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A person wanders through the Rainbow Cave, a cave made up of approximately 86,000 upcycled plastic bags, which is the number of bags used around the world in only five seconds. The bags are held in place by salvaged fishing nets, a material that underscores the importance of containment and references an important food source that plastics are contaminating.
Credit: Hopscotch Portland
From a “quantum trampoline” at Hopscotch Portland to a larger-than-life troll, get a taste of the region’s immersive art exhibits.
4 min read
Katrina Yentch
Katrina Yentch is a freelance journalist, editor, and copywriter living in Portland. When she isn’t writing, she’s either napping and cooking in the winter or paddling and backpacking during the summer.
Sustained entirely by our creative residents, Portland’s enthusiasm for visual arts excels even on the rainiest days. Massive hand-painted murals add splashes of color to the walls of industrial districts throughout Southeast Portland and downtown while art installations abound across our neighborhoods. Alongside this culture exists a brewing appreciation for immersive art experiences that send travelers on all-inclusive sensory journeys.
Hopscotch
Opened in 2023, Hopscotch is a theme park of immersive art exhibits that further enhances the city’s creative culture. Akin to art attractions like Meow Wolf and TeamLab, Hopscotch is a 23,000-square-foot (7,010 sq m) multi-room gallery in Southeast Portland’s Central Eastside. Upon entering, you can disconnect, relax and appreciate the team’s collection of stimulating visual, auditory and sensory pieces.
Credit: Hopscotch Portland
The Hopscotch experience begins the moment you step through the door. An ethereal soundtrack creates a calming atmosphere throughout the room’s hallways while several other musicians converge their music with light installations.
As a nod to Portland’s culinary spirit, a thoughtful menu of playful bites entices visitors to lounge in the welcome room before the adventure begins. Developed by Top Chef alumnus Sara Hauman, the menu features things like popcorn with rotating flavors, indulgent mac and cheeses and shakes topped with matcha drizzle or baklava. While the menu is great for the kiddos and kids at heart, adults can indulge too with a constantly changing array of cocktails inspired by Hopscotch’s various rooms.
Whether bouncing on the Quantum Trampoline — where video projections mirror your movements — or diving through the glow-in-the-dark ball pit, Hopscotch invites visitors of all ages to indulge their inner child without judgment. Introspective exhibits like Walls Within and the Rainbow Cave encourage viewers to think below the surface of the seemingly colorful, amusing arrangements; the latter consists of thousands of salvaged scrap plastic bags and fishing nets.
Mike Bennett’s Art Exhibits
Visual artist and “public joy creator” Mike Bennett’s cartoon wood cutouts brought light to Portland during the pandemic lockdown of 2020. At the time, Bennett’s front lawn décor delighted passersby walking through his Northeast Portland neighborhood. His whimsical “Bennett Buddies” received so much attention that he built scavenger hunts around them, inviting locals on pandemic-safe adventures to search for the cartoon wildlife creatures throughout Portland. To this day, the city commemorates these animals; visitors will spot plenty of the cutouts on front lawns across the city, urging drivers to “slow down” and appreciate life.
Bennett’s universe of whimsical creatures has since expanded to include Wonderwood Springs and Wonderwood Mini Golf, located in a former bank in St. Johns. Elevate your putt-putt game with nine mini golf holes amid original art and hand-painted creatures. After a visit to the golf course, a treat at the Wonderwood Springs café is in order.
The café is an ode to all things fantasy, where folks can enjoy seasonal “elixirs” like the Marshmallow Ember Mocha (chocolate, toasted marshmallow, whipped cream) and the Royal Ransom Cold Brew (lavender, honey, cold foam). Find family-friendly eats, including hotdogs, breakfast burritos, burgers and fries and more. Fittingly, their regular free tabletop board game nights welcome players to immerse themselves in the fantastical environment where Bennett’s cutouts decorate nearly every corner of the café.
PAM/CUT Tomorrow Theater
Opened in 2023, the Tomorrow Theater is the Portland Art Museum’s expansion of its scope beyond solely short and feature films to include multimedia arts such as virtual reality and artificial intelligence. At the fully renovated theater, visitors can enjoy interactive film screenings and multimedia art experiences. Check the events calendar to see what’s playing (and playable).
Giant Troll at Nordic Northwest
Nordic Northwest is a nonprofit center for the appreciation of all things Scandinavian. Within its spacious, lush Southwest Portland quarters stands a towering troll completely fashioned from recycled materials. Scavengers have scoured the globe via Troll Map to find artist Thomas Dambo’s larger-than-life sculptures, patrolling the forests of China and the islands of the Caribbean. Now, one of these, dubbed Ole Bolle, can be found just 9 miles (14.5 km) southwest of downtown Portland.
The Portland troll is easily accessible at the center, where visitors can learn more about the construction of Ole Bolle by following the interactive hunt detailed on the Adventure Lab geocaching app. Several events also accompany the troll’s indefinite stay at Nordic Northwest. Troll Trouble invites kids on a cartoon-making adventure through the center, while outdoor screenings feature troll-related flicks. While at Nordic Northwest, you can immerse yourself in Scandinavian culture, dining at Broder Söder, shopping at Nordic Finn Ware and exploring the on-site museum.
Fun and Weird Museums
From the weird to the wonderful, Portland’s specialty museums offer a wide range of exhibits, from educational displays to curious collections and even exhibitions devoted to alternate universes.
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