Every now and then I organize beer drinking events for art galleries or art festivals. I would like to tell you about my most recent event, which took place at the Igloo Gallery in Portland, Oregon.

I believe that drinking good beer with someone else inspires great conversation and serves as a catalyst for developing relationships. I find that the conversation will often be centered on great beer and how what you are drinking at the moment compares to some other beer you drank last month. From this connection you can talk about many other things and a relationship can bloom over a pint or two. When I organize events around drinking beer I am mindful that it is a relationship building activity.

Last Sunday, I organized another one of these events, but this one had a few extra elements that added a nice touch to the event. This was part of a larger event series at the Igloo Gallery in Portland. Nearly 30 people showed up. This time, instead of drinking beer with friends, I invited my friends, and the public, to sample beers that I would pour for them. I hand-made serving trays that people could take home with them. The serving trays would hold two sampling glasses at the same time – a gesture I thought was symbolic of relationships between two people. So I paired beers based on who I was talking to, the nature of the conversation, as well as attempting to explore taste pallets.

The best part of the event, for me, was that I had put a large amount of energy and effort into building these serving trays that I was just going to give away for free. In other words, the product of my labor was an object that was designed to cultivate relationships, as opposed to my labor being used by some business to make more money for that business.
I received beer donations from Laurelwood, Deschutes, and Ninkasi and I picked up 10 extra Oregon beers from my favorite beer store, Belmont Station (they carry about 1200 beers). The wood I used from the trays was a black walnut and came from someone who harvests their wood up the Columbia Gorge. Zach, from buildsomethingtogether.com helped me to learn a 3D design program, pick out my wood, and he showed me how to use the tools in the woodshop that I needed. I will soon write more about buildsomethingtogether because it’s a wonderful utopian art project.