Chicago alderman: Look what I found...
Love this: A Chicago alderman is getting creative [via AJ] in trying to do something about the Art Institute of Chicago's 50 percent admissions increase. The alderman, Ed Burke, has found an 1891 agreement that might require the museum to be free to the public two-and-a-half-days per week. (That would get the AIC almost halfway to keeping up with its peer institutions.) Stay tuned here...
What!? You think bloody body parts floating in pools of blood, bobbing about, detritus, stirred by my five foot dorsal fin is a spooky sight? .........wooooOOOooooOOOOOOO!!......... Hah!..... You ain't seen nuthin' yet...!......just wait until this weekend at The Merchandise Mart. You want a horror show! -just keep telling yourself as you stroll from one b gallery nightmare to another, to remember what your therapist told you: 'this isn't really happening to me,' 'stay calm!,'' I'm going to my happy place now...'
I hate it when I'm wrong! Barreling up from the deep, ready to chomp the head off some innocent little baby seal -only to find out I've just latched on to the leg of some mangy surfer dude (quit crying for mommy! I didn't mean to take your leg off!...oops I just chipped a tooth!) or worse yet some pelagic researcher's towed rubber seal dummy (-who wants to have tire mouth?!) and to what end? so I can end up on some low-rent, 'man is the real predator, now that we said it don't we feel good?' piece of pulp on Shark Week?......So, imagine the extent of my mortification when Tony Fitz (the whale shark) patrick proves me wrong about...anything! (an exceedingly rare occurrence) But, in this one isolated incident, he has. Three years ago, after a meeting with the Mart/Art Fair people that included Tony, Paul Klein and myself, Tony walked away saying 'I'm done'.....and he was, and he was right. 'These people weren't going to really treat or think of artists in any way other than commodities, indentured servants, serfs' - and they, haven't. Tony went on to say, this isn't about art or an art fair, this is about political ambition and low and behold......read the political pages of The Chicago Sun-Times in the last few days? Read the list of people on the host committee, or the middlemen/ panelists for ancillary events for this years fair? Lots of players, very few artists. Lots of art world bureaucracy, played out and washed up, manning a decaying, and decadent, outmoded system and a failed scene -and by this I mean the infrastructural end of the Chicago Art World.....
With all the money under one roof, whats is there to complain about you ask? Well for one thing, if we are discussing Chicago money -lets face it, its never been supportive of the Chicago art world. Institutions have been built here true, and mostly to house imported fare -whether we are discussing a French Impressionist Painting or a trendy piece of garbage 'painted' by Karen Kilimnick, the conceit persists and insists that what comes from elsewhere is by the very nature of its geographical origins, superior.
Apparently, in their massive lay-offs, The Chicago Tribune has eliminated the job of veteran art critic Alan Artner --- the critic who was both much loved and much hated in the local artworld.
Andrei Molotiu, art historian, gallery comics artist and editor of the forthcoming anthology Abstract Comics, the first book to trace the history and survey the contemporary landscape of abstract sequential art, has started a blog to showcase the book and other work by some of the book's contributors including himself and Mark Staff Brandl. The link: abstractcomics.blogspot.com.
Myth in Material @ Alogon Gallery
Elizabeth Chodos curates: Ryan Fenchel, Rebecca Gordon, Mathew Paul Jinks, Stacie Johnson, and Michael Ruglio-Misurell
Myth in Material
April 18-30, 2009
Alogon Gallery
1049 N. Paulina 3R [entry on Cortez], Chicago, IL
alogongallery.com
After a rather silly introduction by Richard and Duncan, which as they describe it is a "horribly off-track intro which consists largely of talk of herpes and sleeping around. Eventually they get around to discussing what is really important, this week's show!", then comes Steve Litsios, an artist from La Chaux-de-Fonds in the French-speaking part of Switzerland, who also contributes to the Swiss offshoot of Sharkforum. Litsios is interviewed this week by me, Mark Staff Brandl. Litsios is known for his vast paper installations, wall objects, smaller sculpture, and web-work, all of which are elegant, restrained, and yet puckish in their surprising flirtation with elements of garishness. His work has recently begun to incorporate political content into his formerly abstract approach. The artist also plays in several roots blues and skiffle bands.
The teabag rallies are over and millionsthousands hundreds turned out to protest the return to Clinton-era tax rates in 2010. Pathetic.
So here's a simple plan to make all their heads explode, based on the simple idea that they worship Ronald Reagan: instead of returning to Clinton's top marginal rate of 38%, let's return to Reagan's top marginal rate of 50%.
Better yet, let's return to Nixon's top marginal rate of 75%. Or Eisenhower's top marginal rate of 91%.
These were all popular Republican presidents. So why don't we return to good old-fashioned Republican tax rates?
The "In the Factory" series brings you an interview with Chicago's great photographer Dawoud Bey as he discusses his career as an artist, working with high school students and his exhibition at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, Class Pictures: Photographs by Dawoud Bey.
What do Designer Trevor O'Neil, Architect Mark Verwoerdt, Illustrator Aaron Miller and Painter Michael O'Briant have in common? TOJO Gallery.
During the group show opening night reception on the evening of June 5, O'Neil will unveil his most recent furniture piece; Verwoerdt - one of Chicago's hottest architects, will share his eye for truly raw material with his drawings and portraits; and Illustrator Aaron Miller will exhibit his illustrations for the first time in more than ten years. Round out the four-strong artistic Chicago force with the paintings of Michael O'Briant, and collectors and dealers should expect to experience some serious aesthetic "Va-Va" in front of the VOOM.
Above: The Culmination, 2007, oil on canvas, 48" x 72" inches
Nicole Gordon @ Linda Warren
April 3 - May 9, 2009
Artist talk on April 18th, 2 pm
1052 W Fulton Market, Chicago, IL 60607
312.432.9500 www.lindawarrengallery.com
Judith Brotman @ threewalls
April 3 - May 8, 2009
Artist talk on April 23rd, 6pm
119 n. peoria #2d, Chicago, IL 60607
312.432.3972 www.three-walls.org
That’s me with a group of my buddies at my birthday party on April 4, 1965. We were a group of rowdy, rough-edged little lads, but old enough to start wondering about important things in our country's history.
Similar to the totally unexpected collapse of Communism in the years around 1989, a complete rearrangement of the power structure in the world of fine art was announced today.
The rapid and unexpected collapse of the Communist systems of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe continues to mystify scholars and citizens alike. A parallel phenomenon seems to have occurred today. All international, jet-set curators in a massive guilt-ridden attack of moral conscience have simultaneously renounced all claims to leading, directing or educating the artworld. They have decided to return to what they do best, if agonizingly --- fundraising, aperitifs and putting up with difficult artists. ...
