World class
Camp…read moreCaldera is focused on changing the world through art and creativity. They are succeeding.
Given the magnitude of our challenges, we need all the creative thinking we can get!
Caldera gets that.
In Summer, Caldera employs artists to collaborate with at-risk underserved youth to explore and gain confidence in their creativity. In Winter, Caldera hosts small groups of artists for a month residency.
What's world class about Caldera is the setting, curation and communication.
Caldera is set on public land under a 99 year lease. It borders Blue Lake amid land imprinted by a large forest fire. The ghosts of burned trees are primarily ponderosa pine with a healthy recent growth of manzanita shrubs. Sun shines. Air at altitude.
Caldera curates artists nationally. Locally I know many. Each has a private a-frame cabin. Some years, they walk through shoveled paths between buildings in ten foot snow accumulation. Very, very sadly, and of great concern, snow was scarce this year.
I have been wanting to get to Caldera, a 3 hour drive from Portland proper, for some time. I was able to attend one of their resident artists' presentations and studio tours that happen an afternoon just a few times a year.
Visitors gathered in the library to hear short presentations with images by each artist. Then we were able to visit their studios and chat individually. It was clear the artists had created an experience of camaraderie and collaboration from those conversations. One artist commented that, unusual for a residency, the program was able to accommodate her husband and son, a part of her everyday artmaking-life, into the experience.
Caldera is a project of a local creative agency. So you would expect that they would communicate their successes. On the Zen to Super Bowl communication continuum, Caldera hews to Zen.
They have these open houses and they have shows of their youth programs in Portland. Sometimes they show that work in the agency lobby gallery, and they are moving to a new office in the building with more potential for shows. But given their reach and reputation, their promotion of Caldera is done with humility and authenticity.
Now let's talk world class. The buildings were designed by Brad Cloepfil at Allied Works Architecture. The materials and aesthetic are closely related to the land, low and angular, massive fireplaces, raw concrete, fir and cedar. Think Timberline Lodge crossed with Taliesin, using local materials for the 21st century.
The program is world class for its seemingly effortless engagement of young people. We need more. Each young person encapsulates the possibility for optimism and discouragement in their infinite brilliance and critical idealistic eye. We waste too much. At Caldera they are treated with the respect they crave.
Caldera is a private institute. You can visit for a few hours a few times a year they announce. If you are an artist, apply for their residency. If you are a creative youth fitting their program, reach out to them. If you are a patron connect. Get on their social media channels.
Any creative agency continuously engages every dimension of culture to discover insights. If you would like a Mad Men history, look up the book Conquest of Cool. For a more breezy view, about a fictional agency, find the book Palladio.
This is not that. Caldera is an authentic engagement of creative inspiration in a beautiful setting done right. World class. World changing.
