BOOKS & TALKS

Bronwen Dickey
7 p.m. Thursday, Powell's at Cedar Hills Crossing, FREE
Pit bulls: so beloved. So misunderstood. In her new book, Dickey chronicles Americans' complex relationship with the occasionally infamous breed.

Mark Kurlansky
7:30 p.m. Thursday, Powell's City of Books, FREE
The author of Salt and Cod—titles based on seemingly quotidian (but stupendously important) commodities—returns with Paper: Paging Through History.

MUSIC

Purity Ring
9 p.m. Friday, Roseland Theater, SOLD OUT
Canadian electro-pop duo Purity Ring synthesizes ethereal vocals with uptempo beats to produce a chilly, experimental sound, as showcased on 2015 sophomore album Another Eternity.

Titus Andronicus
9 p.m Friday, Revolution Hall
From a rock opera about manic depression to a concept album inspired by the Civil War, the fiery New Jersey punk band is one of the more ambitious—and occasionally exhausting—groups out there.

Chelsea Wolfe
8 p.m. Saturday, Revolution Hall
Like an ethereal folk musician gone goth-metalhead, this Los Angeleno mixes unexpected influences to sludgy, haunting effect.

Leon Bridges
8 p.m. Saturday, Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, SOLD OUT
Last summer at Pickathon, the tender Texan serenaded rapt fans in the tiny Galaxy Barn. Now he's sold out the Schnitz.

FILM

Prince Double Feature
5 and 7 p.m. Saturday, Doug Fir Lounge, FREE
All hail the Purple One. This Prince tribute honors the dearly departed pop star with free screenings of Under the Cherry Moon (5 p.m.) and Purple Rain (7 p.m.), followed by live music and karaoke.

THEATER

CLOSING Desdemona, a Play about a Handkerchief
7:30 p.m. Friday–Saturday, Post5 Theatre
Paula Vogel’s cheeky, feminist adaptation of Othello imagines Desdemona as a foul-mouthed aristocrat who spends her free time filling substitute shifts at a Cyprus brothel. 

CLOSING Jane Austen's Emma
7:30 p.m. Thursday–Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday, Venetian Theatre
Hillsboro’s Bag & Baggage celebrates the bicentenary of Austen’s classic portrait of genteel womanhood with a stage adaptation by British playwright Michael Fry.

The Udmurts
7:30 p.m. Thursday–Sunday, Defunkt Theatre
In a Portland premiere from David Zellnik, a castoff of religious fundamentalism meets a strange and vanishing culture in a Queens flat.

Francesca, Isabella & Margarita on a Cloud
7:30 p.m. Friday–Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday, Imago Theatre
In this original, semi-linear work, Imago’s Carol Triffle throws us into the weird and wobbly world of Bridget, a brilliant but adrift young woman. Expect surprises—Triffle’s work has a way of swinging from hallucinatory campiness to sinister absurdity.

SPECIAL EVENTS

Vanport Mosaic Festival
Various times and locations, Friday–Sunday
On May 30, 1948, what was once Oregon’s second-largest city was destroyed by a flood that displaced more than 18,000 residents, one-third of them black. A play about the city’s rise and fall, short documentaries on people who lived through the flood, a photo exhibit, an educational conference, and a reunion of Vanport’s former residents are all part of this weekend-long event memorializing a place whose existence and destruction had a direct impact on our state’s racial history. For more, read our festival preview.

VISUAL ARTS

Dene bāhī Naabaahii
10 a.m.–8 p.m. Thursday–Friday and 10 a.m.–5 p.m. Saturday–Sunday, Portland Art Museum
In this exhibition at PAM’s Center for Contemporary Native Art, Demian DinéYazhi’ (of the Diné tribe) and Kali Spitzer (Kaska Dena from Daylu on her father’s side and Jewish from Romania on her mother’s) present work that explores identity, gender, and sexuality. Their work crosses disciplines and probes themes of indigenous self-expression.

CLOSING Andrés Wertheim and Thomas Bilanges
12–5 p.m. Thursday–Sunday, Blue Sky Gallery, FREE
For The Museum’s Ghosts, Wertheim superimposed teens and tourists on Bruegels and Rembrandts; inVis-à-Vies, Bilanges pairs old portraits with modern doppelgangers.

CLOSING Eva Lake
10:30 a.m.–5:30 p.m. Thursday–Saturday, Augen Gallery, FREE
When Lake picked up a day job at a high-end clothing store, she also began to create a series called Fashion Items: paper collages and photomontages of beautiful garments floating before dramatic scenery, which the Portlander says reflects the romance and hype of the fashion world. 

CLOSING Laurie Danial and Matthew Dennison
10:30 a.m.–5:30 p.m. Thursday–Saturday, Froelick Gallery, FREE
In Making Home, painter and printmaker Danial draws from what she calls her obsession with Asian art, particularly Japanese prints. In Commensalism, Dennison’s boldly colored paintings depict symbiotic relationships between species.