The dreamery - collaborative works by hibiki miyazaki and david joel kitcher

SELF-CARE
2025 watercolor, casein and graphite on Arches
30 x 22 inches

The Semi-Finalist would like to take a moment to celebrate two milestones taking place at Augen Gallery this month:
For starters, the gallery is presenting the collaborative work of David Joel Kitcher and Hibiki Miyazaki. This is their first time working and showing together, and they have collaborated on each piece in the exhibition. They were generous enough to send me this description of their form, process, and content:
This collaborative drawing project brings together two first-generation American artists, David Joel Kitcher and Hibiki Miyazaki. Both artists share deeply personal life experiences, including growing up with immigrant parents and navigating the challenges of trauma, neurodiversity, mental illness, and addiction within their families.
The artists created a body of work on paper that merges their distinct drawing styles while exploring common themes related to healing and cultural identity. Paper, with its tactile and delicate qualities, serves as an ideal surface for exploring vulnerability, fragility, and memory. It invites layering, erasure, and revision; processes that mirror the complexity of healing.
Throughout the project, the artists exchanged drawings back and forth, building upon each other’s work in their individual studios. They continued this exciting exchange through regular studio visits until the pieces were complete.

SCI-FI TWINS
2025 watercolor, casein and graphite on Arches
30 x 22 inches

The second milestone is in celebration of Augen’s 47 years as a gallery, as well as its planned transition into a project space over the course of 2026 and 2027. From the gallery:

"It has been 47 years since Augen Gallery opened in an 800-square foot space on S.W. Yamhill Street across from Multnomah County Library. Over these past 47 years it has been at least a six-day week and much of the time a seven-day week venture for me. The gallery has had the persistence to survive the 1980's Oregon timber recession and all the subsequent economic disruptions of the dot com bubble, the great recession of 2008, and the pandemic of 2020. But now, as I approach 77 years old, my family is encouraging me to 'dial back' my time commitment to the gallery. So as of January 2026 the gallery will move to a three-day availability schedule, Thursday - Saturday. The gallery will slow down its exhibition schedule to an exhibition every 2-1/2 to 3 months, rather than one or two exhibitions every month, and will slowly transition to become a project space. The gallery will continue to represent artists and continue to deal in major contemporary prints, but will develop a work schedule and commitment that is more appropriate for my age."

 -  Bob Kochs, owner of Augen Gallery in Portland, Oregon

HIGH-DOSE
2025 casein, watercolor, ink and graphite on Arches
15-1/2 x 11 inches

The Dreamery is up through December 27th, 2025. You can also see more images from the show on the gallery website.

SEASON CHANGE
2025 casein, watercolor, ink and graphite on Arches
16-3/4 x 15-1/4 inches

LONESTAR TACO
2025 casein, watercolor, ink and graphite on Arches
15-1/2 x 11 inches

THIS END UP DOWN
2025 casein, watercolor, ink and graphite on Arches
15-1/2 x 11 inches