Hey Chicago! The Fall gallery season has just began. There are so many great openings all around the city. To celebrate, I made a list of my recommended choices for the weekend of September 10 to 13th. With 15 items, I think this is the longest list I have ever done and that includes only a portion of all there is to see this weekend. Make plans, get out and enjoy the opening season. See you around town!
Thursday, Sept 10
1. Jane Addams Birthday Celebration Featuring the 96 Acres Project and Mariame Kaba
Jane Addams Hull-House Museum
800 S Halsted St, Chicago, Illinois 60607
Performances led by artists Patricia Nguyen and Luis Tubensthroughout the house. DJ Tess spins Slo’Mo style jams. Birthday cupcakes for all.
Hear from the 96 Acres Project and artist Maria Gaspar about their latest art installation at Hull-House. They will describe how they use art and collective actions to investigate the Cook County Jail wall as a social, political, and psychological frame, imagine and reflect on new alternatives, and grapple with the voices and personal stories located on both sides of the jail wall.
Hull-House is delighted to present this year’s distinguished speaker, Mariame Kaba. With power, vision, and commitment, Mariame Kaba inspires us to fight for a more just world. Mariame is an organizer, educator and curator who has been a voice in numerous social movements for prison abolition, racial justice, gender justice, and transformative justice. She is the founder and director of Project NIA, a grassroots organization with a vision to end youth incarceration, and a co-founder numerous organizations including the Chicago Freedom School and the Chicago Taskforce on Violence against Girls and Young Women.
Friday, Sept 11
2. Nina Rizzo “You Are Here” and Doug Fogelson “Broken Cabinet”
Linda Warren Projects
327 N Aberdeen, Suite 151, Chicago, Illinois 60607
Linda Warren Projects is pleased to usher in the fall gallery season with two solo exhibitions by gallery artists Nina Rizzo and Doug Fogelson. For Rizzo, the notion of “environment” is at the crux of her exhibition, “You Are Here” (Gallery Y), with a new body of paintings exploring various sites, as far reaching as Iceland and as close to home as her very own studio. In “Broken Cabinet” (Gallery X), Fogelson too looks to environment, though for him, soon to be extinct flora and fauna are the subjects of his camera-less photograms.
Throughout her global travels, Chicago-based artist Nina Rizzo sees paintings in her surroundings. While many painters identify potential subject matter from the world around them, Rizzo recognizes compositions that resemble the hallmarks of the art historical canon: a monochromatic beach recalling de Kooning’s white on black pieces, or the Albers-esque medieval French gameboard of Jeu de Marelle. This “naturally occurring” formalism appears not only in the landscapes of far-flung locales, but also within the context of the everyday.
In “Broken Cabinet,” Chicago artist Doug Fogelson highlights a disconnect between humans and the natural world. In his photograms, the artist places organic items like coral, coyote claws, moths and fox skulls upon photosensitive materials to create candy-colored shadows of these artifacts. Bringing the natural world into the manmade, Fogelson calls attention to the impact that mankind has on the environment; exhibiting the photograms beneath partially shattered glass, the artist emphasizes the fact that it’s most often at the hand of humans that various organisms are undergoing extinction.
3. EXCERPTS FROM A FADING BLOOM: An Exhibition by Jason Hawk
Jackson Junge Gallery
1389 N Milwaukee Ave, Chicago, Illinois 60622
Excerpts from a Fading Bloom is a collection of work by Jason Hawk that examines the developing layers of our society. The sculptural landscapes he creates expose a layered civilization, an evolving cultural dialogue built upon once powerful objects that are abandoned for the next glittering status symbol. Hawk finds beauty in the crumbling ruins that were once deemed the pinnacle of our society—museums, nightclubs and shopping malls all fractured and decayed, defaced by bad graffiti—a cultural battleground where ideas and movements wrestle for dominance.
Jason Hawk explains, “In all of my work there are captured moments of allegory and cultural discourse. The work is almost always wrapped in the shell of beauty that’s hiding some sickening inevitability or truth. Like a milk dud: candy on the outside, poison on the inside.”
4. AMFM Magazine & Stolen Photography present: TWICE.EXPOSED
Cultura in Pilsen
1900 S Carpenter St, Chicago, Illinois 60608
A photography exhibition of Chicago artists showcasing a mixture of documentary work. In this show, we will explore the genre of visual story-telling. Throughout time, these photographers have dedicated their work to discover the world around us, what affects us, molds us, and to know the world inside and out.
Henri Cartier-Bresson – “I believe that, through the act of living, the discovery of oneself is made concurrently with the discovery of the world around us, which can mold us, but which can also be affected by us. A balance must be established between these two worlds–The one inside us and the one outside of us”
PHOTOGRAPHERS: Jennifer Yu, Sebastian Hidalgo, Jose Calvo, AiLinh Nguyen, Nicole S Hester, Jay Holland, Christopher Del Rosario, Joshua Lee, Oscar Arriola
5. INsite ONview featuring artwork by Luftwerk and photography by Kate Joyce
Matthew Rachman Gallery
1659 W CHICAGO AVE, Chicago, Illinois 60622
In October 2014, Luftwerk transformed Mies van der Rohe’s historic Farnsworth House into a revelatory canvas of light and sound through their installation titled “INsite”, resulting in a reanimation of our understanding and appreciation of an iconic architectural space. The four-night installation acted as an exploration into Mies van der Rohe’s architectural philosophy through a dynamic display of light, video-mapped in such a way as to engage the structure of the house, the fluidity of its transparent glass walls, and the organic – where natural form meets man’s geometry.
This fall, Matthew Rachman Gallery will present “INsite ONview” featuring artwork by Luftwerk and photography of the 2014 installation of “INsite” by Kate Joyce. INsite ONview is an exhibition of limited edition photographs and dynamic, kinetic ephemera based on the installation, its documentation, and further musings on the storied house.
6. Chrome Green
Heaven Gallery
1550 N Milwaukee Ave 2nd Fl, Chicago, Illinois 60622
“The sky above the port was the color of television tuned to a dead station.”
-William Gibson, first line of Neuromancer
We never see the natural world exactly as it is; we see it as we hope it will be or fear it might be. Chrome Green features contemporary artists who engage with nature and explores how different minds experience and relate to their natural environment in an era of technological wonders and ecological anxiety.
Chrome Green is curated by James Kao and Laura Mackin and features the following artists: Andrew Chuani-Ho, Shawn Decker, Pamela Feldman, Howard Fonda, Jo Hormuth, Isabella Kendrick, Lilly McElroy, David Robbins, Nathaniel Robinson, Claire Sherman
Saturday, Sept 12
7. Oranges at Midnight
Sidetracked Studio
707 Chicago Ave, Evanston, Illinois 60202
Victorian Noir, Tom Waits, and the Tooth Fairy at Sidetracked Studio. Sidetracked Studio is proud to present Oranges at Midnight, an exhibition featuring the work of five highly skilled visual storytellers all spinning their different yarns.
There will also be a brief and informal artist talk with Flannery Grace Good starting at 6pm that is not to be missed! Works by: Brian Busch, Lauren Levato Coyne, Rory Coyne, Flannery Good, Darla Teagarden
8. Expand – Contract
Gallery 19
4839 N Damen Ave, Chicago, Illinois 60625
Artist Talks: 7pm
September 12th through October 11th 2015
Participating Artists: Patrick Manning, Linda Adel Goodine, and Sally Ko. Also showing work from Aaron S. Coleman. We’re excited to announce that Gallery 19, is moving to a new location. Join us for the reception of our inaugural exhibition, Expand – Contract, this September. Join us from 6 – 9pm for this exhibition and get a tour of our new space!
9. Opening Reception: Laura Davis – Legacy of Loneliness & Seth Kim-Cohen – Bars (of Ponge’s “Soap”)
Threewalls
119 N Peoria St Suite 2C, North Chicago, Illinois 60607
Opening on Saturday, September 12, 2015, from 6-9PM, Threewalls presents Legacy of Loneliness, a solo-exhibition by Laura Davis in the main galleries, and Bars (of Ponge’s “Soap”), an installation by Seth Kim-Cohen opening in the Project Room. Both exhibitions will be on view from September 12, 2015 – October 24, 2015.
Featuring a site-specific wall painting, various sculptures, and a multi-media installation, Laura Davis’ exhibition Legacy of Loneliness responds to the history of female artists working within the field of Modern sculpture. Drawing inspiration from such texts as Albert E. Elsen’s 1974 edition of Origins of Modern Sculpture, Pioneers and Premises, Davis also presents a number of large graphite drawings on Stonehenge paper that layer much of the imagery found in such canon-establishing art anthologies.
10. Allegories:Studio Conversations
White Ripple Gallery & Co.
6725 Kennedy Ave, Hammond, Indiana 46323
Come out September 12th to see the new exhibit, Studio Conversations by Carol Weber, Mary Bookwalter, and Janice Meister. The studio artists will also be open for you to view their works. You can even purchase some of their amazing art! As always, during the Second Saturdays, there will be open mic and refreshments free to the public. So come out and join the fun from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. White Ripple is located at 6725 Kennedy Ave. Hammond IN 46323.
11. Terry Winters The Pencil of Nature with Florian Baudrexel
Corbett vs. Dempsey
1120 N Ashland Ave 3rd Fl, Chicago, Illinois 60622
The idea for the show evolved out of a few years of conversations between Winters, John Corbett and Jim Dempsey, initially concerning the relationship between visual art and music, eventually narrowing to that between drawing and improvisation. These discussions, coupled with studio visits looking at Winters’ incredible works on paper, lead to the notion of a catalog with an associated exhibition. The drawings chosen for the show cover a period from 2006 to 2014, and they range from small scale, heavily worked graphite drawings to quite large ones incorporating charcoal, ink, and gouache. One suite titled Difference Surface involves 20 related panels, each one juxtaposing pattern against pattern, creating augmentations and interferences, places where the broken symmetries are pushed into a new and wondrous realm. Shimmering black surfaces, cellular forms and stretched nets, humming and buzzing lines – these drawings reach deep into the act of mark making and look for the exact place where traces of an action become images, the ghost zone where something potential but impossible is conjured.
12. Reception for “Connexion” with BJAM
Elephant Room, Inc.
704 S Wabash Ave, Chicago, Illinois 60605
Elephant Room is excited to welcome collaborative group, BJAM, in the upcoming exhibition, “Connexion.” BJAM is comprised of artists Jaime Foster, Michael Foster, Barry Dwyer, and Andy Christopoulos. The exhibition runs Sept. 5th through Sept. 26th and there will be a reception on Saturday, Sept. 12th from 7 to 9:30pm.
Beginning their collaboration in November of 2014, they’ve continued producing new works together in various studios across Chicago. The four artists collaborate on one canvas, combining each of their individual styles and processes, in order to create a visual unified harmony.
Sunday, Sept 13
13. A Super Sunday at Hyde Park Art Center
Hyde Park Art Center
5020 S Cornell Ave, Chicago, Illinois 60615
On Sunday, September 13, visit the Art Center for a day of free art making, exhibition openings, workshops, and meeting artists!
1 – 4 PM: Second Sunday
Roll up your sleeves to enjoy two free, family-friendly art making activities led by two of the Art Center’s Teaching Artists.
1 – 4 PM: Crystal Seeing session with artist Dana Major
Using crystals, Major offers guests ages 14 and older a free 3-10 minute positive personal message from the Self to the Self.
2 – 3 PM: “Document your Art” workshop and Digital Lab open studio (Free)
2 & 3 PM: Tours of the Guida Family Creative Wing and School and Studios
3 – 5 PM: Opening receptions for four new exhibitions:
“Front & Center” in Gallery 1, 2 & Cleve E. Carney Gallery
“Warm Kitty, Soft Kitty” in Kanter McCormick Gallery
“Creatures from the Concrete” in Gallery 5
“Continuous Span” in Muller Meeting Room and 4833rph
14. Kate Ingold – The Relatively Brief Preponderance of Moments
Cultivator
4636 North Ravenswood #204, Chicago, Illinois 60640
Join us for Cultivator’s inaugural exhibition featuring artist Kate Ingold at our Ravenswood Exhibition space. Kate Ingold will be exhibiting pieces from her “Damaged Goods_Small Repairs” series investigating disintegration, tenderness, and the body. Included are several hand manipulated photographs of taxidermied animals in dioramas, broken figurines, and cracked pavements,which she inscribes delicate circular patterns or stitches fine threads across. Ingold sources genuinely damaged pieces, then mends them, such as with her antique thread-bare mourning quilts. She methodically hand stitches metallic threads in a pattern across the preexisting patchwork.
~THE END~
artnxtleveljournal.com 