<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418039/ctrqml6fnzvcqendmh7c.gif"><figcaption>Haley Scott, AKA @sugarmilkk</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;By SARAH ADLERLee Godie sold her work on the steps of the Art Institute.A self–taught artist, she insisted her work was better than Cezanne’s. But, it was the late ‘60s, decades before the advent of the Internet, and nearly half a century before Instagram would commandeer the public conscience. In terms of self-promotion, well, the steps of the Art Institute would have to do.Although the internet has revolutionized everything – how we connect with one another, how we look at art, even how we create art, a simple fact remains the same: artists who are starting out, and those without traditional gallery representation, must be their own best advocate. Independent artists are tasked with a critical step after making their work: how to effectively share their art with a wide and engaged audience. Self–promotion can now be created and distributed, for the most part, digitially, originating entirely from the privacy of home or the studio, rather than out on the steps of a major institution. And many of the digital channels available are also, in large part, free.I spoke with two artists without gallery representation on how they self-promote, and in particular, how they use the omnipresent social media application Instagram to do so. I also looked at greater trends in how artists feel about the controversial platform: does its universality and the algorithm of instant gratification ultimately undermine the art, even while bolstering the reach of one’s portfolio? I also wondered, what happens to galleries in the midst of all these great changes?•Haley Scott is a Chicago-based photographer who, on Instagram, goes by the sweetly enticing handle, <a href="https://www.instagram.com/sugarmilkk/?hl=en">@sugarmilkk</a>. With more than 6,700 followers, a bio that proudly claims, “DETROIT MADE * CHICAGO BASED,” punctuated by the link to her professional website, Scott’s feed is a melange of photos united by rich hues as well as a sense of something intimate: there are close-up action shots of limber basketball players contorted into yoga-like positions, friends posing in moody lighting, and selfies of the artist herself modeling her own heavily tattooed arms. In many ways, Scott’s Instagram serves as both an ode to her work as well a window into her own identity.“I know for a fact that whatever my brain is twisted up in makes me see colors differently,” she says, speaking of both her work as well as her personal Instagram. Last summer, a swath of luscious pinks and purples dominated her images; by December she favored rich blues and darker tones.This kind of casual, light relationship to Instagram&nbsp;seems to be the exception amongst many artists today, at least according to several popular articles. <a href="https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/zn8ezy/how-instagram-is-changing-the-art-world">A 2016 piece in Vice</a>&nbsp;by the artist Brad Phillips claimed nearly the exact opposite with its doomsday title, “How Instagram is changing the art world” and subheader, “The app has made me more successful than ever, but at the expense of my own art.”Written in the tone of an artist who is self-consciously biting the hand that has (literally) fed him luxurious six-course meals, Phillips acknowledges the ways in which his own presence on Instagram&nbsp;has dramatically boosted his art practice. Amongst his professional entrees, solo gallery shows and a book deal. His long list of drawbacks, however, underscores a kind of insidious aspect of the social media platform: that it sets up a system of instant gratification, it deletes any merit of privacy or creating work for oneself, and it can arbitrarily choose content to censor (if it transgresses vague community guidelines). In many ways, his criticisms aren’t too different from that of a regular (read: non-artist) user of the application.“The app has been both an amazing and horrible tool for me, as well as other artists,” Phillips proclaims.His frustration at the outwardly capricious nature of Instagram’s algorithms is mirrored by Hailey Losselyong, another Chicago-based artist who goes under the handle <a href="https://www.instagram.com/hai_ey/?hl=en">@hai_ey</a>. Referencing the coveted ability to post active links in one’s Instagram ‘Story’ – a feature that, oddly, is only available to some, seemingly due to a high number of followers or some other account verification (another process with secret guidelines) – Losselyong says, “I think it’s strange that not everyone has access to all the app’s features.”<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418040/iojutaegi7evkbf5g5uq.png"></figure>&nbsp;Despite her grievances with Instagram’s selectiveness, Losselyong warns that it is easy to hate on Instagram, when, in fact, it is also an incredible marketing tool, especially for artists who aren’t represented by galleries, or who do not employ or have access to a public relations team. Instagram, which is projected to surpass 111 million users&nbsp;in 2019, can serve as a very effective form of advertising. “It’s kind of a place to do a less refined version of a portfolio,” she says.Like Scott, Losselyong does not shy away from the selfie. Her intricate, stylized drawings, characterized by fluid and looping lines, are followed up by equally glamorous images of the artist posing, making her feed a kind of ode to not just the art but the life of an artist: subversive, creative, edgy. In one image she sports a head of bleached white-blue and purple hair, using only a blue emoji as the caption. It isn’t a historically typical artist’s portfolio.The effect of Instagram on art spreads beyond the individual artist. When it comes to galleries, Instagram has also introduced radical change. A <a href="https://news.artnet.com/market/emerging-art-dealers-dealing-gallery-crisis-asked-dozen-nada-1414870">2018 Artnet.com article</a>&nbsp;by Julia Halperin and Tim Schneider describes the phenomenon as an “Instagram takeover.” Gallerists acknowledge that they have discovered artists and evaluated images of art by using the app. Some also claim collectors pay more attention to a gallery’s Instagram posts than their email blasts (which, it’s worth noting, mostly replaced mailed announcements). Halperin and Schneider write, “By providing an unmediated, simple, and ever-present line of communication with collectors, Instagram has allowed the gallery to propel conversations begun with collectors at fairs into finalized sales back at the gallery at a later date…”Like other social media tools, Instagram offers for galleries –&nbsp;which, are in simple terms, small businesses –&nbsp; access to free marketing and publicity. While algorithms may interfere with this in ways that wouldn’t happen in a magazine, per se, much can be said about the fact that not only is the content free, but it’s accessible to everyone. Instagram can ideally be a space to expose contemporary art to anyone who wants to engage with it, regardless of their ability to visit museums or frequent galleries.Instagram, therefore, remains in a kind of polarized space. In many ways, the continual pressure the platform fosters – to create work and then promote perfect images of it – both helps and hurts artists. This modern means of sharing, beyond the steps of a museum, can also create great anxiety while pursuing independence, encouraging a singular quest for likes. According to Scott though, sharing her art on social media doesn’t change the fact that she has never done her work for anyone else. “It’s just the Aquarius rebel in me.”<a href="https://www.instagram.com/chigallerynews/">@ChiGalleryNews</a> follows many artists and galleries. Below are a few that have notable followings and frequently high post likes.<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418041/fiscikszk8hqatlavkpr.gif"><figcaption>From left: <a href="https://www.instagram.com/verticalgallery/?hl=en">@verticalgallery</a> – post likes: 755 • 33.9K followers; <a href="https://www.instagram.com/huntslonem/?hl=en">@huntslonem</a> – post likes: 1,183 • 107K followers; <a href="https://www.instagram.com/sarahraskeyfineart/">@sarahraskeyfineart</a> – post likes: 466 • 29.9K followers; <a href="https://www.instagram.com/yvettemayorga/?hl=en">@yvettemayorga</a> – post likes: 358 • 4,434K followers &nbsp;</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;&nbsp;</body></html>

#INSTAArt: Instagram's Independent Art Connections

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417563/isqrm1gy4fjpynwira7m.jpg"></figure>By GINNY VAN ALYEAAs of Monday, May 20 Chicago has a new mayor, in case you haven't heard. Lori Lightfoot was sworn in yesterday as the 56th mayor of Chicago, becoming the first African American woman and the first openly LGBTQ person to hold the office. We also heard that her physical office is now home to some personally chosen works of art, including a last-minute loan from the <a href="https://smartmuseum.uchicago.edu/">Smart Museum of Art</a>&nbsp;at the University of Chicago, as reported by <a href="https://news.artnet.com/art-world/amanda-williams-lori-lightfoot-mayors-office-1552828">artnet.com</a>A&nbsp;work by Amanda Williams, commissioned by the Smart Museum, that was part of the just closed <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/solidary-solitary-the-joyner-giuffrida-collection">Solidary &amp; Solitary: The Joyner/Giuffrida Collection</a>, drew Lightfoot's notice. A call was made, and the the piece was delivered to the newest chief occupant of City Hall.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417564/baozlcdrng0eapnzlvrw.jpg"><figcaption>Amanda Williams. Photo by Jean Lachat, courtesy of the Smart Museum of Art. &nbsp;</figcaption></figure>Beyond what's on her walls, it's worth noting that Lightfoot was the only one of the 14 mayoral candidates this year who made support for the arts officially part of her platform. Now that Lightfoot is in office, the mayor has shared a list of 31 people who are part of just her <a href="https://bettertogetherchicago.com/transition-team/">Arts and Culture committee</a> – from artists like Theaster Gates and Amanda Williams, to nonprofit arts leaders like Esther Grimm (3Arts), Hector Duarte (Chicago Public Art Group) and Nick Cave (SAIC).&nbsp;Lightfoot benefits on day one (and two) from the fact that everything is ahead of her, and nothing has yet gone wrong, as it surely will in a city of Chicago's size and with a city like Chicago's problems and obstacles. For now, we look to her proposed road map, where she emphasizes, "Real transformation will occur only when Chicagoans believe that their government works for them and their communities, responding to their needs and concerns."&nbsp;It's clear the mayor's office hopes to foster change by using the arts as a prime vehicle for localized as well as general progress in Chicago. In a time where funds are not only scarce but already overextended elsewhere, the transition team's statement about Arts and Culture says, "Artistic power is fundamental to reimagining the creative, innovative, and cultural roots of good governance. The new administration can demonstrate transparency and accountability by dedicating funding up front to arts and culture that is competitive with other global cities, in a clear and open manner, while addressing regulations that unfairly impact certain artist and particular neighborhoods. Our youth should be empowered and emboldened to light the way forward."There is no doubt that, well-funded or not, one of the biggest tourist draws in Chicago is our vibrant cultural scene that includes not only public art but also theater, music, performing arts, and more. The arts are serious job and business generators. In a state with a threadbare economy, our arts are valuable assets that benefit many individuals as well as groups.&nbsp;Some recent figures from the <a href="http://www.artsalliance.org/advocacy/resources/talking-points#2">Illinois Arts Alliance</a>:<ul><li>In Illinois, there are nearly 34,000 creative enterprises -- both nonprofit and commercial -- that employ over 140,000 people. These enterprises are essential to the state's economy: they put people to work, buy from local businesses, generate government revenue, and are a cornerstone of tourism and economic development.</li><li>In Chicago, the nonprofit arts alone are a $2.2 billion industry that supports over 60,000 full-time-equivalent jobs, generates a total of $1.3 billion in household income to local residents, and delivers more than $200 million in local and state government revenue.</li><li>The arts attract tourists to Illinois. There are over 100 million Americans who include the arts along with historic sites, cultural events, and ethnic festivals in their trips each year.</li><li>In Chicago, cultural tourists tend to stay longer and spend two-and-a-half times more money in relation to arts and cultural events than Chicago residents.</li><li>The arts are a magnet for talent and investments. They attract companies that want to offer their employees and clients a creative climate and a vibrant, livable community.</li></ul>So while Mayor Lightfoot has an uphill battle ahead of her, with many more critical topics and fields other than the arts, it's encouraging that her office is officially recognizing the role the arts can play in a healthy economy as well as in vibrant neighborhoods far from downtown. The arts can help the mayor reach, and lift up, the residents in all 77+ Chicago neighborhoods. &nbsp;&nbsp;Earlier this year when the first part of the election was underway, candidate Lightfoot joined with a group of local artists at City Hall and announced a <a href="https://lightfootforchicago.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/LL-Position-paper_ArtCulture.pdf">policy</a> to advance arts and culture in Chicago.&nbsp;Her policy proclaimed, "The arts are powerful. Now more than ever, it is essential that we lift up and invest in our unparalleled Chicago artists. A robust Chicago arts community inspires us, engages us, questions the status quo and has the power to bring our diverse city together in conversation around the critical challenges of our day..."Lightfoot’s plan to advance arts and culture includes the following:<ul><li>Prioritize funding for the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events for increased equitable grantmaking and microfinancing to individual artists, arts organizations and arts corridors.</li><li>Audit and streamline city licensing and permitting regulations, including the Public Performance and Amusement license.</li><li>Develop an Artist-in-Residence program to build job opportunities for artists and mentorship opportunities for young people.</li><li>Bring together ideas and resources from the city, philanthropy, culture and the arts to develop policies and strategies to keep artists living and working in Chicago.</li><li>Build investment in Chicago’s public art program by overhauling the Percent for Art ordinance.</li><li>Enhance the voices of socially-active artists to encourage civic engagement and support developing creative conversations and solutions to our city’s biggest challenges.</li></ul>The arts must be supported and fostered, and they also must be promoted so that more people who live here are aware of what they contribute.&nbsp;In 1986 Mayor Harold Washington's administration developed the original Cultural Plan for Chicago, and it was borne out of a two-year, citywide effort to analyze the City's cultural needs and opportunities and to act on them. Mayor Washington died in office the following year.<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417565/z8qufefgykufhpzyqxt5.jpg"><figcaption>Mayor Harold Washington, whose administration created the original Cultural Plan for Chicago.</figcaption></figure>The City of Chicago and cultural community members came together in 1995 to revise the plan. And Mayor Rahm Emanuel's administration again revisited the plan in 2012 after he first arrived in office, launching the Chicago Cultural Plan 2012. The Year of Public Art in 2017 was also spearheaded by the Department Cultural Affairs and Special Events (DCASE) and Commissioner Mark Kelly, followed by the year of Creative Youth in 2018.&nbsp;The arts have not been neglected in the past, but for those who actively rely on and are connected to the current cultural community in Chicago, there is always much at stake with a new mayor in office and many have applauded Mayor Lightfoot's regular and public statements on behalf of the arts.&nbsp;When asked about the significance of loaning the work by Amanda Williams to the Mayor for her office on the day of her inauguration, Smart Museum of Art Director Allison Gass told artnet.com, “Chicago is a city full of hope about shifting histories and moving toward equity, and the fact that the new mayor wanted a work of art about that says a lot,” Gass added. “We believe in the power of art to help shift perspectives, and hopefully the map in the office will help do that.”<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417566/lva4go7idyk0usbmzfsh.png"><figcaption>Additional works by area artists have already made it onto the walls in City Hall. Artist Dan Devening shared, via Instagram @devening_projects, that his work (shown behind Lightfoot's head), Negative, from 1989, is installed, along with works by Tony Fitzpatrick, Dawoud Bey, David Klamen, and others.&nbsp;</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;As stated in Lightfoot's ambitiously worded arts policy from February 2019, "Arts and culture are as essential as clean air and water. They sustain us, create joy, unleash our radical imaginations, and challenge us to see the world in new and better ways. They unite us while recognizing differences and defining our common humanity."&nbsp;What happens next will be key.&nbsp;</body></html>

A New Mayor's Welcome Embrace of the Arts in Chicago

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417520/uix5vltyjdipmgs8qmoz.gif"><figcaption>Lee and vicki caught the art bug in the 1980s when they needed something to go above their sofa. Today they have art over every piece of furniture and on every wall, including works by Roger Brown, Ed Paschke, Andy Warhol, Hollis Sigler, Morgan Blair and Cindy Sherman</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;By GINNY VAN ALYEAOne late February morning I found myself driving to a sleepy part of Chicago and realized how much it would be transformed soon, once baseball season started in a few weeks. I was on my way to visit collectors Lee Wesley and Vicki Granacki, where the classic graystone exterior of the couple’s Wrigleyville home similarly revealed no hint as to the creative energy that I would soon discover inside.I’d never met Vicki or Lee, but as soon as they welcomed me in, they seemed somehow familiar. Their home is first and foremost a place to live – as comfortable for the couple as well as the volume of art it contains. The antithesis of a stark white or glass cube, all angles and sharp edges, it’s distinctly old Chicago, framed inside by warm wood trim, lots of doorways and natural light. That this historic residence houses so much locally significant contemporary art makes perfect sense when I learn that Vicki runs a Chicago-based historic preservation firm, Granacki Historic Consultants, and she serves on the Emeritus Board of Landmarks Illinois and the Board of Directors of the Polish Museum of America. Lee is President of the Dr. Newton K. Wesley foundation Fund, continuing the legacy of his father’s pioneering work in contact lenses.A minute after passing through the front door and taking off my coat, I was sitting on the sofa, which is essentially where the couple’s art collecting journey began.&nbsp;It all started in the 1980s in a practical way, when the couple needed something to hang over their couch, which happened to be pink and velvet brocade. The pair had bought this distinctive piece of furniture in London at Harrod’s, the famous department store, and they had it shipped home to Chicago after their honeymoon.<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417521/nk6hdrcyl2ctgoiekdvp.gif"><figcaption>Vicki still has a photo of the sofa that launched an art collection, pictured here with the couple's first purchase: Gladys Nilsson's Duplicate and Triplicate.</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;Vicki and Lee had long been interested in the Hairy Who –&nbsp; an artistic group formed in Chicago in the 1960s by graduates of the School of the Art Institute. Vicki says, “When our son was just over a year old we started hanging out in Chicago’s River North galleries on Saturday mornings. Our first purchase, in 1981 from Phyllis Kind Gallery, was a pinkish pastel watercolor, Duplicate and Triplicate by Gladys Nilsson, a member of the Hairy Who, whose mice-like figures could hold their own against our flowered suite.”More than 38 years and over 125 works of art later they’ve had plenty of time to carefully build a significant collection that includes other Hairy Who members and associates, such as Ray Yoshida, Don Baum, Jim Nutt, Karl Wirsum, and Suellen Rocca. In addition, the collection includes pieces by Imagists such as Ed Paschke and Roger Brown, and Monster Roster member Seymour Rosofsky, not to mention dozens of other contemporary figurative artists – Phyllis Bramson, Joanne Carson, Robert Lostutter, Jim Lutes, and Hollis Sigler – who followed in their creative footsteps. To wander through Vicki and Lee’s home is to understand that their pursuit of art is serious and unending. Together they each have an eye for what may stand the test of time and trends.Vicki’s childhood was filled with art, in part because her father was a commercial as well as amateur artist – many of his personal watercolor landscapes are hung throughout the house. Similarly, Lee was inspired by his father, whose creativity saved himself from blindness when he invented the first commercially successful contact lens. Lee’s own research team extended that tradition with development of the soft lens. Once Vicki and Lee became parents, they worked to make art a part of their children’s lives through hands-on art projects for each developmental stage, until adulthood. Among the many works of art hung on the walls of their home, several by their son and daughter fit in nicely alongside pieces by famous artists.•<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417522/dqrgo3hmzzwslthiw3lw.gif"><figcaption>An eclectic mixture of two and three dimensional work from a range of periods is placed throughout Vicki and Lee’s main living areas. Featured here: &nbsp;two works by Phyllis Bramson: A Gender Bending Melodrama,&nbsp;(above the piano) and Lovemaking at the End of Springtime (female) (on pedestal), Yinka Shonibare’s Toy Painting 10, 2003 (above center), and Joanne Carson’s The Rope Trick Serenade (above sofa)</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;It’s not uncommmon for collectors, who may have been actively buying art for decades, to reach a natural stopping point. Vicki and Lee are not at that juncture. When we met just before March, they were preparing to head to New York to attend the spring art fairs, as they have for years. An important part of collecting for them is to continue to discover and support living artists.Lee shared a story of when they were last at The Art Show in 2017, organized by the Art Dealers Association of America (ADAA) at the Park Avenue Armory. It was there that they encountered the powerful works of artist Nathaniel Mary Quinn, who happened to grow up in Chicago and was exhibiting with David Nolan Gallery. When the couple met the artist in the booth, they hit it off. As Lee remembers, “We just enjoyed being around him. And he has an incredible story to tell.” Lee recalled a backstory about Quinn, that after his mother Mary had died, he returned home from boarding school to the public housing apartment in Chicago where his family lived and found it empty. They had moved out while he was gone.According to Lee, “We didn’t buy a work in New York, but later we visited Rhona Hoffman Gallery here [in Chicago] for a show of Quinn’s work and when we walked in and saw each other, it was like we were old friends. When we told him we had not been able to get a work of his yet, he said he wanted us to have a cherished portrait of his mother that was hanging in the gallery.”Quinn’s narrative-driven portraits occupy a unique place on the art history timeline of Vicki and Lee’s collection, but they are also representative of the pair’s focus on contemporary figurative work that is rooted in Chicago’s artistic tradition.<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417523/nx7amemy4mvymh6fdtbk.gif"><figcaption>Figurative paintings dominate Vicki and Lee’s collection. Highlights, often prime examples from an artist, span styles and decades and often reference art history. Pictured from left to right: Nathaniel Mary Quinn, Bring Yo Big Teeth Ass Here!, 2017; Jim Lutes, Dr. E. Victor (detail), 1989; Fabrizio Arrieta, 1947 (detail), 2018</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;The abundance of faces and figures throughout the couple’s home imbues each room with an energy that seems to come from not only on but also within the walls. Even in quiet moments, instead of solitude, it feels like action is happening somewhere; the collective energy made evident through color, complex narratives and examinations inspires a kind of continuous search for artistic themes and messages.Explains Vicki, “Although our Chicago collection is the strongest and most coherent, we’ve taken side trips into realism and pop art. Besides painting and drawing, there are sculptures and photography in the mix. But above all the theme remains figuration, from the real and recognizable to the stylized, illustrative, and even truly weird.”Lee adds that figurative art speaks volumes about that inspired spark found both in technology and art where human beings continually reinvent themselves.&nbsp;•Vicki and Lee frequent galleries, but as they strive to add to their collection they enjoy the hunt for rarer pieces, which are sometimes acquired at auction. The couple has maintained their interest in the Hairy Who ever since they first began buying art, but renewed interest nationally, most notably when the Art Institute of Chicago hosted an exhibition of the Hairy Who’s work in 2018, means increased competition for anything related to shows that took place during the 1960s. Yet sitting on a glass coffee table in the living room, next to a Don Baum house with a cutting board for a foundation, are the newest additions to the couple’s collection, won just last year at Leslie Hindman Auctioneers: a pair of comic books, and a flyer, published to accompany the first Hairy Who exhibitions held between 1966 and 1968, illustrated and autographed by member artist Karl Wirsum. There is also a cloth covered catalog, Who Chicago? An exhibition of contemporary Imagists, published in 1980 and packaged with an etching by Jim Nutt.Looking at this table filled with precious, temptingly touchable pieces of history and works of art, I asked if they had brought these objects out for me, or if they’re regularly so accessible. Vicki says, referring to their young grandchildren, who live locally and come over often, “We leave these out and encourage our grandchildren to touch the art. These are things they enjoy.”&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417525/a1lpiosfots6rohhpbcw.gif"><figcaption>Art in Vicki and Lee’s home is not off limits to anyone, even their grandchildren. Shown here: Hairy Who comic books signed by Karl Wirsum, one of Don Baum’s constructed houses, Kiki van Patton, 1988, and Keith Haring dominos and playing cards.</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;Despite having actively collected for so long Vicki and Lee have kept their passion mostly to themselves. Their daughter, Monica, married a man also passionate about art, and he has encouraged them to enjoy their collection through sharing it. The most significant step so far towards celebrating the assembling of these 125 plus works may is a private project to catalog each piece, noting relevant details on each work – artist, title, date, dimensions, acquisiton and so on – as well as artistic groupings. The resulting booklet, which continues to be updated and is sometimes brought along to art fairs and galleries, provides a tidy, personal summary of the works that comprise this unique collection.Before I ended my morning on the Northside, Vicki took me into one last room upstairs in their home, where, tucked away were items not officially part of the couple’s collection: watercolors, maps, and journals created by Vicki’s father, Leon Granacki, during his four years spent serving in the US Army 132nd Infantry Regiment in the South Pacific during WWII, from 1941–1945. Explains Vicki, “He rose from private to Master Sergeant, and while attached to the G-2 Intelligence Section, prepared original maps and target photos used by both ground and air troops.” Today she’s using her professional experience in historic preservation to capture and save what’s so beautiful and important about her father’s work. She says, “His small but historic contribution was to a cause larger than himself.”&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417526/mdsnot3sio3p7y2dxyhs.gif"><figcaption>One of the maps created by Vicki's father Leon Granacki while serving in the US Army in WWII</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;This effort, along with Lee’s work finding a home for his father’s collection of artifacts tracing the innovative history of contact lenses, also informs how they think about their art collection. Though Vicki and Lee have spent decades learning about, acquiring and living with art, ultimately they believe that they are just caretakers.&nbsp;“I’ve always thought especially about being a steward of the historic buildings that we live, work, and worship in," says Vicki. "They were built by our ancestors, and if we care for them kindly and properly, will be enjoyed by our descendants. That’s what my career in historic preservation was about. As part of our work we were always doing research – looking for maps, plans, sketches, photos and journals that identified who came before us and what they created. We would be so excited to find records kept by ordinary people of the world around them. I have this idea that someday someone else may be looking for something that I’ve taken care to collect and put in a public archive or museum and they will be just as excited to find my treasure.”&nbsp;Additional images from the collection:&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417527/axr3ehwzr3kejnna9810.gif"><figcaption>Watercolors by Leon Granacki</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417528/iorl1sywrhttanszv5vu.gif"><figcaption>Keys rest next to Outsider artist Mr Imagination's Siamese Head Portrait, Michael Nakoneczny's Untitled (baseball), and a Yayoi Kusama Pumpkin</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417529/ssdwgik7e6bxdbhyq1wx.gif"><figcaption>Pepe Mar's Envy Headed, Mixed media collage sculpture in acrylic box; and Alison Zuckerman's Palatial Respite, 2018</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417530/btko5mogguyrmfqq3bp0.gif"><figcaption>Shown here, starting from the upper left by the door frame: &nbsp;Tony Oursler, Robert Lostutter; first row to right of door, descending: Joel Peter Witkin, Martha Mayer Erlebacher, Seymour Rosofsky; second row, descending: Michael Nakoneczny, Ed Paschke, and Andy Warhol.</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;&nbsp;</body></html>

Stewards of Art and History: The Expansive Collection of Lee Wesley and Vicki Granacki

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417518/tmm8qn23sgvpnctsmm81.jpg"><figcaption>Weather Station by the Chicago-based artist team Iñigo Manglano Ovalle and Bill Baker City of Chicago &nbsp;</figcaption></figure>By CGN STAFF via CITY of CHICAGO DCASE PROn Monday outgoing Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced the completion of the city's 1.25-mile Chicago Riverwalk when he led a celebration to open the newest section of the walk, the Chicago Riverwalk East (the Section Between Michigan Ave. to Lake Shore Drive), featuring a new landscape, seating, vendor spaces, a community market place, and of course, public art.Together with city officials, Riverwalk architects, site designers, artists, vendors and other local partners the Mayor celebrated the opening of what may be his signature contribution to the city, the newly transformed Chicago Riverwalk. This completion of this final portion of the Riverwalk, which cost $12 million, means that every block of this award-winning 1.25-mile promenade and recreational amenity has been modernized or developed for the first time.&nbsp;“Chicago is reconnecting with the River in a way that improves our quality of life, protects ourenvironment and enhances economic development that is sustainable for future generations,” said Mayor Emanuel. “The completion of Riverwalk East is a major milestone in that journey. We are finally fulfilling Daniel Burnham’s original vision of Chicago as a true two-waterfrontcity.”In August 2018, Mayor Emanuel announced plans to improve older sections of the east end of the Riverwalk from Michigan Avenue to Lake Shore Drive, building upon the success of the Riverwalk and creating even more opportunities for residents and visitors to interact with and enjoy the Chicago River.The design team, led by Mueller and Mueller, worked with the landscape architecture firm of Site Design Group to substantially complete this reimagination of Riverwalk East. This design emphasizes the transition from a park-like environment on the east end near Lake Shore Drive to the urban civic space of Michigan Avenue and creates areas of public seating surrounded bylandscaping. The new Riverwalk East space includes: 10,000 square feet of “play” space; 94new LED dark sky compliant light fixtures; three public restrooms; approximately 150 new tree plantings from 35 different species to increase the diversity of the urban tree canopy, and 20 types of furnishings from the Riverwalk palette increasing public seating by over 500 along the Riverwalk.“I have been designing public spaces in the City of Chicago for the past twenty-five years," said Ernie Wong of Site Design Group. "It is an honor to have worked with Muller 2 and the Department of Fleet and Facility Management on the site improvements for Riverwalk East! The design intent was to take a largely urban hardscape on the west end and transiting to a natural and lush landscaped corridor. The project adds valuable open space, better pedestrian access to the river and seating to view the natural asset in the heart of downtown Chicago.”In line with the Mayor’s goal of bringing more public art to the Riverwalk and throughout thecity, the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events (DCASE) and the Department of Fleet and Facility Management (2FM) led a Riverwalk East Gateway Project committee to select a new work of art that will create an iconic visual marker for the south bank of the Chicago River just east of Michigan Avenue. The committee selected Weather Station by the Chicago-based artist team Iñigo Manglano Ovalle and Bill Baker. Manglano-Ovalle is a renowned conceptual and visual artist working across media to create large-scale installations and architectural interventions, and Baker is a structural engineering partner at Skidmore, Owings &amp; Merrill (SOM), whose innovative structural engineering design and research have been vitalin realizing some of the world’s most recognizable structures.Scheduled for completion in fall of 2020, Weather Station comprises an array of seven slender, stainless steel towers of varying heights – each culminating in a wind vane and anemometer –collectively rising from the river bank to a height of 117 feet.<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417518/uz5be6yhfmmrvizscvvs.jpg"><figcaption>A rendering of Weather Station. City of Chicago</figcaption></figure>“The Chicago Riverwalk has become an escape from the everyday with one-of-a-kind visual art projections at Art on theMart and new works of public art that enhance what is truly amagnificent urban space,” said DCASE Commissioner Mark Kelly. “Once complete, Weather Station will become an iconic public art landmark rising from the banks of the Chicago River with its animated stainless steel towers."Additionally, a submarine memorial designed and funded by a group of Navy volunteers is another new addition to Riverwalk East, and will be dedicated on Saturday, May 18. The memorial commemorates the 28 submarines manufactured in Wisconsin that used the Chicago River to connect through various waterways to the Gulf of Mexico and on to the war efforts after the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941.As part of additional investments in the Riverwalk, Mayor Emanuel, the Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection (BACP) and 2FM developed the Riverwalk Community Marketplace between Michigan and Wabash Avenues, a new concessions programto highlight existing vendors in the City’s culturally diverse communities. Construction on themarketplace began in the fall of 2018. This investment includes the expansion of the existing path to create a corridor for the placement of kiosks. Following a 2FM public solicitation to identify marketplace vendors that encouraged minority and women-owned vendors to apply, the new Community Marketplace will open in June and will feature nine new vendors.Additionally, five panel installations by artist Ebony G. Patterson were unveiled and will sit above the Chicago First Lady ticket booths. Patterson, represented locally by Monique Meloche Gallery, is known for colorful, large-scale, multimedia murals created out of everyday, tactile materials.&nbsp;The gauzy installations by sculptor Robert Burnier, featuring site responsive tent-like geometric structures of steel, nylon, hardware, streamers, are also still on view on the west end banks of the River.&nbsp;It's worth noting that Mayor Emanuel leaves office in just a few days, on May 20.&nbsp;In a May 2 interview with the <a href="https://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/theater/ct-ae-mayor-emanuel-chicago-arts-jones-0505-story.html">Chicago Tribune</a>, when asked why he placed so much importance on arts and culture while in office – and according to the reporter, perhaps too much – Emanuel responded,&nbsp;"It was always more than programming for me. It was about policy. The arts and culture imbued everything we did. They influenced our educational policy. They changed the CTA — there is not a new transit station now that does not have art. The arts have been an outlook, a philosophy and an approach. That is what our cultural plan was about — seeping the arts into everything the city did. Culture is the soul of this city."The Chicago Sun-Times also <a href="https://chicago.suntimes.com/news/emanuel-strengthens-his-case-to-have-the-riverwalk-named-after-him/">reported</a> this week, "Mayor Rahm Emanuel has privately told associates that, if anything in Chicago is ever named after him, he would love it to be the Riverwalk, the embodiment of his vision to create a “second waterfront.”More information may be found at <a href="https://www.chicagoriverwalk.us">chicagoriverwalk.us</a>&nbsp;</body></html>

Mission Accomplished: Mayor Announces Completion of Chicago Riverwalk 

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417542/od7btljp33rrbtqgwmio.jpg"><figcaption>Designer Ruthie Sommers created an entrance vignette to the 2018 CAADS that brought the art of nature inside the Merchandise Mart&nbsp;</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;By GINNY VAN ALYEABeginning this Thursday evening the seventh floor of the Merchandise Mart will offer an abundance of fine antiques and art from many of the world's top dealers, when the third edition of the Chicago Antiques + Art + Design Show kicks off.&nbsp;Chicago is attracting the global spotlight lately, in particular for being home to the best of what's new and contemporary in art, food, architecture and design. This weekend&nbsp;offers the chance to also view and appreciate antiques that are once again new and to consider the many ways that they can inform much of what we admire in current visual trends and practices.&nbsp;It was not long ago that Chicago was without a major antiques&nbsp;show on its cultural calendar,&nbsp;and since Dolphin Productions launched the fair in 2017 it has continued to mature and give Chicagoans a chance to once again host a splashy international gathering that features treasured art and antiques from the past alongside newer modern pieces that attract a younger, style savvy audience.&nbsp;Running through Sunday&nbsp;the show highlights fine antiques and artworks reflecting a variety of design periods from more&nbsp;than 75 national and international exhibitors. The show, the only one of its kind in the city all year, is not to be missed, largely because of the opportunities to learn and appreciate treasures that are not often on view but also for the chance to be among so much history as well as beauty.&nbsp;Proceeds from ticket purchases and sponsorship of Thursday's <a href="https://wbnorthwestern.org/event/artshow/">Opening Night Party</a> benefit programs and patient care initiatives supported by The Woman’s Board of Northwestern Memorial Hospital – including the Board’s most recent major commitment to fund the study of collaborative mental health care in Northwestern’s primary care clinics in Chicago and help improve access to mental health care in the community. The Woman's Board hosted the revamped opening night last year, bringing a committed, stylish crowd to the fair. This year tickets for the Opening Night Party are $250 with 5 pm VIP entry ($275 at the door) and $200 with 6 pm entry ($225 at the door).&nbsp;&nbsp;VIP Tickets also include a Cocktail Reception and Designer Lecture with <a href="https://amandalindroth.com/">Amanda Lindroth</a> and <a href="http://www.fernandowongold.com/">Fernando Wong</a> along with the opportunity to shop the show before it opens at 6 pm. Lindroth is known for a style that evokes 1960's and 70's Palm Beach. Wong is lauded in interior/outdoor and landscape design circles. He recently created an Art Basel Showhouse for Elle Decor. Both designers are contributing their vision for the opening night party and will be featured as part of the Designer Lecture.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417542/eosd7tky5tapvbf9zj4p.jpg"><figcaption>Fernando Wong's Elle Decor Art Basel Showhouse combines design with fine art</figcaption></figure><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417544/e29ufb1m5ybherf70w6j.jpg"><figcaption>Designer Amanda Lindroth is Florida, everywhere</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;The weekend offers plenty of design education programming on Friday, May 17 as well:• Hidden in Plain View: Chicago’s WPA Poster Designers11:00 am, taking place in the Pella Showroom on the Mart’s First Floor, Suite 100Featuring Neil Harris, Preston &amp; Sterling Morton Professor Emeritus of History and Art History, University of Chicago; contributing author, Art Deco Chicago: Designing Modern America (Chicago Art Deco Society, 2018)• Farnsworth House Revitalized: A New Look at the Mies Masterpiece12:30 pm, Scott Mehaffey, Executive Director, Farnsworth HousePrograms hosted by Pella Crafted Luxury, and organized by Zurich Esposito, AIA Chicago.&nbsp;RSVP to <a href="INFO@DOLPHINFAIRS.COM">INFO@DOLPHINFAIRS.COM</a><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417545/v8okiwreku2xt5x4vpce.png"><figcaption>Friday's programming has a local angle</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/chicago-antiques-art-design-show">The Chicago Antiques + Art + Design Show </a>runs May 16-19, 2019Some highlight's from this year's exhibitors are shown below.&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417546/cxijqjlwcpqtfzluhkon.gif"><figcaption>CAADS 2019 exhibitor M.S. Rau Antiques of New Orleans showing Le Carnaval du Sage by Rene Magritte</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417547/nyevm7nw5ooakkc72ljo.gif"><figcaption>CAADS 2019 exhibitor Nicholas Wolfe of Chicago showing a pair of dressers by Paul Laszlo for Brown and Saltman circa 1950s</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417548/z3ewzomb5tk8zf4ybvm2.gif"><figcaption>CAADS 2019 exhibitor Jayne Thompson Antiques of Harrodsburg KY showing a leather screen painted with Chinoiserie scene English or Dutch circa 1740</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417552/mq1xs6mxx6aguowfze1t.gif"><figcaption>CAADS 2019 exhibitor Nally Jewels of New York showing a brooch by Van Cleef &amp; Arpels</figcaption></figure><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417553/gjwkundklt16ukcobyqp.gif"><figcaption>Les Enluminures will exhibit representative examples from their extensive collections, including medieval manuscripts such as Books of Hours, miniatures, and historic rings.</figcaption></figure><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417554/wc7rg8vqygbakcnp8xf4.jpg"><figcaption>CAADS 2019 exhibitor Converso of Chicago showing a Nakashima Long Chaise 1965</figcaption></figure></body></html>

Chicago Antiques + Art + Design Show is a Chance to Mingle Among History and Beauty

<html><head></head><body>When visiting galleries, wandering a museum or strolling through a fair, the art you encounter is complete. Most of us do not see the process a work of art goes through on the way to completion; we do not often see the artist at work, in the studio testing ideas and concepts or on site tending to an installation.For our summer issue of CGN we asked a handful of artists to share what they are working on now as well as to describe their process so we might glimpse what really happens behind the curtain and see what is still a work in progress. –GV&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417221/cqltn7xdnuln01rrxule.gif"><figcaption>Tony Fitzpatrick</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;TONY FITZPATRICKFitzpatrick is a prolific artist who is always sourcing bits and pieces of found materials for his drawing collages. He’s currently working on a series called The Garden Of All Other Ecstasies as well as making maquettes for a large scale local project that will be publicly announced in late spring.“These works are about the Gardens of our Desire. What moves us, and keeps us up, and makes our hearts beat faster... There are thorns, dirt, bramble and burrs. There is conflict, sweat, and the smell of the earth.”&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417222/grtrxdrebizhezm5ufq9.gif"><figcaption>Jordan Martins</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;JORDAN MARTINS“I’ve been working through ideas relating to camouflage, signalling theory, and gestalt psychology, including the way plants and animals conceal or advertise themselves visually.The work I’m preparing for Goldfinch for my show in September 2019 is, in a sense, beginning with the idea of a painting behaving like a plant or animal in this active way, rather than an inert object on display.In part this is being worked through with the kinds of patterns built up within in each piece, but also in how individual pieces can relate to another in the space, to conceal or distort themselves or perhaps suggest a level of instinctual communication between them.”&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417223/i7ic1ecxbnoskwnshqxc.gif"><figcaption>Zack Wirsum</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;ZACK WIRSUM“These days in the studio I am preparing for a show in October at Jean Albano Gallery. My current body of work is mostly memory related in concept and content; a combination of observational painting from recollections and nostalgic re-explorations of subject matter that fascinated me as a child, now from the perspective of adulthood. The two small paintings [pictured here] are examples of the later working studies for a larger painting about a birthday party for a cryptid attended by monster movie and Disney characters, tentatively titled Feliz Cumpleanos El Chupacabra Expanded Guest List. I am playing with the composition of the party invitees and tweaking coloration. The larger painting, in the background with the masking tape blocking cues and partially obscured by the studies, is about the 1930s Boston Red Sox spring training in Hot Springs Arkansas. It depicts baseball players climbing the wooded Ouachita mountains in full uniform as part of their conditioning, which I learned from a historical plaque. The stylization of the ball players I concocted reminded me of samurais, so I utilized colors I imagine a samurai would chose to paint their house with. I am still working on the patterns and layout of the rock formations and boulders the athletes are scaling. The masking tape is helping to inform these decisions.”&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417224/hdhtkw8kfxgsnkblmmam.gif"><figcaption>Anna Kunz</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;ANNA KUNZAnna Kunz is working towards a collaboration with Emanuel Pratt and the team at the SWEETWATER foundation, which will include new suspended paintings and structures.Parts of the collaboration will be on view in the Artists Garden and Theatre at the Taste of Chicago this summer.Recent exhibitions include Inquiry into Abstraction, University of Cincinnati, curated by Mark Brosseau, and All is Well and Good at Circle Contemporary, curated by Eric Ruschman.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417225/mnu7asympymjiocnumjk.gif"><figcaption>Diana working on a scale model – with helpful Legos – for a show at Carrie Secrist Gallery</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;DIANA GUERRERO-MACIÁ&nbsp;“I use slow craft practices to make hybrid paintings and objects. My core values are: material making is meaningful, craft is a form of consciousness, and the decorative has work to do.Materiality is a meaning that is distinctive. I make surfaces that are collaged, pieced, dyed, and stitched as a reconsideration of the field and form. My early works were constructed from discarded clothing, cut apart, flattened and pieced back together by hand in a way to expand the materiality of painting. I was influenced by Modernism and the Arts and Crafts Movement. In my practice, I admired the Pattern and Decoration movement and artists who used craft and collage methods to challenge categorization of art, craft and design.As a Latina artist, I learned the value of material culture in real-time. My Cuban immigrant parents taught me hand-work, material re-use, and improvisational “making-do.” They understood the need to balance the decorative with the utilitarian to resist subjugation. My artwork comes to me intuitively, through my lived experience.&nbsp;I’m not trying to answer with logic, rather, I look to where my hands-on pursuit leads me.”&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417226/p1thvew0uzk41nltufph.gif"><figcaption>George Klauba</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;GEORGE KLAUBAIn October George Klauba will have a solo exhibition at Hofheimer Gallery of his new body of work. He will have 20 oil paintings and drawings on wood of tattoo–related imagery. As of this spring he had completed 10 paintings. The sketch pictured here is one idea in showing women and men tattooed. Klauba explains, “I usually use the head or face of the subject in animal form to blend a similarity of the person’s inner make-up or angst. It’s part of the belief that tattoos mirror the inner side of the person or soul.”</body></html>

Artists and Their Art: Revealing Works in Progress

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418288/n8mjnvpbnm9cdtgquq3c.gif"></figure>&nbsp;By GINNY VAN ALYEAThe Golden Triangle has sourced global treasures as well as inspiration for customers of its unique, River North Chicago space for 30 years. Founded in 1989 by Douglas Van Tress and Chauwarin Tuntisak, The Golden Triangle has built a reputation for itself as a nexus of antiques, design and art. Today it is one of Chicago’s largest home furnishing stores, housed in an 18,000 square foot former Chicago River warehouse featuring vignettes from various historical periods, such as the Raj, other Colonial periods, ancient China, and 19th Century Europe, as well as an indoor courtyard. As shoppers and designers move from space to space, their experience changes with the context.<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418289/h5vr3l0rojve9nzc8mdj.gif"><figcaption>The arches in two of the buildings are inspired by Georgio de Chirico’s painting, Piazza d’Italia, as well as Southeast Asian shophouses. The third building, says Van Tress, is pure modern.</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;Owners Van Tress and Tuntisak travel the globe to hand-pick items for the Chicago store, and they regularly visit Chiang Mai, where they have a warehouse for shipping things to Chicago, at least twice a year since the store’s founding. A misty mountainous city in northern Thailand, with colorful hill tribes housing hundreds of elaborate Buddhist temples, Chiang Mai is considered a destination for handicrafts and antiques. The city houses beautiful hotels, lively nightlife and epicurean delights, and as of this past fall, Golden Triangle Hang Dong.&nbsp;According to Van Tress, “Golden Triangle Hang Dong is something new. We want to sell in Asia and even globally.”<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418290/dy7yt2dydzoyugvhgw3x.gif"></figure>&nbsp;The new store is a collection of three buildings, adjacent to the existing warehouse, which will become a marketplace and restaurant. The goal, says Van Tress, is to be a new kind of retail space, “A design village where the visitor can explore and see things juxtaposed...in a kind of spiritual experience.” He sees Golden Triangle Hang Dong as a means of bringing “the best of the past, history and human culture into modern design. We’re not a normal antique store.”The Golden Triangle will celebrate its 30th anniversary on May 16, 2019 with an exclusive (and already waitlisted) event featuring many local artists and cultural supporters.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418291/rwjpzva1ccafa9vydvvo.gif"><figcaption>Van Tress says the basic idea for the store’s design – modern but also a bit softer, with historical references – was his own, fulfilled by architect Techinphat Khachonphurithanakul.</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;</body></html>

A Chicago Space's Global Reach: The Golden Triangle Expands to Thailand

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418300/z5p5gsuvdvpowlxqgart.gif"><figcaption>Edra Soto, Open 24 Hours, 2018. Photo: James Prinz</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;By ALISON REILLYEdra Soto’s warmth, generosity, and kindness are apparent (and contagious). She speaks candidly about her work, her influences, and her upbringing in Cupey, Puerto Rico. Her motivations, her life experiences, and her perspectives push her audience to more closely examine their own neighborhoods, sidewalks, fences, and homes. In a contemporary art world that can often reject the participation of the audience, Soto takes the hands of her viewers and looks them in the eye. She acknowledges their bodies, their physical presence, and their memories. Her artistic and personal lives are bound together, which some might consider a great risk. However, her exceptional body of work demonstrates the opportunity for shared growth by revealing vulnerabilities. Below is an edited version of our recent conversation about her move to Chicago, her ongoing series GRAFT, and her upcoming projects. Chicago Gallery News: Can you tell me about how you grew up? Which part of Puerto Rico are you from?Edra Soto: I grew up in a middle class family in Cupey, Puerto Rico. Cupey is the biggest and most populated barrio in the metropolitan area of San Juan. Both my parents worked hard for my brother and me. My father worked for an insurance company and for the military through the air force. He traveled a lot. My mom stayed with us at home and did many jobs. She had a home nursery; she ran a commercial ceramic business with my dad at home; and she was a baker. She made amazing wedding, quinceañera, and birthday cakes. I have childhood memories of chewing hard sugar flowers and looking at my reflection in the immense mirrors she made by pouring sugar in order to create a fake pond. Perhaps that was the beginning of my appreciation for installation work.CGN: What did it feel like to move from Puerto Rico (via Paris) to Chicago?ES: I felt fortunate to have parents that had faith in me and who could help me make the move. But I also thought that I was not going to make it outside of Puerto Rico. I became a commercial artist very early in my life. During my last year at Escuela de Artes Plásticas&nbsp;de Puerto Rico I won a few awards at my bachelor’s graduation and sold out two shows at a commercial gallery in San Juan. My parents were impressed and motivated to help me transition into higher education.It took me awhile to get used to Chicago’s weather. I even did an installation, titled I Love Chicago Project, dedicated to my relationship with Chicago, the School of the Art Institute, and the weather. I created an alter ego in the form of a lion tamer to symbolically build self-empowerment. This was my first time bringing people together to activate a project. I invited artists I met at the school, my roommate, my boyfriend (now my husband), and whoever wanted to be a part of this project. I made posters to promote the events and opened my semi-private studio for visitors.<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418301/nzejtkvkckblcrqklijw.gif"><figcaption>Portrait of the artist Edra Soto. Photo: Dan Sullivan</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;CGN: You mentioned your commercial success as an artist in Puerto Rico, but you have now moved away from the gallery/artist relationship model. How do you support yourself?ES: After grad school, I supported myself by working at a Chicago public school. Some years later, I worked at a charter school. I dedicated ten years of my life to teach high school. It was hard work, but I learned a lot from the experiences. I met wonderful students who brought great joy and pride to my life. After those ten years, I built enough confidence to teach at the college level. I’ve been a lecturer at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago for the past five years and just recently started to teach an Introduction to Social Engagement course at the University of Illinois in Chicago. As my visibility as an artist increased, I started to get approached by colleges and universities to lecture and do exhibitions. These opportunities increased to the point where I could become a freelancer.CGN: Do you encourage other artists to follow your example?ES: Perhaps following my path is not even practical for me. I tend to live in the moment and my planning is mostly work-related, not life-related. My life works because my art works, and I try to keep that way. It is not a predictable or financially stable situation. At this precise moment I don’t feel great financial support, but I am creating projects that might bring financial support in the future. So, I’m still gambling.<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418302/heuiotrjbba4qp49ml4k.gif"><figcaption>Edra Soto, GRAFT (detail), 2019.</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;CGN: How has your experience as an art teacher in Chicago public schools shaped your practice as an artist?ES: Many of the methods and materials I used with my high school students became a part of my artistic practice. Structure doesn’t manifest naturally on me. When I’m telling a story, I have to make a conscious effort to keep it on track to build a natural progression. Becoming a high school teacher forced me to work with a type of structure that allowed me to keep order. To be an administrator, you have to be organized. It turns out that so much of the work I do, as an artist, is administrative. If I’m not efficient at keeping track of what needs to get done, I will miss deadlines, opportunities, and even relationships.CGN: What is your studio like?ES: My studio looks like a warehouse! My process is very embedded in my daily life. I’m less of a craftsperson and more of project manager, designer, and researcher.CGN: In 2017-2018 you presented Open 24 Hours at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago (MCA). In an interview you stated, “Putting the bottles in other people’s hands is putting the responsibility of littering in their hands, which was my initial motivation for picking up the bottle.” Can you talk about your relationship with the viewer (or participant)? Why is it important for you to put the responsibility of littering in their hands and how does that relate to your motivations as an artist?ES: I consider the action of picking up garbage my civic duty. I learned this when I was in ninth grade. I forget a lot of things, but that lesson I never forget. A teacher took a group of students and me to a hallway and told us, “Even if it’s not your garbage, you pick it up, and place it in the trashcan.” The action of picking up garbage became a sign of education.This is the same model brought to life in Open 24 Hours. The work is about respect for the land, appreciation for the place you live, and the people living in it. Cleaning can become a conversation on values, from self-value, to value of a place, to others’ values.At the MCA, all the refuse that I collected in 2017 was on display to evidence what I witness daily. I designed a transactional procedure between the museum visitor and me. I created a contract that they had to sign if they wanted to acquire, or “adopt” as the museum described it, a glass bottle that I had found in my neighborhood, picked up, and cleaned. In the contract, I describe the bottle as “a piece of American history” to instigate intrigue in the meaning behind the bottles. The procedure was a strategy to elevate the desire and value of these objects. They taught me about a history that I was not aware of, so I couldn’t simply offer them for free. Through the procedure, I also asked people for their time. Perhaps time is one of the things we all value the most.CGN: You started your ongoing work GRAFT in 2013. What does the title mean?ES: GRAFT is an imaginary migration. Citing structures known as quiebrasoles and rejas found prominently in Puerto Rico, GRAFT physically interconnects existing architecture to a site-specific place while conceptually representing an imaginary transplant or migratory gesture.&nbsp;CGN: Do you keep an inventory of quiebrasoles and rejas patterns? Are the patterns in your work based on ones you have seen, or do you create new patterns?ES: I source all the patterns for GRAFT. My visits to Puerto Rico have been steadily increasing since my father passed in the summer of 2017. But I’ve been documenting quiebrasoles and rejas patterns for many years, even before I started the project.I used to make drawings of the patterns, but at the time I didn’t see great value in the gesture. Living a greater part of my life surrounded by these patterns makes me sensitive to the role they play in visual culture. Presenting them through architectural interventions becomes a way of reinstating them rather than reproducing them. The history that this project unveils explains why it is so easy to “borrow” their beauty without thinking about their greater cultural significance.CGN: Do the materials of quiebrasoles (concrete) and rejas (wrought iron) resonate with you?ES: The purpose of concrete and wrought iron to the casa criolla (common house) in the Caribbean was for protection and ventilation. These are familiar, raw, nostalgic, and even seductive materials to me, but I wouldn’t appropriate them and take them out of their original function and context.CGN: How does it feel to present GRAFT in different settings? For example, in 2013 you installed it at Terrain Exhibitions in Chicago and recently in 2018 at the Untitled Art Fair in Miami.ES: At both of these spaces the architectural interventions were remarkable in terms of visibility and audience responses. They both motivated creative thinking and negotiation of space. At Terrain it was the first architectural intervention I’ve made. At Untitled I took the opportunity to introduce photo documentation as a new element. I embedded small viewfinders in the circular spaces of the structure. By peering through the viewfinders, the audience is met with an image documenting my everyday life during visits to Puerto Rico. Photos of my childhood home, scenes from various neighborhoods, and destruction from Hurricane Maria are just some of the images viewers see. The act itself is akin to peering through the quiebrasoles and rejas surrounding a Puerto Rican home to glimpse the house behind the walls.CGN: Have you presented GRAFT in Puerto Rico?ES: Not as an architectural intervention; it would be redundant. At the Museo de Historia, Antropología y Arte de la Universidad de Puerto Rico, documentation of GRAFT was included as part of an exhibition titled Ida y Vuelta curated by Dr. Laura Bravo. I recently donated these prints to the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico for their permanent collection.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418304/yfohbylnma9wwxevjohi.jpg"><figcaption>Edra Soto, Manual Graft, 2019. Architectural intervention at the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art. photo credit EG Schempf.</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;CGN: For each iteration of GRAFT you include a literary component. Why is that important to you?ES: GRAFT allows me to expand the multidisciplinary aspects of the project and explore visibility by providing a format that can be disseminated beyond the gallery experience. The literary component creates an accessible history of Puerto Rican vernacular architecture. While quiebrasoles and rejas are popularly recognized in Puerto Rican’s visual culture, there is little exploration or research on the origin of these patterns. Contrary to the familiarity of colonial architecture, vernacular architecture has yet to be included as an exploratory subject in primary and secondary education in the Caribbean. Writers from disciplines of art history, art, architecture, and politics are invited to reflect on rejas in the contexts of their individual fields of expertise. The content is published in both English and Spanish and is available to the public.CGN: Some iterations of GRAFT include a shelter that resembles a bus stop. Why is this type of structure significant to you?ES: The elements of GRAFT are specific to each space, and sometimes I include a shelter, reminiscent of a bus stop, that serves as a bench for visitors to sit and read the accompanying publication. Bus shelters in Puerto Rico may be made of concrete, wood, and aluminum. I’ve seen a few made in concrete that integrate quiebrasoles in their design.CGN: What are your upcoming projects for this year?ES: Currently, my work is on view until June 2, 2019 at the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art as part of an exhibition curated by Risa Puleo titled Monarchs: Brown and Native Contemporary Artists in the Path of the Butterfly.Another group exhibition I’m part of, Art of the Neighborhood, is currently at the Willis Tower through the summer, curated by CNL Projects and Chicago Artists Coalition.I’m involved in three MacArthur Foundation cultural exchanges! One is currently at Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico in San Juan. The second, an exchange with Cuba, will have its Chicago presentation at the Smart Museum in summer 2019 and in Cuba in 2020. The third, an exchange with Brazil curated by Jordan Martins, will take place in 2020. A long overdue commission for the Chicago Transit Authority’s Blue Line Western station is on its way as well.This summer I was invited to create work with a client from the Light &amp; Salt Coalition, a grassroots movement that mobilizes individuals and organizations to heal, educate, and empower youth and women in the fight against slavery. My donation will be auctioned at their summer gala.More information about and works by Edra Soto may be found at &nbsp;<a href="https://edrasoto.com/home.html">www.edrasoto.com</a>Publisher's note: In April 2019 Edra Soto was awarded the Illinois Arts Council Agency (IACA) 2019 Artist Fellowship Award. Non-matching Fellowships in fixed amounts of $15,000 are awarded to Illinois artists in recognition of their outstanding work and commitment within the arts.</body></html>

Artist Edra Soto: Mining Personal History to Create Artistic Engagement

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418278/cblo9nrg7wqxu1rk6qkh.gif"><figcaption>Kingston-born multimedia artist Ebony G. Patterson is creating a series of five intricate and colorful banners titled …between the below… &nbsp;</figcaption></figure><h3>Chicago Riverwalk&nbsp;</h3>Seasonal walkway opens May 13Stroll along the east branch of the Chicago River and admire new and permanent public art installations along the banks while enjoying creative food and entertainment. New this year: banners by artist Ebony G. Patterson.&nbsp;From Lake Shore Dr./Lake Michigan west to Franklin.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.chicagoriverwalk.us">chicagoriverwalk.us</a>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418279/axw1eule0d6a9jqgojcm.gif"><figcaption>Art on the Mart will project seven nights a week this summer and coordinate programming with the City’s year of Chicago Theater in 2019 &nbsp;</figcaption></figure><h3>Art on theMART</h3>Nightly May 13–Sept 30With its minimum 30-year duration, its location downtown along the Chicago River and its substantive and relevant content, Art on theMART is a milestone on Chicago’s trajectory of public art. Local and international works are on display and freely accessible with no branding nor sponsorships.&nbsp;Best viewed on The Chicago Riverwalk between Wells and Lake St.&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href="http://artonthemart.com">artonthemart.com</a>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418280/wpajo0uswwiujdrhv2qg.gif"><figcaption>This large, iconic vintage Georg Jensen sterling eel dish is from &nbsp;Greg Pepin Silver from Denmark, exhibiting this year at the Chicago Antiques + Art + Design Show &nbsp;</figcaption></figure><h3>Chicago Antiques + Art + Design</h3>May 16–19The third edition of this dynamic show features 100 exhibitors and a sequel to last year’s splashy, refreshed opening night party benefitting the Woman’s Board of Northwestern Memorial Hospital.&nbsp;Show tickets: $20+. Opening night tickets $200+&nbsp;222 W. Merchandise Mart Plaza<a href="http://chicagoantiquesartdesign.com">chicagoantiquesartdesign.com</a>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418281/xaaewkfb8z9sk3ipyipi.jpg"><figcaption>Randolph Street Market takes place nearly every month, but the outdoor summer events become more popular every year. Things kick off Memorial Day weekend in the West Loop. &nbsp;</figcaption></figure><h3>Randolph Street Market Memorial Day Garden Party</h3>May 26 and 27Kick off the season’s outdoor markets with a live band, fancy foods, market bars, on site-appraisals and more. Check website for early buying hours. 1340 W. Washington,&nbsp;Tickets: $5–10<a href="https://www.randolphstreetmarket.com">randolphstreetmarket.com</a> &nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418282/hyxkwdfg4w4ymbyu6jvp.gif"><figcaption>Featured in Sculpture Milwaukee’s 2018 exhibition was Richard Deacon's Big Time, 2016, painted and lacquered stainless steel, image Courtesy of Marian Goodman Gallery, New York</figcaption></figure><h3>Sculpture Milwaukee &nbsp;</h3>June–OctoberA free outdoor urban sculpture experience in downtown Milwaukee returns for a 3rd year with works by 20+ internationally and locally renowned artists. Past exhibitors have included Magdalena Abakanowicz, Sanford Biggers, Robert Indiana, Hank Willis Thomas, Erwin Wurm and others.&nbsp;Works on view and for sale.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.sculpturemilwaukee.com">sculpturemilwaukee.com</a>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418284/qyo66jyv7kaaw2s4rxfp.gif"><figcaption>Joe Mills is just one artist participating in the 72nd 57th street art fair in Hyde Park</figcaption></figure><h3>57th Street Art Fair</h3>June 1 and 272nd annual two-day outdoor celebration of the arts in Hyde Park. 57th St. at Kimbark<a href="https://www.57thstreetartfair.org">57thstreetartfair.org</a>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418285/eobcv1i1mzvvx6l64auq.gif"><figcaption>CAC’s Work in Progress party is always creative as well as supportive of artists. 2018’s theme was construction attire...</figcaption></figure><h3>CAC’S Work in Progress</h3>June 6Chicago Artists Coalition’s annual benefit is CAC’s biggest night of the year and raises over $100,000 to support residencies, education programs, and resources for Chicago artists.This year’s party honors artist Hebru Brantley + Gensler.2130 W. FultonTickets: $60–$350<a href="https://chicagoartistscoalition.org/get-involved/annual-benefit">chicagoartistscoalition.org</a>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418286/lj2xjf6ipd5qfgbbpjf3.gif"><figcaption>“The Nate” sculpture park hosts a summer solstice event based around Edvin Strautmanis’s Phoenix, built from steel beams</figcaption></figure><h3>Summer Solstice Sunset Celebration</h3>June 22Arrive at the Nathan Manilow Sculpture Park in south suburban University Park, IL around 6:30pm “Ravinia” style (BYO picnic and beverages) enjoy ambient tunes with our guest DJ next to the bonfire near the lake, take a walk around the park and watch the sun go down through the geometric angles of Phoenix, by Edvins Strautmanis, which is sited to frame the sunset on the Solstice.&nbsp;FREE and family friendly.<a href="http://www.govst.edu/About/Nathan_Manilow_Sculpture_Park/Programs_and_Events/">www.govst.edu/sculpture/</a>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418287/nahvptfkpisivo1zdgte.gif"></figure><h3>MCA's Tuesdays on the Terrace</h3>June 5–September 25Every Tuesday this summer, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago hosts free outdoor activities, including the popular Tuesdays on the Terrace live jazz series and the SOARFarmers Market.Tuesdays on the Terrace features Chicago’s quintessential jazz musicians performing outside on the MCA’s terrace. Visitors can experience the musicians up close, enjoy dining al fresco, or relax with a cocktail on the sculpture garden lawn. The performances take place from 5:30-8 pm every Tuesday with support from Luminarts and media sponsor WDCB 90.9 FM, and are hosted by WDCB’s Al Carter-Bey and Richton Guy Thomas from WHPK 88.5 FM.&nbsp;</body></html>

Summer 2019 Art Social Calendar 

<html><head></head><body>By GINNY VAN ALYEA&nbsp;It's hard to believe but May is nearly here, meaning we are on the cusp of summer and a new season of art. This Friday night, May 3, several new solo shows open in Chicago, with the bulk of them taking place in River North. Openings are also happening in Ravenswood, as well as in West Town – notably, Catherine Edelman Gallery is hosting their first show in their new space at 1637 W Chicago Ave.The highlights are listed below, and our full calendar may be viewed&nbsp;<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events?filter=openings">here</a>.&nbsp;Have a plastic glass of wine on us, and keep an eye out for our new summer issue of CGN that will be in galleries in the coming days as well.&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417838/hacepvfs8yd3ttfojypw.jpg"><figcaption>Joel-Peter Witkin, Harvest, 1984</figcaption></figure><h3>Joel-Peter Witkin: From the Studio</h3>Opening: Friday, May 3, 2019 5–8&nbsp;pm<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/joel-peter-witkin-from-the-studio">Catherine Edelman Gallery</a>This will be Catherine Edelman's first show at their new, 4,200 sq. ft. West Town location at 1637 W. Chicago Ave.The gallery inaugurates the new space with Joel-Peter Witkin: From the Studio. The exhibition runs through July 3, 2019. Joel-Peter Witkin will be &nbsp;at the opening on May 3 from 5:00 - 8:00 pm with various family members.&nbsp;For more than 60 years, Joel-Peter Witkin has stayed true to his mission: to create photographs that show the beauty of marginalized people by placing them into art referential tableaus, often laced with Catholic overtones. His work features hermaphrodites, post and pre-op individuals, and people born with physical abnormalities. In his eyes, all people are beautiful, regardless of societal norms.&nbsp;<h3>&nbsp;</h3><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417838/ppr0otin3p43roj1g0wc.jpg"><figcaption>Art Shay, The Supremes at Hittsville USA, Detroit 1965, silver gelatin print, 16 x 20 inches</figcaption></figure><h3>Art Shay: A Lifetime of Photographs, 1922-2018</h3>Opening: Friday, May 3, 2019 5–8&nbsp;pm<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/art-shay-a-lifetime-of-photographs-1922-2018">Gallery Victor Armendariz</a>It's been a year since Art Shay died, and now Gallery Victor Armendariz is opening a show of the famed photographer's work, including many iconic images of people and moments that epitomized the times.&nbsp;Also opening on Friday will be <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/dystopian-utopia-christopher-klein">Christopher Klein: Dystopian Utopia.</a>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417839/szvwnml6lod8ti0ml9xe.gif"><figcaption>Molly McCracken Kumar, Ephemeral Germination, 2019, 42" x 50", acrylic and resin on canvas</figcaption></figure><h3>Molly McCracken Kumar, Celestial Vigor, New Paintings</h3><h3>Brooks Anderson, Illumina, Cloud Paintings</h3>Opening: Friday, May 3, 2019 5–8&nbsp;pm<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/organizations/addington-gallery">Addington Gallery</a>The gallery opens two shows on Friday night, both of which feature palettes bright enough to temporarily rebuff this week's gloomy weather. Molly McCracken Kumar's acrylic and resin paintings conjure the heavens, while Brooks Anderson's cloud paintings make you think of looking skyward on a summer day with grass beneath your head.&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417840/rg4zdxrbg7thqxtsoqge.jpg"></figure><h3>Perfect Life</h3>Opening: Friday, May 3, 2019 5–8 pm<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/perfect-opening-reception">Rangefinder Gallery</a>Arina Dähnick lives and works in Berlin. She grew up in a creative family and was taught early on about fine art and photography.&nbsp;Her first professional photo exhibition was at school&nbsp;at the age of 17.&nbsp;Dähnick says, "My photography wants to invite people to rediscover reality with special awareness. I am truely fascinated with modern, with urban life. What is the actual meaning of “modern times”? The Project “Perfect Life”&nbsp;follows this question.&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417841/wyfx0qqom7x07epmnm8h.jpg"></figure><h3>Kitsch'n Art</h3>Opening: Friday, May 3, 2019 5–8&nbsp;pm<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/curated-by-john-cain-executive-director-south-shore-arts-featuring-artwork-from-his-private-collection-july-august-2019-gallery-group-show-emily-ackerman-managing-editor-business-manager-chicago-gallery-news-858-n-clark-st-suite-204-chicago-il-60610-tel-312-649-0064-emily-chicagogallerynews-com-chicagogallerynews-com">Jean Albano Gallery</a>The gallery's newest show is curated by John Cain, Executive Director, South Shore Arts, featuring a funky title and artwork from his private collection.&nbsp; &nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417842/khgmikqfdge03ccghz7g.jpg"><figcaption>Daryls Ewoldt</figcaption></figure><h3>Midwestern Metal</h3>Opening: Friday, May 3, 2019 5–8&nbsp;pm<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/organizations/vale-craft-gallery">Vale Craft&nbsp;</a>This invitational show highlights metal objects, sculpture and jewelry by mostly Chicago artists.&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417843/czfuyls14weqdmnafsgl.jpg"></figure><h3>Nasturtium: Jennifer Shanahan</h3>Opening: Friday, May 3, 2019 7-10pm<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/nasturtium-jennifer-shanahan">The Dime</a>With "Nasturtium" Jennifer Shanahan creates a meditation on the ephemeral notions of Beauty, Impermanence, Sensuality, and the passage of time. The Nasturtium, a flower long prized for its beauty as well as being an edible flower; has been an alluring subject for poets and Artists for centuries. Jennifer spent three years making Photographs that ruminate on this lovely if elusive, Flower. This is the artist's first one woman show.&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417844/sliremdf0wt5dwvsipe3.gif"><figcaption>Susan Aurinko</figcaption></figure><h3>Europa Europa: Susan Aurinko</h3>Opening: Friday, May 3, 2019 5-8pm<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/europa-susan-aurinko">Hofheimer Gallery</a>Photography Susan Aurinko's opens a show of photographs from her travels in Europe. She will be at the opening on Friday in Ravenswood and will also give a talk on Saturday, May 18th from 2 to 4pm with guest curator Chuck Gniech.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417844/f7yk77vn6ub5swwxbhhm.jpg"><figcaption>Pooja Pittie</figcaption></figure><h3>New Work by Pooja Pittie</h3>Opening: Saturday, May 4, 2019 4-7pm<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/new-work-by-pooja-pittie">McCormick Gallery</a>These new, abstract paintings by Pooja Pittie use a range of materials and textures to create multiple layers and dimensions.&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721417845/uloc86hxe3bcouwfiyxw.jpg"><figcaption>Shannon Finley</figcaption></figure><h3>Shall we go, you and I while we can</h3>Opening: Saturday, May 4, 2019 5-8pm<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/shall-we-go-you-and-i-while-we-can">Carrie Secrist Gallery</a>Also opening in the West Loop at 835 W Washington is a vibrant show featuring the work of gallery artist Shannon Finley and others.&nbsp;</body></html>

May Openings Usher in Start of Summer Art

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418275/d1p5y9uao9q2edlpj7g3.gif"></figure><h2>Learn how public art shaped Chicago through walking tour series</h2>Lovers of all things Chicago have an exciting opportunity to learn about the city through a series of historical seminars at the Newberry Library. Offered June through August, the courses cover a variety of <a href="http://www.newberry.org/programs-and-events?field_event_category_tid=14&amp;field_event_date_value2%5Bvalue%5D%5Bdate%5D=04%2F30%2F2019&amp;field_event_date_value%5Bvalue%5D%5Bdate%5D=07%2F30%2F2019">Chicago-focused topics</a> ranging from art and landscape design to baseball and beer.By Jay Koziarz, Curbed Chicago<a href="https://chicago.curbed.com/2019/4/30/18524213/public-art-newberry-library-chicago-history-seminar">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418277/suky6fzxwpjvqgtkmrot.gif"></figure><h2>'Outsider' Art Is Going Mainstream. But In Chicago, It's Always Been In</h2>Outsider art is having an "in" moment.It's a label given to self-taught, unconventional and often uncelebrated artists, but in recent months exhibitions of outsider art have shown up at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and Atlanta's High Museum of Art.While mainstream interest in the genre may be on the rise, it's always been in the spotlight at Intuit: The Center For Intuitive And Outsider Art, a small gallery founded in Chicago in 1991 that is one of the few museums in the world dedicated solely to outsider art.By Chris Bentley, WBUR<a href="https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2019/04/11/outsider-art-chicago">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;</body></html>

News From Around the Art World: April 30, 2019

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418245/bk84ra4zpajkt82h60qy.png"><figcaption>The Chicago Athletic Association Hotel</figcaption></figure>By CGN Staff via NADA PRAs we gear up for a season of museum blockbusters and gallery group shows and summer art walks, we also have one eye on the fall, which is Chicago's busiest art season of the year. Come September, in addition to the eighth edition of EXPO Chicago and the third Chicago Architecture Biennial, a new art fair will take place: The Chicago Invitational, presented by the nonprofit&nbsp;<a href="https://www.newartdealers.org/">New Art Dealers Alliance</a> and running September 18-21, will overlap with EXPO and span three floors of the Chicago Athletic Association Hotel on Michigan Ave. &nbsp;In 2018 NADA&nbsp;<a href="https://news.artnet.com/market/nada-new-york-shuts-down-1330418">cancelled</a> its New York fair.&nbsp;As EXPO has established its strong, international profile during it previous seven editions, the addition of a new fair in the city with a commitment to newer voices and unconventional initiatives in the art community will broaden the scope and appeal of events taking place during this busy time in Chicago and extend the profile of the city as a hub for contemporary art and culture.&nbsp;Current NADA member galleries based in Chicago include: Shane Campbell, Document, Kavi Gupta, M. LeBlanc, PATRON, Regards, Volume, and Western Exhibitions.&nbsp;&nbsp;CGN will continue to share updates as they become available. Additional details below via NADA's press release this week:“Historically, Chicago has been a hotbed of artist-run galleries and alternative spaces,” said Heather Hubbs, NADA Executive Director and former Chicago-based art professional. “The city then and now embodies the experimental spirit of NADA, and we look forward to connecting our exhibitors with this audience.“The fair will take place throughout three floors of the iconic Chicago Athletic Association Hotel, with a curated selection of galleries in the hotel’s historic Stagg Court and Tank spaces, and a takeover of 13 hotel rooms on the fourth floor. The landmark hotel is located across from Chicago cultural landmarks the Millennium Park and the Art Institute of Chicago.“I’m very excited for the Chicago Invitational, NADA’s new and re-imagined art fair at the Chicago Athletic Association Hotel. This important expansion to Chicago, in an ideal venue, will continue our mission to support artists and arts organizations internationally,” said Rachel Uffner, NADA Board President and owner of Rachel Uffner Gallery. “The Invitational will also allow us to cultivate existing relationships in the region while developing new ones. We are already feeling incredible support from Chicago’s cultural and arts community and are looking forward to seeing everyone in September.”The inaugural edition of the Chicago Invitational further exemplifies NADA’s expanded commitment to year-round programming and producing alternatives for galleries to exhibit artwork in a new setting. NADA recently held the New York Gallery Open, a new initiative designed to bring visitors and collectors to over 50 art spaces across New York City for public tours, talks, and performances, and NADA House, the organization’s second off-site exhibition on Governors Island, which will be on view from May through August 2019.“As EXPO CHICAGO approaches its eighth edition, we welcome the addition of the Chicago Invitational presented by NADA, which will serve as a complement to a full week of exhibition alignments, openings, and events for international arts patrons to explore,” said Tony Karman, President | Director of EXPO CHICAGO. “NADA’s critically acclaimed fairs and year-round programming in support of its members remains extremely important in these ever-changing times, and I am confident that their first Chicago edition will be successful.”</body></html>

A New Art Fair This September: NADA's 1st Chicago Invitational

<html><head></head><body>By GINNY VAN ALYEA&nbsp;The&nbsp;first week of April was a busy start to 'spring' openings, but now that new shows, for the most part, no longer happen on just a single big busy night in the city – they're happening nearly every weekend in various neighborhoods – there are actually more opportunities to spend time visiting smaller groups of galleries at once, rather than making the mad dash to see 15 shows in one night or having to see some shows at the expense of others.&nbsp;Friday night, April 19, is a chance to visit the five spaces – at 1709–1711 W Chicago Ave – that cemented West Town as a new and <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/news/2018/5/a-new-westward-migration-galleries-move-in-search-of-space-and-community">growing gallery destination</a> and to see the strong range of art that is being exhibited.&nbsp;This is the season after the first big openings of the year and before the summer group shows. There will be a lot to see and talk about Friday, and then more shows will continue to open, as they do now, through next week and into the first weekend of May.&nbsp;The highlights are listed below, and our full calendar may be viewed&nbsp;<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events">here</a>.&nbsp;Have a plastic glass of wine on us, as we pull all-nighters to get the summer issue of CGN off to the printer on Tuesday!&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418261/vyqnnf0uxbyfkg1o1jro.jpg"><figcaption>Laura Letinsky, To Want for Nothing 25, 2018, Archival pigment print. Edition of 7.</figcaption></figure><h3>Laura Letinsky: To Want for Nothing</h3>Opening: Friday, Apr 19, 2019 5–8&nbsp;pm<a href="/organizations/document">DOCUMENT</a>Letinsky is a Chicago-based photographer who is also a Professor in the Department of Visual Art at the University of Chicago. Known for her contemporary still lifes, the work in this show is also accompanied by poetry of Danielle Dutton.&nbsp;“When I was little I used to take a blade and cut the faces off models in my mother’s magazines. In the scene I was looking at, this book the narrator was reading, the one I thought I knew, was gone. In her hands was a blank white space in the shape of a book I’d read. But it was also, for a moment, like I’d been cut away—just a white shape on the sheets where I and my material needs had been.” —Danielle Dutton, 2019Document will also be exhibiting <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/greg-stimac-amulet">Greg Stimac: Amulet</a> in Gallery 2.&nbsp;<h3>&nbsp;</h3><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418262/yf6vwb7p6onomw7u80tl.gif"><figcaption>Binky &amp; Tony Forever, 2009, Pigmented inkjet print, 37 x 43.25 inches, print, 38 x 44.25 inches, framed, Edition 6 of 6.</figcaption></figure><h3>Deana Lawson &amp; Dru Donovan</h3>Opening: Friday, Apr 19, 2019 5–7:30&nbsp;pm <a href="/organizations/rhona-hoffman-gallery--2">Rhona Hoffman Gallery</a>Deana&nbsp;Lawson is a photo-based artist whose work examines the body’s ability to channel personal and social histories, addressing themes of familial legacy, community, romance, and spiritual aesthetics. Her practice borrows from simultaneous visual traditions, ranging from photographic and figurative portraiture, social documentary aesthetics, and vernacular family album photographs.&nbsp;Lawson&nbsp;is visually inspired by the materiality of black culture and its expression as seen through the body and in domestic environments.&nbsp;Dru Donovan (b. St. Paul, MN) received a&nbsp;BFA&nbsp;in photography from California College of the Arts in 2004 and an&nbsp;MFA&nbsp;in photography from Yale School of Art in 2009, where she was awarded the Richard Benson prize for excellence. In 2011&nbsp;TBW&nbsp;Books published her first book, Lifting Water. She has said, "I use photography to look, interact, escape, control and be invited in and I decided that reinvestigating these moments in a similar way would help me make visual sense of what had happened. The act of revisiting and looking at these different gestures and then making photographs of these directed moments helped me to work through the mourning process and the complexities of the situation." Donovan lives and works in Portland, OR.&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418263/j4fazmnrlmc127w6lrpu.jpg"></figure><h3>Paul Nudd: Plastic Blastula</h3>Opening: Friday, Apr 19, 2019 5–8&nbsp;pm<a href="/organizations/western-exhibitions">Western Exhibitions</a>For his fourth solo show, Plastic Blastula, at Western Exhibitions, Paul Nudd presents a selection of large-scale paintings depicting an ambiguous and chaotic prenatal cosmic universe, densely populated by a series of many rapidly transforming and colliding embryonic cleavages. Collectively they can be seen as a forceful and monumental continuation of many of Nudd’s aesthetic and formal obsessions: bodies in distress, molecular anxiety, blobs and biomorphic abstraction, disease, malformation, mutation and uncontrollable biological forces.&nbsp;A blastula is a pre-embryonic cellular blob of matter that eventually morphs into a fetus. Plasticity similarly induces a development or transmutation of nature as plastic is created through a seemingly science-fiction derived embryonic mass production. Both blastulas and plastics can be deformed in any direction, but plastic differs from these pre-embryonic forms in that it is materially permanent and impenetrable. Plastic is unnatural and can be molded and stretched to fit in or around anything.&nbsp; If birth is rupture, plastic birth is rupture without rupture.In Nudd’s worldview, Plastic Blastula walks the line between cautionary apocalyptic tale and orgiastic revelry.Western Exhibitions is also opening the first show of work by <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/julia-schmitt-healy">Julia Schmitt Healy</a> featuring a selection of textile works from the early 1970s&nbsp;— a series of&nbsp;ballpoint on handkerchief drawings and a grouping of tufted watercolor on muslin pieces that exist somewhere between painting, pillows and soft sculpture.&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418264/uynvmodkpajv9ewvsyoc.png"><figcaption>Thomas Leinberger</figcaption></figure><h3>Thomas Weinberger: Interior</h3>Opening: Friday, Apr 19, 2019 6–8&nbsp;pm<a href="/organizations/volume-gallery">Volume Gallery</a>Thomas Leinberger is a designer based in Chicago, IL. He designs furniture, objects and installations out of his studio in Garfield Park. INTERIOR gives the viewer a considerable insight into Leinberger’s conceptual exploration of the interior and the role of objects in space. Inspired in part by his great interest in early modernist interior design and the continuum of designed objects, the pieces in the exhibition were first imagined as interventions in historical interiors, considering how they would activate in these environments and in turn, the space transformed by their introduction. These objects are conceived to participate in everyday functions of support and furbishing, yet they also possess autonomy outside of their utility.&nbsp; Leinberger’s continued interest in the monolith is evident throughout the exhibition. Their single forms lack signifiers of “furniture” other than their distinctly domestic scale and implied function. Their existence is not substantiated by the functionality, like a readymade who changes in context, these objects lend themselves to all kinds of speculative use. Through this work, Leinberger continues to exemplify design that resists the strict functionalism that’s associated with object design, instead, his work quietly invites us to imagine how an object is capable inexhaustible ways of being.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418265/i4hvk78yb328aufsg9fx.png"><figcaption>Amadeo Morelos</figcaption></figure><h3>Amadeo Morelos &gt; Reps</h3>Opening: Friday, Apr 19, 2019 5–8&nbsp;pm<a href="/organizations/paris-london-hong-kong">Paris London Hong Kong</a>Amadeo Morelos’ recent paintings depict grotesque figures pleading for sympathy and acclaim. Using humor and absurdity, he re-configures autobiographical symbols and the visual language of bodybuilding culture and Greek mythology to suffuses the mundane with fantastical proportions. As canvas is substituted with fabric reminiscent of posing trunks, these paintings recall an incomplete body that is built through external expectation. Morelos received his BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2016.&nbsp;</body></html>

Weekend Openings in West Town

By CGN Staff via CAC PR<figure class="image"><img src="https://marketing-image-production.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/1130ee4e33fb1cb72c5aded1ec7047113cdaa0af51f6edbe92390b766812977838fbce13af4531433b407f9a7052c7b927815db4416eb20b20efd9d26129efa1.jpg" alt=""></figure>This week Chicago Artists Coalition shared news of a new grant/award program to support emerging artists with unique support needs.&nbsp;CAC announced the 15 inaugural awardees for the&nbsp;SPARK&nbsp;Microgrant: a new, unrestricted award opportunity for emerging Chicago-based visual artists who identify as&nbsp;ALAANA (African, Latinx, Asian, Arab, Native American), an artist with acute financial need, an artist with a disability, or as a self-taught/non-formally trained artist who does not hold a degree from an art program but has made their art practice a primary vocation. With the generous support of the Joyce Foundation, the SPARK&nbsp;Microgrant&nbsp;offers 15 unrestricted awards of $2,000 each to recognize exceptional emerging artists working in Chicago.2019 awardees include Alexandra Antoine, Gregory Bae, Rose Blouin, Laksha Dantran, Coriama Davis, Kevin Demery, Ashley Freeby, Jacquelyn Guerrero, Candace Hunter, Liang Luscombe, SaraNoa Mark, Meida McNeil, Carlos Barberena de la Rocha, Dorian Sylvain and Chunbo Zhang.The selected artists span a diverse range of mediums and artistic practices. The unrestricted award seeks to alleviate some of the financial burdens associated with being a working artist today.&nbsp;To read all 2019 SPARK Microgrant awardee bios, <a href="https://u56787.ct.sendgrid.net/wf/click?upn=mPItHjtI7tOJrRgasA2r3ZrjKxhIn-2F77inofey5MtoeRgE-2B4NzqVTCc5mEe-2BOR-2FmmjR3USWXSknLVeLO6n95fKVZ3iFcX7rToF7kCGwAaF8-2FTTVnL6cS92LYTBnSkgOQlbhmKhqPEouNARHr8Ziilw-3D-3D_ccrt5mFyEURAsnSxeCM5PPo2atdxAGCaQlH-2BxhBeC2CXdtoRskmbVfOZI162ow-2FcFbRvHHXvmWFsiOTp9XtEo0OjuX5EiD9Xmkg0NMXMseSjBHAkxVNprg-2FL-2FcgKOGo9Fk-2FCwENkTM7BUWCEWUYQgZ4oOxOhWSu46GSn-2BxerbXodwMtRVtduBgS5AwCq2jXEI3zA4A9VHVDM0lB17-2FzWAfPHI93U3-2BxGZvBYYM92VhKJLxs5DAxyjMQJwKgP2pjYgJpoKjAohBv-2B8XuJh4CQ-2FBbmnc6GzjU9bGV466pxLZmNNfof3dlDl-2BBJMBDmL5j7D7O8EbbDlwt14vctsVVxqiLesEYsHJD6oHVafNUq9CspspDLXdGMO-2BQ-2BSH8khzBGkH5QJP9iiHTS6Te3tzeEJ-2FtSUC7-2FVsxyU3FFi2VkoKRKfUnKyTabfL-2FsKVY-2FCxF5">click here</a>.This program reaffirms CAC’s commitment to emerging artists of Chicago and demonstrates the organization’s desire to directly address the historical barriers that have prevented the arts in the city from reflecting its demographic. The SPARK&nbsp;Microgrant recognizes that the category of “emerging artist” is not necessarily defined by age but often a consequence of encountering systemic disadvantages perpetuated by discriminatory policies, structures and&nbsp;practices; or, by operating outside of an academic or institutional system.The inaugural cycle of the program received 186 applications that were juried by Rashayla Marie Brown, Sky Cubacub, Pemon Rami and Vincent Uribe.&nbsp;Caroline Older, Executive Director of&nbsp;CAC, notes, “We are grateful to be collaborating with the Joyce Foundation to create a program that directly supports and acknowledges artists as a vital part of the city’s arts ecosystem.”“Expanding funding for Chicago artists was among the top priorities outlined in the city’s cultural plan. The creation of this new&nbsp;microgrant&nbsp;program directly connects to that goal,” stated Tracie D. Hall, Director of the Joyce Foundation’s Culture Program. &nbsp;“We have truly visionary artists living and working in every neighborhood across the city. We hope that this new line of support will help bring some of their visions to life, for their individual benefit and that of their broader communities.”CAC&nbsp;hired Adia&nbsp;Sykes to manage and administer this new program. Sykes received her BA in Anthropology from the University of Chicago in 2016 and MA in Arts Administration and Policy from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2018. She works as an independent curator and arts administrator throughout Chicago and has previously realized projects with the Hyde Park Jazz Festival, Woman Made Gallery, ACRE Projects and the Chicago Mayor’s Office.More information on the SPARK Microgrant program can be found <a href="https://u56787.ct.sendgrid.net/wf/click?upn=lsHS5Knzzw6Kzie1hb3iMDg-2BRjG7Kdmk2lsOK-2FQzM7W1nTbJbyVhTQYxuMT-2BEbqphNi-2FHQRKOSNcf4-2Fokg42vH0DL-2Bgrh2wYDkYfoMOP390RhkIEV15V3ID2EylrFbT0n5rTcQzHkAY09ArTY0j4bYB4hVA44oj8Wr68IOUQFb4-3D_ccrt5mFyEURAsnSxeCM5PPo2atdxAGCaQlH-2BxhBeC2CXdtoRskmbVfOZI162ow-2FcFbRvHHXvmWFsiOTp9XtEo0OjuX5EiD9Xmkg0NMXMseSjBHAkxVNprg-2FL-2FcgKOGo9Fk-2FCwENkTM7BUWCEWUYQgZ4oOxOhWSu46GSn-2BxerbXodwMtRVtduBgS5AwCq2jXEI3zA4A9VHVDM0lB17-2FzWAfPHI93U3-2BxGZvBYYM92VhJwy9yFxEL5c2U3v7SO1qpq81We37r8A6rr-2FR1T9ZPYkrI5IgJXxM-2BgIaE-2BiKs3JJqVIcEflGZ5Xpe9bfctOUn6rPGvYb88vXjLE2CWwDVRQRcTcDkJIyDHzEUFm8hBfUKoLqEi0lJTqN-2FrId9VZ74YmzM9hf4jtcf3CbC8k-2FqlOEt2kU5Q3K8QJDSH0ecWG83-2FmCycXyB-2BCESWmZTuLjnd">here</a>.

CAC Awards 15 Artists New SPARK Microgrants

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418244/tdmezkev01mnygy24jdl.gif"><figcaption>Hebru Brantley's (new) mural is painted on 1401 North Milwaukee Avenue</figcaption></figure>By CGN STAFF via DCASE PRLast year some murals around the city were power washed (by the City, it turns out) into oblivion. As was the case for artist <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/news/2018/9/oops-i-had-to-do-it-again-hebru-brantley-repaints-mural-covered-by-city">Hebru Brantley</a>, he created a new mural in the original location, thanks to some private neighborhood funding. In order to prevent such incidents from happening again, the City began to consider a registry of public murals throughout Chicago.Yesterday the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events (DCASE) announced the launch of the City of Chicago Mural Registry, a publicly-accessible database of Chicago’s growing collection of murals found at <a href="http://icm-tracking.meltwater.com/link.php?DynEngagement=true&amp;H=I%2BqMhXDuIS2RujNbavWSOKShOr7Ezi73JeGvxlkJ09Qb0kDpZZQFeNpuUszPZOPpev69iwnbOgAmGaPx7GQTtNwQQRSqSssk9D4%2FSBccByrIq%2B0wicOUWdpZNZN4jf60dGPS%2FojzP%2Bk%3D&amp;G=0&amp;R=file%3A%2F%2F%2FC%3A%5CUsers%5C1845%5CDownloads%5Cchicago.gov%5Cmuralregistry&amp;I=20190415143616.00000183ddec%40mail6-46-ussnn1&amp;X=MHwxMDQ2NzU4OjVjYjQ4ZTBmNGZkZjUzZDhjMWY4YWM1ZTs%3D&amp;S=_pffQ14zp7bTvs6QytOFBmm4e3u76oaSVtpXgfJIR64">chicago.gov/muralregistry</a>. In October 2018, Mayor Rahm Emanuel and 2nd&nbsp;Ward Alderman Brian Hopkins introduced an ordinance to the City Council to create a registry of murals, including graffiti art. Maintained by the Public Art Program of the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events (DCASE), the Registry has been developed as a resource tool that will help communities identify, explore and preserve murals in our neighborhoods. As part of the registry’s release, DCASE will work with city agencies, aldermen, community groups, block clubs, chambers of commerce and residents to populate and promote the registry.“Chicago is home to talented artists, working across all mediums, creating public art and adding to the cultural fabric of our communities,” said Mayor Rahm Emanuel. “This registry will strengthen Chicago’s legacy of public art and enable artists to share their work with the world.”“Public art in Chicago is very much a part of the spirit and quality of life in neighborhoods throughout the city,” said Mark Kelly, Commissioner, Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events. “Not only will the new registry help protect these critical cultural assets, it will also create a portal for the public to access and explore where murals are located in every corner of the city.“The Mural Registry catalogues and acknowledges Chicago’s collection of murals and will include a growing list of completed murals created on both private and public property. Artists, organizations and property owners are encouraged to register completed murals by submitting an application. Accepted murals will be assigned a unique Mural Registration ID and will receive an official emblem from the City of Chicago.There are no fees associated with the Mural Registry. For the registration criteria and application, visit <a href="http://icm-tracking.meltwater.com/link.php?DynEngagement=true&amp;H=I%2BqMhXDuIS2RujNbavWSOKShOr7Ezi73JeGvxlkJ09Qb0kDpZZQFeNpuUszPZOPpev69iwnbOgAmGaPx7GQTtNwQQRSqSssk9D4%2FSBccByrIq%2B0wicOUWdpZNZN4jf60dGPS%2FojzP%2Bk%3D&amp;G=0&amp;R=file%3A%2F%2F%2FC%3A%5CUsers%5C400147.CITYOFCHICAGO%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CMicrosoft%5CWindows%5CTemporary%2520Internet%2520Files%5CContent.Outlook%5CKUMLQRIB%5Cchicago.gov%5Cmuralregistry&amp;I=20190415143616.00000183ddec%40mail6-46-ussnn1&amp;X=MHwxMDQ2NzU4OjVjYjQ4ZTBmNGZkZjUzZDhjMWY4YWM1ZTs%3D&amp;S=Nfm4bHo9K4_dNVgPHBK3Eq-rY_PlFAnpXRK3r6G3jrM">chicago.gov/muralregistry</a>.DCASE will hold two public information sessions about the Mural Registry and the registration process on Monday, April 22, from 5–6 p.m. and Tuesday, April 30, from 12–1 p.m. at the Chicago Cultural Center (78 E. Washington St.) in the Millennium Park Room, 5th&nbsp;Floor South. Artists, arts organizations and business/property owners are encouraged to attend.In 2017, the City of Chicago celebrated the "Year of Public Art," which culminated with hundreds of new works of public art throughout the city and the creation of Chicago’s first Public Art Plan. The new plan is a blueprint that will help shape the future of public art in Chicago and shift how we interact, talk about and support works of art that can be viewed by all. Chicago was one of the first municipalities in 1978 to implement an ordinance mandating that 1.33% of the cost of public buildings be set aside for the creation of original artwork.The Chicago Public Art Collection managed by DCASE includes more than 500 works of art exhibited in over 150 municipal facilities around the city, such as police stations, libraries, and CTA stations. The Collection provides the citizens of Chicago with an improved public environment and enhances city buildings and spaces with quality works of art by professional artists. For complete details on the Chicago’s Public Art Program, visit <a href="http://icm-tracking.meltwater.com/link.php?DynEngagement=true&amp;H=I%2BqMhXDuIS2RujNbavWSOKShOr7Ezi73JeGvxlkJ09Qb0kDpZZQFeNpuUszPZOPpev69iwnbOgAmGaPx7GQTtNwQQRSqSssk9D4%2FSBccByrIq%2B0wicOUWdpZNZN4jf60dGPS%2FojzP%2Bk%3D&amp;G=0&amp;R=file%3A%2F%2F%2FC%3A%5CUsers%5C1845%5CDownloads%5Cchicago.gov%5Cdcase&amp;I=20190415143616.00000183ddec%40mail6-46-ussnn1&amp;X=MHwxMDQ2NzU4OjVjYjQ4ZTBmNGZkZjUzZDhjMWY4YWM1ZTs%3D&amp;S=f8fe6H_CbZIC1ewHn6m0--c5aHETilZXDf-gS6kMjvE">chicago.gov/dcase</a>.</body></html>

Accidents Can Happen, So The City of Chicago Launches Mural Registry

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418246/vdyihucctpfvhd24ayn1.gif"></figure>&nbsp;Click to listen to the CGN Publisher's June 2019 <a href="https://wgnradio.com/2019/06/26/how-a-1989-fire-in-river-north-changed-the-art-community-for-years/">WGN Radio Interview</a> about the fire&nbsp;&nbsp;By GINNY VAN ALYEACGN Founder Natalie van Straaten contributed to this article.Photos © <a href="http://www.firescenes.net/?tag=river-north-art-gallery-fire-in-chicago">Jim Skrabel</a> &nbsp;To talk about the River North gallery fire, which happened 30 years ago today, on April 15, 1989, is to travel back in time to a period in Chicago that sounds oddly familiar: the decade heralded the arrival of a visionary art fair amidst a recession, followed by a resounding financial and real estate boom, set against a backdrop of rapid political and social change.1989 in Chicago capped a robust expansion of the local as well as international art market: John Wilson’s Art Expo debuted at Navy Pier in 1980; dozens of galleries moved to or opened in River North throughout the decade. The country enjoyed significant economic growth in the mid ‘80s, only to be gutted by the 1987 stock market crash. For a group of Chicago galleries, April 1989 literally burned it all down.A <a href="https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1989-04-16-8904040385-story.html">Chicago Tribune</a> article about the blaze from April 1989 reads, “Artwork estimated to be worth millions of dollars was turned into ash Saturday as fire destroyed a historic brick loft building, site of the largest redevelopment project to date in Chicago’s trendy River North district.”<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418247/bj1amwbaoaapuimyhid7.gif"></figure>Much of what has changed in River North in the last three decades can be traced back to that five alarm inferno. At the time River North was truly the heart of the art gallery scene. The fire obliterated an entire square block – bounded by Huron, Sedgwick, Orleans and Superior Streets – that contained nine galleries in a former manufacturing building. It smoldered for weeks, while the shock persisted and anger grew. While most of the galleries in the fire were resilient and reopened, the neighborhood changed. It was a couple of years before the vibrant spirit returned. The district continued to house the largest number of galleries in Chicago until the early 2000s, but gradually the block that burned became a site for townhouses and design firms, and new neighborhoods drew many galleries elsewhere in the city. &nbsp;&nbsp;Today the district is still home to more than a dozen galleries, with Zolla/Lieberman Gallery remaining as the only one from the group of nine that burned in the fire. Most of the galleries and people directly affected by the fire are no longer around or in the gallery business: Ann Nathan/Objects Gallery, Klein Gallery, Peter Miller Gallery, Sazama/Brauer, East West Contemporary, Rowe Company Fine Arts, van Straaten Gallery, and the original Habatat Gallery.A year after the fire, a follow up article in the Tribune relayed, “The city Fire Department never reached a determination on the cause of the fire,” spokesman Tom Shephard said... The evidence was so badly damaged, we couldn’t come up with a cause.”The destruction of art was ultimately the biggest casualty: a year’s worth of work by Zolla/Lieberman artist Chema Cobo was lost, and the entire estate of a deceased artist at Rowe was incinerated. For dozens of artists work up in smoke meant devastating personal losses, from irreplaceable art to financial lifelines. A tragedy that affected so many throughout the community is worthy of rememberance 30 years later.</body></html>

30 Years Later: The 1989 River North Fire

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418229/jpznmf1wt3y7qqk6s5ab.gif"></figure>Theaster Gates presents art installations at Red Line’s 95th Street stationThe final <a href="https://chicago.curbed.com/2017/7/13/15964470/chicago-95th-street-cta-red-line-terminal-theaster-gates-art">two art installations</a> at the Red Line’s 95th Street station were unveiled Monday morning. The two pieces by artist <a href="https://www.theastergates.com/">Theaster Gates</a> are part of the <a href="https://chicago.curbed.com/2019/1/4/18168913/cta-95th-street-terminal-complete-south-side">massive terminal overhaul</a>which wrapped up in January.The final touches on the train and bus station are a pair of tapestries of decommissioned fire hoses and a radio station with a performance space. Gates is an internationally recognized artist who’s had commissions and exhibits across the world, but it’s clear he has a soft spot for Chicago.“These things don’t happen in a vacuum,” Gates said at the announcement. “It takes a lot of people who believe in art and culture.”By Sara Freund, Curbed Chicago<a href="https://chicago.curbed.com/2019/4/8/18300520/theaster-gates-95th-street-terminal-art-installation">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418230/vbuegaxuh7rvhfxhy8mf.gif"></figure>10 Must-See Artists at AIPAD’s Photography ShowThe 39th edition of The Photography Show, presented by AIPAD, features work from a roster of artists as diverse as the images they shoot.By Alina Cohen, Artsy<a href="https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-10-must-see-artists-aipads-photography-04-04-19">Read More</a> &nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418231/pfxqxtn7l7bh3b35y39z.gif"></figure>Disruptive Design Contest Announces FinalistsA group of <a href="https://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/rahm-emanuel-interview-chicago-architecture-biennial">Chicago</a> organizations are on a mission to change the public’s perception of affordable housing and elevate design in the process. As part of this initiative, finalists were chosen in a <a href="https://www.disruptivedesign-chi.org/">Disruptive Design</a> competition, which challenged architects to envision “forward-thinking, viable solutions” for affordable housing in the city.By Rebecca Holland, Architectural Digest<a href="https://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/disruptive-design-contest-announces-finalists">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</body></html>

News From Around the Art World: April 9, 2019

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418158/olbqfio31rmodnhhqduw.gif"></figure><h2>The Art Institute of Chicago postponed an exhibition of Native American pottery</h2>The <a href="https://www.artsy.net/artic">Art Institute of Chicago</a> (AIC) has postponed its forthcoming exhibition of Native American pottery from the Southwestern United States over concerns that indigenous people were not sufficiently represented in the exhibition.&nbsp;Via Artsy News<a href="https://www.artsy.net/news">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418159/qgwhvj2ynny39vftrblp.gif"></figure><h2>UIC draws up plan to help train high school art&nbsp;teachers</h2>The University of Illinois at Chicago is giving students who want to become high school art teachers some help.The school <a href="https://today.uic.edu/uic-offers-bfa-in-art-education">says in a news release</a> that for the first time since 2010 it is giving students pursuing an undergraduate degree in studio art the opportunity to obtain a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Art Education — or BFAAE degree — along with a professional teaching license.By Associated Press, via Chicago Sun Times<a href="https://chicago.suntimes.com/entertainment/uic-help-train-high-school-art-teachers-bachelor-fine-arts-education/">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418160/cfqha4hzgfddhia59gah.gif"></figure><h2>Relax and immerse yourself... the art of experiencing museums slowly</h2>Where a protest against McDonald’s spawned the Slow Food movement, so the blockbuster exhibition has inspired a Slow Art&nbsp;resistance. Anyone who&nbsp;has visited a “once-in-a-lifetime” exhibition will be familiar with the exhausting routine: queueing at the entrance, jostling with crowds around the masterpieces, fighting falling energy&nbsp;levels and mounting frustration. If photography is permitted, throw selfie sticks and&nbsp;Instagram posers into the mix too.By Hannah McGivern, The Art Newspaper<a href="https://www.theartnewspaper.com/feature/slow-down-relax-and-immerse-yourself">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</body></html>

News From Around the Art World: April 2, 2019

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418181/yh02zpszue129fjdmzt6.jpg"><figcaption>A show of new paintings by Karl Wirsum opens at Corbett vs Dempsey Friday, April 5</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;By GINNY VAN ALYEA&nbsp;The&nbsp;first week of April continues an active year in galleries that began at the start of 2019, nearly three months ago already.&nbsp;Beginning Thursday, April 4 and continuing through Friday night, several exhibitions and events take place that you don't want to miss, many featuring artists who are exploring significant issues of our time. Unlike during the fall in the Chicago, spring gallery shows aren't competing directly with the specter of art fairs and biennials. This time of year, as the body as well as the mind begins to wake up, seize the opportunity to emerge from hibernation and encounter shows featuring work by up-and-coming artists as well as art world stars. Now you may have the time to visit and contemplate the many images and messages that are being presented.&nbsp;April already heralds a lot of good and important things to come in these warmer months, and new art may be found throughout the city's neighborhoods and into the suburbs as well.Some highlights are listed below, and our full calendar may be viewed&nbsp;<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events">here</a>.&nbsp;Much is planned in the coming days and weeks, including the summer issue of CGN in early May, so forgive us if our news slows down for a little while as we get the next edition of the magazine off to the printer later this month.Enjoy the arrival of spring and all there is to see in the galleries!&nbsp;<h3>&nbsp;</h3><h2>Theaster Gates: Every Square Needs a Circle</h2><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418181/x8wsokwtjwd04pcwh4lx.gif"><figcaption>Theaster Gates (b. 1973), Progress Mill,&nbsp;2018, Neon, 38 1/2 x 38 1/2 x 4 3/4 inches, 97.8 x 97.8 x 12.1 cm</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;• April 4–June 29 at Richard Gray Gallery, <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/organizations/richard-gray-gallery-gray-warehouse">Gray Warehouse</a> – West Town (Opening April 4)Every Square Needs a Circle, a&nbsp;solo exhibition of new sculpture, film, installation, and neon work by Theaster Gates opens this Thursday night at Gray Warehouse with a reception for the artist from 6-8 PM.The exhibition marks a continuation of Gates’s long engagement with the work of American sociologist W.E.B. Du Bois, whose examination of genius and progress in Black America from Emancipation to the mid-20th century has been a source of inspiration for the artist. Placing his interest in poetics and the weighty history of objects, Gates debuts a multi-faceted installation that bridges the work of Du Bois with architectural excerpts from Chicago, expounding on the archives that hold and preserve records of Black intelligence.Relating moments from art history to stories of quotidian labor, Every Square Needs a Circle is a rumination on materials, time and repetition.&nbsp;&nbsp;<h2>Karl Wirsum: New Paintings</h2><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418182/dncmqysnojkqu49lxwo1.jpg"><figcaption>Karl Wirsum, Geezer Gazing Geyser, 40 x 18 inches (Geysey), 41 x 31 inches (Geezer)</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;• April 5–June 22 at <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/organizations/corbett-vs-dempsey">Corbett vs Dempsey</a> – West Town (Opening April 5)Karl Wirsum, an original member of the Hairy Who is a legendary figure in Chicago art. This is the first exhibition of Wirsum’s new work in six years and Corbett vs Dempsey's first show of new works by the artist.&nbsp;<h2>Genevieve Gaignard: Black White and Red All Over</h2><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418183/ncwxgvcm8fkcxf2dmwym.gif"></figure>&nbsp;• April 5–May 24 at <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/organizations/monique-meloche-gallery">Monique Meloche Gallery</a> – West Town (Opening April 5)Black White and Red All Over is Genevieve Gaignard’s first solo show with the gallery, and her first in Chicago. The exhibition will focus on the artist’s new body of mixed media works on panel and will include a new site-specific installation. Arising out of her well-known photographic and installation-based series, these new works convey a declaratively political angle through novel formal means.Gaignard explores issues of race, class, and femininity using an uncanny humor befitting these concepts’ duality as both weighty markers of identity and unfixed values traded fluidly in popular culture. As a biracial woman in America, Gaignard investigates the aesthetic and cultural divide between black and white, a chasm as palpable as it is “invisible.” As an artist interested in the varying incremental shades that exist between, and inadequately define, these markers, Gaignard’s practice hinges on composites: of identities, experiences, appearances, materials.<h2>&nbsp;</h2><h2>Herman Aguirre</h2><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418184/j8n3h3kngbcgdwrnbnur.jpg"><figcaption>Herman Aguirre, Cenizas nada mas, 2018, oil and acrylic / acrylic skins on canvas, 72" x 48"</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;• April 5–May 4 at <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/organizations/zolla-lieberman-gallery">Zolla/Lieberman Gallery</a> – River North (Opening April 5)&nbsp; Painter Herman Aguirre uses representation and abstraction to bring texture to the depictive and affective aspects of an image. He uses various techniques and materials to investigate charged subjects in order to prompt the sense of fragility of human existence. Through the use of symbolism and metaphor, he depicts images that convey respect, love, and honor in commemoration for “those who are not with us but are around us”. Paintings are executed using references from an archival collection of images, including the images of victims of the Mexican drug war, as well as his own family photographs and souvenirs. The body of work reflects the psychological and physical trauma faced as an observer, creator, and family member. The objects, images, and events that build up the world that surrounds him become conduits for ideas. Constantly wrestling: his painting process becomes a confused, frustrated, and overwhelmed accumulation of impasto, which not only gives value to the image, but also allows for its proper burial. At last, reaching tranquility and peace.<h2>&nbsp;</h2><h2>Frances Cox &amp; Michael Noland: A World Apart</h2><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418185/yqvbmanphvb4yy6qjty2.gif"><figcaption>Michael Noland, American Flood, Oil on linen</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;• April 5–25 at <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/organizations/hofheimer-gallery">Hofheimer Gallery</a> – Ravenswood (Opening April 5)&nbsp;Hofheimer Gallery presents a show featuring the work of Frances Cox and Michael Noland, two artists who feature color and pattern strongly in their work.Frances Cox keeps redefining landscape and still life in an invented and abstract vocabulary.&nbsp;Michael Noland’s work is influenced by Chicago Imagism and traditional American scenes. He creates portraits of flora and fauna, rendered exotic with vibrant hues and colors richly layered. In Michael’s paintings are a dynamic push and pull of forms often unexpected and inventive.<h2>&nbsp;</h2><h2>A Month of Sundays</h2><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418186/iq7nrrcqtcmzpitcxlee.jpg"><figcaption>Patty Kirk</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;• Opening April 5 at <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/organizations/the-dime">The Dime</a> – Wicker Park (Opening April 5)&nbsp;Patty Kirk has been painting since childhood, and now at the age of 61 she is having her first one woman show. Kirk's paintings speak to her strong Catholic faith and spirituality and an adherence to the primacy of family. They also invoke thoughts of that which is unseen, a pursuit of the invisible, an invocation to the spirits which are a foundational element of her faith.&nbsp;<h2>&nbsp;</h2><h2>This Stillness</h2><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418187/avn6xn85lwlcbiy1xhr5.jpg"><figcaption>Image: Vanessa German, A Love Powm to Nia Wilson #2 (detail), 2018</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;• April 4–May 5 at <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/organizations/intuit-the-center-for-intuitive-and-outsider-art">Intuit</a> – West Town (Opening April 4)A new exhibition opens at Intuit on Thursday evening. Curated by Jamillah HinsonThis Stillness is an exploration into the complexities of Black girlhood and womanhood and the quiet reflections of self that arise from these circumstances. The exhibition goes beyond the contemporary use of a traditional Black American art form—assemblage—and delves into themes of autonomy, self-reflection, and the dehumanization of Black women and girls. At the same time, the exhibition serves as an archive of personal, familial and cultural identity. This Stillness explores mediums often found in the practice of Black American female artists who are re-piecing histories, narratives and memories that were not allowed to flourish in the past.<h2>&nbsp;</h2><h2>Abstractly Speaking</h2><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418188/qeu1f7jcaqpsj8ipmpgv.jpg"></figure>&nbsp;• April 5–27 at <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/organizations/woman-made-gallery--2">Woman Made Gallery</a> – Pilsen (Opening April 5)Woman Made Gallery (WMG) presents Abstractly Speaking, highlighting art which is non representational and unconcerned with literal depiction, instead relying&nbsp;on the visual language of form, color, line, texture, mark-making and process, as a means to an end. Artists include: Peggy Breidenbach, Marian Carow, Carolyn Cronin Hughes, Susan Dickman, Camillia Elci, Carol Estes, Nancy Ferro, Lisa Flowers Ross, Heather Gallegos-Rex, Darcy Gerbarg, Nina Ghanbarzadeh, Margie Glass Sula, Monica Goldsmith, Celia Greiner, Mille Guldbeck, Maki Hajikano, Julie Henry, Kelly Hensen, Jamie Kost, Ginny Krueger, Court Lurie, Robin Malpass, Elyse Martin, Joan McLane, Katherine Nemanich, Louise Pappageorge, Sonia Pratt, Olivia Rozdolsky, Sabine Senft, Kathie Shaw and Kathleen Waterloo. Juried by gallerist Melanee Cooper.&nbsp;&nbsp;<h2>6-Year Anniversary Group Show</h2><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418189/nflueb7pnsym6i2abp4i.jpg"><figcaption>Hebru Brantley</figcaption></figure>• April 6–27 at <a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/events/6-year-anniversary-group-show">Vertical Gallery</a> – West Town/Ukrainian Village (Opening April 6)The gallery presents a special exhibition celebrating its 6-year anniversary. The show will feature over 40 artists - local, national &amp; international - from 14 different countries with artistic styles that have shaped the gallery’s programming over the years. Since opening its doors at 1016 N. Western Avenue in 2013, Vertical has presented ambitious exhibitions with work influenced by street art, urban environments, graffiti, pop culture, graphic design and illustration. With 10 to 12 group and solo shows per year, plus participation in major international art fairs, Vertical Gallery has featured over 300 different artists from around the world in its exhibitions.</body></html>

Color and Concepts Fill Galleries this April

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418190/gsexqjpi9tphulvnw1hu.gif"></figure><h2>Laurie Simmons’s Works at Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago</h2>Over four decades, <a href="https://www.blouinartinfo.com/artists/laurie-simmons-169787">Laurie Simmons</a>’s accomplished series have wrestled with image culture, object fetishization, gender roles — and, more recently, non-binary identity. In the current survey of the artist’s work, “<a href="https://www.blouinartinfo.com/artists/laurie-simmons-169787">Laurie Simmons</a>: Big Camera/Little Camera” (on view until May 5), the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago is presenting her photography alongside three films (one of which features vintage puppets, the actress Meryl Streep, and Alvin Ailey dancers) plus a sculptural installation.By Sarah Moroz, Blouin Art Info<a href="https://www.blouinartinfo.com/news/story/3599155/laurie-simmonss-works-at-museum-of-contemporary-art-chicago">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418191/orsq2le6olmbwiqaukx9.gif"></figure><h2>High school seniors awarded college scholarships for artwork</h2>Though their artistic talent was recently recognized in academic circles, the students have said their goals include a military career and entrepreneurship while not forsaking art.By Steve Sadin, Lincolnshire Review via Chicago Tribune<a href="https://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/lincolnshire/ct-lsr-students-arts-scholarships-tl-0328-story.html">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418193/xqpv94zomzkxvbcchhh0.gif"></figure><h2>Discovered After 70, Black Artists Find Success, Too, Has Its Price</h2>McArthur Binion had been creating art almost completely under the radar for four decades, handling his own occasional sales and raising two children in Chicago on a teaching salary.Now, Mr. Binion has been fully embraced by the mainstream art world — at the age of 72. His dealer is a prominent Chelsea gallery. Museums and international collectors are snapping up his large canvases, minimalist grids painted in oil stick over collages of personal documents.By Hilarie M. Sheets, The New York Times<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/23/arts/design/black-artists-older-success.html">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</body></html>

News From Around the Art World: March 26, 2019

<html><head></head><body>&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418147/dcrpgljiymt233xrqt0k.jpg"><figcaption>Chicago Cultural Center. Courtesy Chicago Architecture Center</figcaption></figure>By GINNY VAN ALYEAIs it a biennial? Or should we call it a Biennale?A slip of the tongue by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, which turned into a joke, revealed that as this thoroughly American city, recognized for its abundance of significant architecture, prepares to host the third Chicago Architecture Biennial (yes, that's part of the official usage, vs the Italian word for every other year) it hopes to engage with a global audience in talking about new concepts and practices in the field.&nbsp;Last week the Chicago Architecture Biennial announced the first group of contributors to the 2019 edition, which will open this fall. Titled ...and other such stories, the biennial will form an expansive and multi-faceted exploration of the field of architecture and the built environment.&nbsp;At the event at the Chicago Cultural Center on Thursday, a large crowd came in from the rain to gather in Preston Bradley Hall under the morning's stand–in for the sun, the intricate and illuminated Tiffany dome. The outgoing Mayor Emanuel kept things light, reminding the crowd that they were visiting Commissioner of Cultural Affairs Mark Kelly's 'house', and that Kelly most likely has the nicer office between the two. Emanuel went on to emphasize that spaces and built environments are important in the lives of many and in multiple contexts. The Chicago Architecture Biennial is a means of bringing culture to the citizens who live in all 77 neighborhoods of the city. This event, said Emanuel, puts Chicago on the global stage along with Paris, London, Berlin, LA and New York, among many others.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418148/mvd4dtubzbw98lwvylua.jpg"><figcaption>© Chicago Architecture Biennial / Marcin Cymmer, 2019</figcaption></figure>When Kelly spoke at the event, he shared that in thinking about this next CAB he wanted others to remember that Chicago has made notable efforts to make the city a space for conversation and public creativity in recent years. He cited how the Chicago River has been reclaimed as a public space, the River Walk has been completed, as well as the 606 Trail. More pedestrian bridges have been built. Groundwork has been laid in order to foster ideas and public contributions from area artists like Theaster Gates, Nick Cave, and Hebru Brantley. For Kelly a critical component of these examples is that they are public and they are free. They allow us all to explore and understand our common ground.More opportunities lie ahead for dialogue that can not only benefit Chicago but other urban communities. Dare we say that the mayor must have learned a critical lesson about the true value of public art last year when the public loudly and effectively cried out to prevent the sale of Kerry James Marshall's Knowledge and Wonder.&nbsp;Now Director Yesomi Umolu and co-curators Sepake Angiama and Paulo Tavares are tasked with overseeing the group of contributors who will produce meaningful new commissioned projects for the Biennial. Early highlights are:• Reflections on landscapes belonging and sovereignty that challenge existing, narrow definitions of land as property and commodity from Wolff Architects (Capetown, South Africa), Territorial Agency – John Palmesino and Ann-Sofi Ronnskog (London, UK) and Theaster Gates (Chicago).&nbsp;• Explorations of sites of memory – and the politics of remembering and/or forgetting in contested spaces – by contributors CAMP (Mumbai, India), Center for Spatial Research (New York, NY), MASS Design Group (Boston, MA/Poughkeepsie, NY/Kigali, Rwanda), Tanya Lukin Linklater and Tiffany Shaw-Collinge (Ontario, Canada and Alberta, Canada) and Wednelien van Oldenborgh (Rotterdam, Netherlands)The Chicago Architecture Biennial is the largest architecture and design exhibition in North America. The exhibition is free and open to the public. Over the coming months the Biennial will announce the full list of contributors and key programming for this year's edition.&nbsp;Whatever you call it, the Chicago Architecture Biennial promises to construct a provocative and engaging means of welcoming visitors from around the world in just a few months.&nbsp;&nbsp;The Biennial will take place from September 19 through January 5, 2020, and the opening with align with the eighth annual EXPO CHICAGO, which will run September 19–22, 2019 at Navy Pier.For more information visit <a href="http://chicagoarchitecturebiennial.org">chicagoarchitecturebiennial.org</a></body></html>

You Say Biennial, The Mayor Says Biennale

<html><head></head><body>By RILEY YAXLEYSometimes, I loathe working in the arts.I rarely admit this sentiment, because doing so makes me feel ungrateful for the incredible opportunities and experiences that I’ve had in the arts, especially whenever I hear people &nbsp;romanticize a career in the arts and the gift of distance from the mundanity of a corporate career. How could I dare to not adore working in the arts?Anne Carson writes in her book ​Eros: The Bittersweet t​hat “no one in love really believes that love will end... They are astonished when they fall in love, they are equally astonished when they fall out of love.”&nbsp;Last time this year I had just started working part-time at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago as a Visitor Services Associate. I worked every Tuesday and Thursday until 10:30pm. Maurizio Cattelan’s ​Felix ​– a 26 foot tall skeletal sculpture of a cat – was on view in the MCA’s Kovler Atrium, which I had to cross through in order to leave each day. One night on my way out I stopped for a moment in the atrium, alone except for the distant, musical commotion of Michigan Avenue traffic. The sculpture was lit only by the dim glow of auxiliary lighting and, while standing there admiring the absurd polyvinyl resin and fiberglass feline, I felt a tingling warmth in my chest, despite mid-January's bitter cold. I had fallen in love.Less than six months later, however, I recall feeling completely disillusioned. I was burnt out. I had just completed my undergraduate program at DePaul University, and I was &nbsp;working at the newly opened Wrightwood 659, doing an internship at Intuit: The Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art, pitching an ambitious new interview series for CGN, and also starting an internship at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago. Each morning I begrudgingly climbed out of bed, making sure to grab everything I would need for a twelve hour day of working. I had fallen out of love.Recently I was again reminded why I adore working in the arts when I attended the opening of ​object / item / material / me,​ an exhibition curated by Graham Feyl. I ​<a href="https://www.chicagogallerynews.com/news/2018/7/art-is-graham-feyl">interviewed​ Graham</a> about this exhibition for Chicago Gallery News in July 2018 and was now ecstatic that the eight artists and their work had finally found a physical space in which to be shown. When I first sat down with Graham for the 2018 interview, we met at Fork, an American fare restaurant in Lincoln Square and we talked for nearly two hours, exhausting a number of topics that veered back and forth between the professional and the personal. At the time we both expressed our common frustrations and joys of doing the work that we do, but to write my first interview I was skeptical of whether or not I could communicate the personal perspectives. I resolved recently that it is exactly these experiences that are perhaps the most fruitful things I can write about.So here I am now, writing about what it's like to fall in and out of, and then back in love with art again.Through a partnership between The Overlook and Annas, a gallery space and curatorial residency at 629 W Cermak, object / item / material / me opened on January 26 and will close on February 24th.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418145/bi1woii6ekiwb6gktiz3.gif"><figcaption>Installation view of&nbsp;object/ item/ material/ me&nbsp;at Annas, L to R Julia Arredondo&nbsp;Give Me Space hats, 2018&nbsp;HOME PROTECTION AMULET (aka Stay Away), 2018, Jennifer Sova&nbsp;men with children, Selections from a Living Archive, 2016 and Janelle Miller&nbsp;Building Virtue: A Study&nbsp;(2017-)</figcaption></figure>A paralyzing snow storm barreled into Chicago on the opening night of ​object / item / material / me. I spent nearly an hour and a half in an uber, inching along the Kennedy Expressway from my apartment in Lincoln Square down to the exhibition in Chinatown. I was half expecting an empty gallery space, assuming that the majority of people would have given up because of the weather. So I was surprised when I arrived and saw that the large, warehouse–style space was so crowded I could barely push my way past the entryway. Nearly 100 people attended the opening, rivalling some of the more traditional gallery openings that I’ve been to in the past few years.In the hallway outside the gallery, there was a large bucket filled with ice and IPA beer, which I drank, but I can’t remember if I enjoyed it or not. I was accosted by several co-workers from the MCA almost immediately, and for the rest of the night I bounced around the space like a silver marble flung around inside a pinball machine. I was overjoyed to run into Jenn Sova, the founder of The Overlook, and to have the opportunity to view ​men with children,​ an ongoing series where Jenn collects photos from thrift stores, online, and from friends to explore relationships between men and children.&nbsp;I took photos with Janelle Miller and her ​Building Virtue: A Study (2017-cont.)​, an ongoing project where Janelle collects fans that used to be used during service by churchgoers in African American churches. The fans were mounted on a wall that had been painted a delicate lavender in a shape reminiscent of a church’s stained glass window.&nbsp;I admired Kimberly English’s ​Love is, e​xcited to see the work in person and not merely as the background on the exhibition flyer. ​Love is​ is made from a deconstructed t-shirt with only the outline of the skeletal hem remaining with price tags that reflect where the garment has been and how its value has decreased over time.&nbsp;I congratulated Graham on having brought the exhibition to fruition and having rallied such a supportive, engaged community around the work.Since the opening was scheduled to end at 9pm, the director of Annas had to loudly, and forcefully, announce that the gallery space would be closing but that the group would be moving to Skylark, a quaint, cash-only bar a block away. I didn’t follow everyone to the bar, because I was headed to a friend’s birthday party nearby, but a sizable crowd did leave together to trudge through the snow to continue the night and the conversation. An enthusiastic and loving community had rallied around a new exhibition.<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418146/btaqz5u8sfrczewk8zyy.gif"><figcaption>Kimberly English,&nbsp;Love is, 2018&nbsp;&nbsp;</figcaption></figure>I was practically giddy on my uber ride home, grinning like a child that has been told they can stay up late and watch TV on a weeknight. I could not remember the last time an art event gave me that elation. I remember going to bed thinking, “How lucky am I?”I had fallen in love again.&nbsp;&nbsp;</body></html>

Art Is... The Bittersweet

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418168/iggwjm01cr6gcrim7zir.gif"></figure><h3>EXPO CHICAGO Expands Curatorial Exchange Program, Announces Details For 2019 Edition</h3>Expo Chicago, the city’s international exposition of contemporary and modern art, has partnered with Red Bull Arts Detroit to bring more international curators to the Detroit and Chicago area. The Red Bull Arts Detroit Global Curatorial Initiative, an expansion of Expo Chicago’s existing program, will offer mid-career and established curators the opportunity to participate in the eighth annual exposition, which will take place at the Navy Pier from September 19 to September 22, coinciding with the Chicago Architecture Biennial.Via ArtForum<a href="https://www.artforum.com/news/expo-chicago-expands-curatorial-exchange-program-announces-details-for-2019-edition-78831">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418170/ecricdx8jl2zjtkqcda1.gif"></figure><h3>Artist shares watercolor techniques at Elmhurst museum</h3>Joe Rizzo strives to evoke joy in his work. “I find that childlike, unrealistic, unbounded joy can be expressed through color alone,” Rizzo says in his Artist Statement. The suburban artist has found joy in the creation process through two techniques that he will share with his audience at a free demonstration of monoprinting and marbleizing paper at 7 p.m. on March 21 at the Elmhurst Art Museum. The event is sponsored by the Elmhurst Artists’ Guild.By Myrna Petlicki, Chicago Tribune<a href="https://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/elmhurst/news/ct-fhj-ent-joe-rizzo-0314-story.html">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418171/drghzaohgv8gorfr9ock.gif"></figure><h3>Space p11 adds to Chicago’s underground art and architecture scene</h3>“The pedway is an exquisite corpse,” said Space p11 director Jonathan Solomon of the assembly of underground spaces that make up Chicago’s Pedway, the subterranean home of the new design and architecture-focused gallery. “We are looking to encourage the many institutions above to take ownership and make the pedway a space for culture.” That notion of ownership, or perceived lack thereof, along with substandard signage, uneven maintenance and concentration of urban odors causes many Chicagoans to shame the pedway.By Elizabeth Blasius, The Architects Newspaper<a href="https://archpaper.com/2019/02/p11-chicago-pedway/">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<h3>The artistry behind protecting and repairing photographs</h3>Within the walls of the Art Institute of Chicago resides one of the nation's foremost collections of photography. Here, works by 20th century masters such as Alfred Stieglitz and Walker Evans share space with daguerreotypes from the earliest days of the medium. For a collection this size and quality to be fit for the viewing public, hours of painstaking work is required behind the scenes.By Jeffrey Brown, PBS News Hour<a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/the-artistry-behind-protecting-and-repairing-photographs">Read More</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</body></html>

News From Around the Art World: March 5, 2019

<html><head></head><body><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418118/gqx7gucil5dr9gtajra8.jpg"><figcaption>The MoCP Silent Auction on Thursday, February 28</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;The Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College Chicago (MoCP) held DARKROOM, their annual benefit auction, on&nbsp;Thursday, February 28 at Venue SIX10, bringing in over $230,000 to support the museum. Funds raised at DARKROOM will provide critical support for the museum's exhibitions, collections, and community engagement initiatives in 2019. Highlights of the evening included a VIP hour conversation between MoCP chief curator and deputy director Karen Irvine and Silver Camera Awardee Lalla Essaydi about Essaydi’s photographic contributions. &nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418119/bcpinzs69efuuhn81zaa.jpg"><figcaption>(From left) Karen Irvine, MoCP chief curator and deputy director; Lalla Essaydi, MoCP Silver Camera Awardee; Bob Wislow, chair of the MoCP Advisory Board</figcaption></figure>Other high points of the evening included a ceremony honoring artist Lalla Essaydi with the Silver Camera Award, followed by a rousing Raise the Paddle, that raised over $20,000 to support MoCP education initiatives, including expanded teen programs and a bus subsidy program aimed at bringing more Chicago Public School students to the museum from underserved communities. Co-chaired by Ted Keim and Marisa Murillo, with honorary co-chairs Bill and Vicki Hood, DARKROOM 2019 hosted over 300 guests, who enjoyed an elegant evening celebration of photography while supporting the Museum of Contemporary Photography, the only museum of its kind in the region.The silent auction this year featured photography by Lalla Essaydi, Sandro Miller, Doug Fogleson, and Beate Gütschow, among many others.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418120/howpfialte1iaa9touix.gif"><figcaption>Sandro Miller, Green Marylin, 2014</figcaption></figure><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418121/nry3vq2t9ys74hlhzv2w.gif"><figcaption>Lalla Essaydi, Les Femmes du Maroc #22B, 2005</figcaption></figure><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418126/cwo1ol8thlsbptv9znsc.gif"><figcaption>Doug Fogelson, Forms and Records No. 5, 2014</figcaption></figure><figure class="image"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1721418127/uc1l95ug0nemdfduoeyq.gif"><figcaption>Beate Gütschow, HC#5, 2018</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;&nbsp;</body></html>