by Christina Williams
February 5th 2021
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Portland Artist Mike Bennett and the Unipiper, Brian Kidd, fire up the PSU Toon Tour.
Portland State University officially launched its self-guided tour of campus this month featuring 24 life-size cartoon cutouts scattered across campus in a delightful treasure hunt.
The art along the PSU Toon Tour is the work of a local artist, Mike Bennett, who works tirelessly to keep Portland neighborhoods vibrant and entertaining.
The final piece of the Toon Tour — a cutout of Portland’s most famous unicycling bagpiper, the Portland Unipiper — was installed in a special, socially distant event on campus. The art piece was delivered especially by the Unipiper himself, Portlander Brian Kidd.
"Every single piece has a fun little backstory based on Oregon, Portland, or specifically Portland State. They’re all a lot of fun,” said artist Mike Bennett. In addition to the Unipiper piece, Bennett said he’s parietal to the Hazelnut character, installed at the 5th Avenue Cinema building.
The Unipiper cutout will reside near an entrance to the Karl Miller Center, home of the PSU School of Business.
The Toon Tour is designed to reinvigorate Portland State’s corner of downtown Portland with a self-guided tour of the beautiful downtown campus.
Each character on the PSU Toon Tour, visible from outside, has a special connection to Portland and the tour shares information about the building in which they’re located.
The PSU Toon Tour is for anyone interested in Portland State, from the Portland area, or visiting Portland, to get to know our amazing downtown campus in a safe, socially distant way.
Visitors are encouraged to get out their phones and share photos using #psutoontour and be sure to tag @portlandstate, @go2psu, and @mikebennettart. For more information visit http://admissions.pdx.edu/tour.
When the tour concludes in June, the art pieces will be sold at auction with the proceeds going to support student scholarships.