iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 2h

What an amazing night at my @portlandartmuseum.bsky.social PAM CUT show, talking about my book and curating a night of shorts and archival footage for a full house of people. So grateful!

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

From what I can tell, our cats seem to look alike.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

Now playing, a Miles Davis album that Id like to see become better known.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

Join me this Thursday! At the @portlandartmuseum.bsky.social's PAM CUT Tomorrow Theater, I will be hosting an evening of short films and selections from the Oregon Historical Society archives, including a 1970s student film featuring Matt Groening, an ode to Portland's Lovejoy Columns, and more.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

I really enjoyed the movie Rose of Nevada last night: the saturated 16mm film stock and unsynchronized sound, the inexplicable time-travel narrative, the Cornwall setting. And I love that director Mark Jenkin shot, wrote, edited and did the sound design. I’ll be contemplating this movie for a while.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Portland friends, come see me this Friday afternoon! From 12-4pm, I will be at the Weedman Design Partners gallery (1905 NW 23rd Place), signing books and generally hanging out. My exhibit of photos remains on view there through October.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

My book received an incredible two-page spread in the print version of The Oregonian today. Pretty cool!

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Watching Satyajit Ray’s The Hero tonight I paused the film several times to photograph the screen. Great cinematography.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Returned to the Unseen Portland exhibit this morning for a second look at unrealized projects I’m writing about for my next architecture column.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

I love this 1903 design for what was known as the Spiral Elevator, designed Daniel E. Condon for Portland's Lewis & Clark Centennial Exposition. At 180 feet, it would have been taller than any present-day local building. Alas, it went unbuilt. (As seen in the current exhibit "Unseen Portland.")

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

A return visit with one of my favorite album purchases of recent years.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Sometimes I still marvel that this beauty (a German shepherd coyote mix) was my childhood dog.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

I don't normally like posting (or looking at) photos of myself, but Powell's Books just sent me this pic from Tuesday's reading and conversation, and it was such an extraordinary night — standing room only and a sellout of books — that I'm happy to share.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

WHAT A NIGHT! We had standing room only at @powells.bsky.social and they ran out of copies with 20 people in line. I'm gobsmacked and grateful. Thank you so much to everyone for coming!

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Appearing on the Hello Rose City TV show this morning. Thank you KGW and host Lacey Evans!

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

You know it's a weird day when you do two different local TV news interviews in the morning and afternoon. Thank you KATU (that's channel 2 on your dial) and KOIN (channel 6)! Tomorrow I'm going for the hat trick (of ABC, CBS and NBC affiliates) with KGW.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

Thanks so much to everyone who came to my gallery show opening yesterday! What a wonderful time. Huge thanks to Weedman Design Partners.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

I love that I’m actually getting social media ads this week for the show I’m curating, using my own photo. It’s pretty trippy seeing a shot you took in an Instagram ad.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

My photographer-friend Patrick Smith, who has a side business digitizing others' archives, often from estates of deceased photographers, recently posted a cool series of late eighties/early nineties Portland shots by an unknown artist. I like these, and am curious to see if I can learn more.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Just finished my second Iris Murdoch novel (after The Bell — superb) and was ultimately quite moved. There was a moment midway when I briefly lost faith as it became almost over-the-top farcical. But by novel’s end I was hooked again. A profound exploration of mortality, hubris, regret and love.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

Fun little milestone: Although my book officially comes out on September 15, I just sold the first copy from my private supply. It begins!

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

This shot of our beloved Ruthie (2003-2020) popped up on Facebook this morning, and I got a kick out of a comment at the time from my sister-in-law: "Cat Mona Lisa!"

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

I can’t think of any other albums in my collection that I associate so strongly, and so resonantly, with a time and place.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

Returning again this evening to my favorite jazz album. I actually have its first track stipulated in my will as my funeral song, although to say that may be more dour than I intend here. It’s really such a magnificently JOYFUL record.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

Jenny joins the Caturday parade.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

The kitchen-table view from a cabin at Cape Meares, Oregon I've loved staying at. @valarie.bsky.social and I might go back there next summer, and when I randomly saw this photo today, I smiled.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Just finished The Bell by Iris Murdoch and really enjoyed it. Decided I was overdue to read a novel after several film and jazz books and some Ross Macdonald rereads. It’s a fun multi-character narrative about seeking spiritual and romantic equilibrium, and likely not from traditionalist sources.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

I just randomly thought about the red early-seventies Opel GT my dad owned when I was a little kid. One of my earliest memories is him opening and closing the eyelid-like operable headlights as a parting goodbye as he drove to work. The guy was cool back then.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

After seeing many top-100 movie lists yesterday, I started making notes for my own. But at a certain point it becomes hard to quantify, and difficult to weigh movies I've loved recently against ones I loved decades ago. That said, the top slot remains an easy call.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

I had to pause one of my favorite Columbo reruns (“Now You See Him” with Jack Cassidy as The Great Santini) to take these three shots of actor Thayer David in the episode’s best cameo.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

This is fun: I'm curating a night of Portland films at PAM CUT's Tomorrow Theater (aka @portlandartmuseum.bsky.social) on October 8. The night includes 1930-40s home movies, 1990s experimental films, and 1970s TV news bloopers, all tied to the release of my book, In Search of Portland.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

I was reviewing movies for a local newspaper when it came out, and wound up naming it my top movie of that year.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

I'm working on an architectural column lamenting not just the August 2 fire that destroyed Portland's historic Centennial Mills, but the city's quarter-century-long demolition by neglect. Below is an illustration of the structure by Nicolai Kruger, from my upcoming book In Search of Portland.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

Jenny wishes a happy International Cat Day to all who celebrate.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

The wide shot in the post below occurs right before my all-time favorite moment in Columbo, and its most cinematic: the reflections in Robert Culp's eyeglasses show in flash-forward montage how he will dispose of the body of the woman he has just killed.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 01/08/2026

Peek-a-boo from Jenny’s activity tent.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

On my last Portland Art Museum visit, a handful of works caused me to linger for long stretches of time: paintings by Rothko and Cezanne, as well as photographs by Carleton Watkins. This 1867 shot of the Columbia River, from the Oregon Historical Society archive, is called “Passage of the Dalles.”

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 30/07/2026

It’s happening! The author copies of my book were delivered yesterday. So excited! A moment nine years in the making.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

I also love 1985’s La Vida Breve and 1990’s Field of Silence.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

Two more favorites, 1969’s Mandala #1 and 1965’s Vivian.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

I’ve been working for weeks on a long article about painter Mary Henry, the subject of a Portland Art Museum retrospective. Her geometric abstractions are so great! A local collector just sent me images of these two paintings he owns, 1997’s Lament for Icarus and 1995’s Gavotte or What.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

It was three years ago yesterday that @saralibby.bsky.social and I attended the world track & field championships in Eugene, getting to see early heats involving greats like Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone and Noah Lyles, plus the men's 1500 final. Such a cool memory, and a great 50th birthday present.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

Any Cibo Matto fans left out there? I revisited this second album on a recent car trip and since then have been replaying it often. Always a bit surprised that I reach for this over their debut, produced by the great Mitchell Froom and also excellent. But Stereo Type A just has a fun bounce to it.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

The price of my Oregonian subscription is going up, but at least there is some great journa…

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

I think I will have read this book in two sittings. And I can’t wait to watch this stone-cold masterpiece of a movie again. I can already hear the rhythm of Lee Marvin’s determined, angry footsteps as he marches down the hallway.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 08/07/2026

I love this photo (encountered for the first time today) of 1890s Portland. That's the swing-style Madison Street Bridge (later replaced by the Hawthorne Bridge) and the Willamette River.

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Brian Libby @brianlibby.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

A time-lapse from the final evening of last week's vacation, at our favorite cabin.

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