Artists talk ‘Kaleidoscopia’ at The Dalles Art Center

Brielle Lefebvre

A lifelong maker, Lefebvre hails from the East Coast, where she attended Philadelphia’s recently shuttered University of the Arts. After testing the waters in Philly’s fine arts scene, she returned to school to study textile design. “I always had a love for patterns and wallpaper,” Lefebvre said. “Anything that was in my parents’ friends’ home that was really funky and repeated.”

Her attraction to fabrics birthed a 10-year stint in the fashion industry that gradually migrated westward across the United States, from making sleepwear for Ralph Lauren in New York, to Abercrombie & Fitch in Ohio, before landing in San Francisco, where she served as the textile designer at Levi’s. “That was the whole plan,” Lefebvre said. “[The work] was a vehicle to get me to where I wanted to be geographically.”

But San Francisco grew too expensive, prompting a major move to the remote, census-designated town of Klickitat, and later, Lyle. Here, Lefebvre started a freelance contracting business, Canyon House Textiles LLC, making art and fabric for clients.

This meandering post-grad period marked a hiatus from fine arts and painting, while creating “in a more corporate way,” she explained. “I was a little disenfranchised from it. I had put it away in a box, in a dark corner for a really long time.”

When the COVID-19 pandemic struck, Lefebvre grew existential in isolation, curious about our existence and where we come from. She and her two-year-old son would go on long walks to fill the time, collecting, organizing, and beautifying rocks. “I started studying them and getting more into the esoteric aspects of where they came from, their mineral compositions, and different patterns,” she said.

Craving a heightened sense of self, Lefebvre began to draw still life rocks — a spiritual practice, she explained, that unearthed a new version of herself and a return to creating artwork. “It was divine timing.”

Lefebvre’s numerous paintings on display at TDAC come in many shapes and sizes, portraying collages of both undefined and recognizable shapes — often rocks, plants, or fossils — with crisp edges and soft interiors. She used watercolors on raw canvas, first stretching the material to allow the paint to absorb into it. The piece, “Blom Rune,” for example, portrays an assemblage of leaves tinted with a gentle rainbow gradient.

Lebfebvre said her move to the Gorge, with its many interesting rock formations and stunning landscapes, inspired her to continue painting. “It’s everything,” she said. “Living here is the work.”

Jason Breeden

Breeden, meanwhile, said his journey into art took an opposite approach; he never really gave it much thought. “I didn’t really know what else to do,” he said. “It’s becoming internalized.”

The multi-talented artist grew up in Missouri and later studied film, photography, and painting at the San Francisco Art Institute. Alongside his creative partner, Sara Dyberg, who helped curate “Kaleidoscopia,” Breeden leads the experimental rock duo Susurrus Station. 

Besieged by advertisements as a child, he grew anti-commercial as a teenager, vowing never to work for a company. He started abstract drawing early on and allows natural improvisation to lead his creative approach, aiming to avoid repetition from piece to piece. “That's the fun part,” Breeden said. “If you try to control it, then there are no surprises.

His beautifully intricate mixed-media collages on display, including watercolors and pen drawings, possess less of a creative throughline than Lefebvre’s work, allowing spectators to develop their own interpretations. Each piece is its own, fragmenting system of brilliant colors and arrhythmic patterns to get lost in, born from random motion and flittering ideas. 

Breeden and Lefebvre met when they each lived in Klickitat and became good friends over time. “Kaleiodoscopia” was a collaborative concept, calling on the ever-changing, colorful patterns the optical instrument allows. 

The gallery will reset at the end of its six-week run on July 9. TDAC is located at 220 E 4th St, The Dalles. For more information, visit thedallesartcenter.org.