Believe it or not, Corvallis is home to a bustling art scene. Different community organizations host fairs, run galleries and community initiatives to spotlight all sorts of art — from landscape paintings to multimedia sculptures.

None, however, have the same unique style as Chris Adams. 

Adams is the creator and artist behind Sporelust, a local art and apparel brand that mixes punk culture with mycology, the study of fungi. 

“Since around 2015 90% of my artwork has revolved around a fusion of scientifically accurate mushroom drawings with my youthful inspirations from Skate-Punk art of the 90s & 60s comic art,” Adams said over email. 

Adams, who got a degree in architecture, originally only enjoyed doing art in his free time.

“I’ve always drawn. If you ask any of my parents, siblings, or whatever, they’ll say since I was three, that’s how I would spend most of my time,” Adams said. 

Adams said he would’ve liked to study art but didn’t have a role model to show him that it was a career option. It was not until much later that he realized he could make a living in the arts. The idea behind Sporelust was still in its germinal stages, though.

According to him, his brother introduced him to common edible mushrooms that grow in Oregon, such as the famous flaky chanterelles and bright-red lobsters, which started Adams’s interest in mycology. 

Oregon attracts a lot of mushroom hunters because of the climate. According to an article in Portland Monthly, the moist, wet forests are considered a sort of “fungal paradise” for mushroom foragers.  

“I got obsessed immediately,” Adams said. “My wife and I just started spending all of our time between late August and December out on the coast range picking mushrooms.” 

From there, foraging became increasingly prominent in Adams’s life. It wasn’t until years later that mushrooms began to appear in his artwork. 

Then came Sporelust.

“I had a moment where a lot of friends around me, who were smarter than me with business, were like, ‘If you really want to make a living as an artist you probably need to pick one thing and just pursue that for a while,’” Adams said. 

Adams’s choice to start focusing on mushrooms in his art was random, chosen from a list of things he was into. 

“Now, looking back, it seems so obvious because it’s this endless world of variation,” Adams said. 

After deciding on mushrooms, Adams created his first fungi series, which featured black and white mushrooms in a tarot card style.

Immediately after starting to sell mushroom-related pieces, such as shirts and stickers, Adams began to receive much more attention for his art and everything began to click. Since then, Adams has turned his art into a successful clothing brand, partnered with non-profits, and even had a brick-and-mortar pop-up in Seattle until 2023. 

Alongside selling his art, Adams goes throughout the United States to teach drawing workshops, spreading his self-learned knowledge of illustrating mushrooms to anyone interested. 

“It really feels like the only thing I get to take credit for is that I didn’t quit. … I wanted to do it and I kept doing it,” Adams said. 

To learn more about Sporelust you can go to their website at https://sporelust.com