On View by Melanie Stevens presents the fifth iteration of If You’re Watching This, It’s Too Late. This multi-media work combines copper etchings of images ripped from popular news media, then screen printed onto fabrics. The installation as a whole is both a nod to the editorial illustration often found in newsprint, as well as a call and response to daily current events as they were happening in the moment. This work began in 2016 and has shown four times in Portland, with a new section added each time. The installation currently extends to over one hundred feet.
Melanie Stevens investigates the reinforcement of societal power structures, specifically the narratives centering on people of the African diaspora. Her work juxtaposes a reimagined version while encouraging opportunities for meditation and discourse. She holds a BA from Yale and an MFA from PNCA.
Lisa Jarrett, Melanie Stevens, and Samantha Wall created three simultaneous exhibitions as a singular gesture. Their themes—the racialized body, the poetry in its cultural tells, and the wit required to endure criticism—disrupted Portland’s oft ubiquitous fall exhibition calendar.
Pairing concurrent shows by Melanie Stevens, an emerging artist, and Lisa Jarrett, an established artist and professor of social practice at Portland State University, was the suggestion of their fellow artist Samantha Wall, who has a solo show at Russo Lee Gallery at the same time.