artists Chris Brunkhart and George Michael Stanley. During the Bardo Project: Oregon exhibition are free community workshops taking place at the gallery, centering on art-making, grief and loss, end-of-life care planning, remembrance, ritual, and healing. Founded in 2014, Bardo Project is an ongoing visual art and social practice project by artist Marne Lucas. Collaborating with terminally ill artists nationwide to express artistic endeavors that represent their legacy, Lucas is a trained end of life Doula, that helps the dying attain acceptance in the face of death using creativity as a form of spiritual end of life care, illuminating the positive effects of art as mind and body are integrated. Bardo Project also encompasses public facing arts programming, art workshops, and outreach focused on end-of-life care planning. The current focus is to engage with Oregon-based artists, to reach larger audiences with their legacies, and advocate for Oregonians to consider their own legacies.

“As an end of life Doula (EOLD) I act as witness and guide, supporting clients and families at the end. In concert, as artistic collaborator, I coax the dying to arrive at peace and acceptance in a short time frame, I make photographic portraits, and assist them to define their creative legacy through unique works. The dying process acts as a space for a person to reflect on their life and career. In witnessing that vulnerability, I am faced with the question “What is most valuable?” To celebrate life and explore mortality alongside my fellow artists is the ultimate expression of my creativity and caregiving skills. The project combines my efforts over two decades of portrait photography, video, elaborate large-scale collaborations, and socially-engaged creative and activist endeavors within arts and health-related organizations. Bardo Project is in advance my own legacy.” -Marne Lucas

Presenting the creativity of those pondering, or facing and accepting the end of life, Bardo Project allows viewers to enjoy visual beauty while engaging with mortality. The project advocates for the dying to gain agency by actively participating in their end-of-life process, and aims to help viewers think about their own future end-of-life choices. The philosophical impact of making plans about one’s death can provide peace of mind. “Bardo” is the Tibetan word describing the transitional existence between death and rebirth; living with terminal illness and the process of dying are similarly "in between" states and are opportunity for introspection and honesty.                                                                                    

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Chris Brunkhart (1968-2016) 
Brunkhart’s black and white photography series ‘Iceland’ presented in Bardo Project: Oregon will be exhibited posthumously for the first time.

Chris Brunkhart hailed from Portland, Oregon and lived in Brooklyn, New York, with his partner Ezekiel Martin Brunkhart. A self-taught photographer and artist, he was known as the “Ansel Adams” of the newly emerging sport of snowboarding in the 90’s, giving the sport a new, stark look. He later battled addiction, struggling to come out as a gay man within the macho snowboarding culture that, at the time, was not as Queer accepting as it is today. In August 2014, while living/working in New York, Chris was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer, with a less than a 5% chance of life for two years. The couple moved back to Portland, OR, for oncology care. Chris’ response to the terminal diagnosis was to focus on art making, determined to edit and publish the landscape work he made while living in New York, all while enduring palliative chemotherapy and rapidly declining health. Throughout his 16-month battle with cancer, Chris enjoyed a newfound confidence about his talent, exhibiting and selling his work, which was published widely, even meeting his photography idol, Mary Ellen Mark. He created a new body of legacy work based on his honeymoon trip to Iceland, where he shot landscape photographs, accompanied by Marne Lucas. By December 2015, Chris released his legacy project, Borderless Space: a limited-edition photography book and art exhibition of his New York landscape work. Chris Brunkhart died two weeks later, on January 2, 2016, at age 47, in Portland, Oregon. Chris is survived by his husband Zeke, who lives and works in Portland, and will be present at the opening reception.

“I shared in Chris’ intense output of creativity as he faced his sudden terminal diagnosis, and he became my first collaborator in The Bardo Project. I acted as photo assistant and doula on his bucket list trip to Iceland with his husband Zeke. Inspired by attending a photography workshop in New York by his idol, Mary Ellen Mark, he booked a future workshop with her in Iceland. Despite his declining health, Mark who was also battling cancer, encouraged him to attend. Mark died just before the trip was to start, but Chris still wanted to make the trip to Iceland, as he said, “She still has something to teach me.” The trip was complicated by his failing health— he fell ill during the trip and was hospitalized—but he made it back to Portland, and finished his New York landscape book project. It is incredibly rewarding to be able to exhibit Chris’ ‘Iceland’ series for the first time in his hometown of Portland.” -Marne Lucas

‘Rara Avis: A Rare Bird’ is color photography series by the late Corvallis, Oregon based artist “Mike” Stanley. This is the first exhibition of his nature photography, curated posthumously by his eldest daughter Marne Lucas.

George Michael Stanley (1947-2023) “Mike” Stanley was an Oregon Coast renaissance man, best known as a generous sharer of his knowledge and passions, who at age 75, passed peacefully after complications from an unexpected stroke, surrounded by his family. Mike was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He was a medical illustrator, artist, musician, jazz aficionado, and avid cyclist who traveled across Canada and Europe, eventually settling in Cannon Beach, Oregon in 1973, and marrying his wife, Christina, in 1989. There he ran Mike’s Bike Shop for 40 years, and advocated for safe community cycling. Besides cycling he enjoyed kayaking, hiking, traveling, playing flute and concertina music, and spending time with family. After retirement he and Christina moved to Corvallis, Oregon, where he took up bird watching, nature photography, sailing his boat the “Ursa Minor”, and playing flute and concertina music with local groups. He was also active in the Sangha Jewel Zen Center community. He is survived by his wife of 34 years Christina Stanley, his son Henry Stanley, daughters Marne, Nicole, Megan and three granddaughters.

Also on view are Marne Lucas’ behind the scenes color photographs from that Iceland trip, and, sculptures she made inspired by her experience of working with Brunkhart, and symbols of death and transition. These initial Bardo Project-related sculptures were created in 2016 just three weeks after Chris’ death, at a four month Arts/Industry residency at the Kohler Co. Factory, in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, working at their Foundry (cast iron, brass) and Pottery (vitreous porcelain) Divisions.


 Marne Lucas (she/her/they) is a queer, multidisciplinary artist and end of life doula (EOLD) working at the intersection of art, science, and health, using conceptual overlaps: life’s energy, the body, and mortality, in social practice investigations. Lucas’ long-term projects are informed by events and emotions of the community around her, and are inspired by the doula and palliative care movements. An infrared thermal video pioneer, Lucas uses heat-sensitive imaging technology to illuminate the magic and fragility of human life cycles. The Bardo Project explores creativity as a form of spiritual and somatic care in collaborations with terminally ill artists nationwide to establish their legacy. Lucas received EOLD training at INELDA under Henry Fersko Weiss, a role that supports the dying and their families. Marne has collaborated with artists, choreographers, dancers, musicians, activist groups, sex workers, health care and LGBTQIA non-profits, and the public at large. Lucas received Regional Arts & Culture Council project grants (2024, 2013, 2008), UMEZ Creative Engagement grants (2018, 2021) administered by the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and an Oregon Arts Commission public art commission (2009). Lucas was formerly a harm-reduction activist for Danzine, and advisory board member to OUTsider, an LGBTQIA multi-arts festival (Austin, TX.) www.marnelucas.com