Rejoice!

Today is International Museums Day. Fun fact: "museum" derives from the idea of a temple set aside or devoted to the muses in Ancient Greece.

> LOCAL MUSEA
> IMD on WIKI
> ICOM

In other news, it is architect Walter Gropius' 125th birthday.
He doesn't seemed to have designed an museums or have a museum of his work though. However, he is definitely represented in many museums collections.

Last and Only Chances

The first of three MFA shows from the Department of Visual Art at the University of Chicago opened Thursday. This Saturday an event by Joe Miller centered around his ongoing social/graffiti/art/work/experimentation at the Empty Bottle takes place. Look for more info on the MFA shows at the bottom of this post.
> BOTTLE

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Gordon Matta-Clark
The Gordon Matta-Clark retrospective at the Museum of Contemporary Art closes this Sunday. So make sure you stop by for this excellent exhibition if you haven’t already. You can see the Art or Idiocy slide show of images taken at the media day on Flickr as well.
> FLICKR
> MCA

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Howard Fonda
In Hyde Park there are several shows on view that are worth seeing, two of which close on Sunday. At the Hyde Park Art Center Howard Fonda: Nothing to Live Up To finishes and DIRTY: Work by Paul Nudd and Casey Wasniewski opens, although the reception isn’t until May 11th.
> FONDA
> NUDD&Co

Catherine Sullivan

The Smart Museum of Art is sending off its moving image cinematic extravaganza Adaptation with a talk by curator Stephanie Smith at 2P Sunday. The website/catalogue for the show is also worth visiting. It features clips from the videos on display and interviews with the artists. Adaptation features plenty of good work, but in particular offers a rare opportunity to see landmark works by Eve Sussman and the Rufus Corporation and by Catherine Sullivan.
> ADAPTION
> SMART
Jason Lazarus
At the Renaissance Society is Black Is, Black Ain’t. The exhibition includes Jason Lazarus’ Standing at the grave of Emmet Till, day of exhumation, May 31st, (Alsip, IL). When the piece was first exhibited in September of 2005 I wrote this about it:

[I]n the project room [of Bucket Rider Gallery] was a single large photo by Jason Lazarus ...And Then Finally, I Remembered. It was a blandish landscape of a cemetery. Some plywood boards added a nice beige to the pale green of the grass and the pale blue of the sky. These colors made the sunny day seem real, and to take you right there. Later I learned it was Emmett Till’s grave. That added a whole new twist to things. It was not heavy handed at all because I didn’t even realize it until later. There was also the tie in with Jeff Wall’s flooded grave piece. The two are so similar. So here we have Lazarus’ (apropos) “fake” Jeff Wall being a real grave.

> REN

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UofC 2008 MFA Thesis Shows
In the DOVA Temporary restroom

...and somewhere in between through May 11
Manol Gueorguiev • Joe Miller • Clay Smith

Cryptomnesia May 15 (opening 6-9P) – May 25
Jeremy Pelt • Val Snobeck • Brett Tracy

One Brick Country in the Sea May 29 (opening 6-9P) – June 8
Jennifer Krantz • J. Thomas Pallas • Casey Smallwood

DOVA Temporary
5228 S Harper AVE / Chicago, IL 60615 / (773) 753-4821
Hrs: M–TH: 1–5P / F&SA: 10A–6P

Tonite! SAT, APR 26

Art or Idiocy? is coming to you LIVE from the Artropolis press room. In the next few days you will find posts and slide shows on a variety of goings on and noteworthy things, such as muscle cars slowly enacting the end of history in the Hegelian sense and the result of modern primitives building the starship Enterprse. But for now there's plenty of stuff going on tonight after the fairs close down for the evening. Here are just a few:



Artist Paul Nudd has organized STOMA (the post-COMA aroma) that is taking place at the former home of The California Occidental Museum of Art (COMA)an alternative space run by artists Erik Brown and Annika Seitz. When I found out about it, I said

Dude that is one fucking sweet poster. So we know that COMA is closing? And Stoma is the final-ing of it? And it is like a stye?

To which the reply was

is a stoma not an opening from an internal organ to an external device? like a colostomy bag? our goal is to find someone with a
colostomy and feed him/her one of the erotic cakes and then we can all watch the art being stomatized....
nudd

So check it out.
STOMA (the post-op aroma of COMA)
Saturday April 26th, 2008 7pm
1626 N. California #2,Chicago

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Next is Alogon, a space run by folks from the Art Institute's grad program.
Discipline Problems is a group exhibition curated by the magnifficant Joseph Grigely.

Alogon
Performance and Opening Reception:7-10P
April 26 to May 3 2008 Alogon Gallery, hours: Sundays 1-4pm
Film Screening and Closing Event: Saturday May 3rd 7-10pm
1049 N. PAULINA APT 3R, CHICAGO, IL 60622
(Division stop on the blue line)
>WEBSITE

artists include: Sarah Alford, Katie Lennard, AndrewandAndrea, Alicia Chester, Ellen Alderman, Danielle Sommer, Rebecca Gordon, Kristi McGuire, Mike Gibisser, Samantha Topol, Jesse Vogler, Szu-Han Ho, and Heidi Neubauer-Winterburn, with a performance by Joey Orr, and a screening program of occult shit films, Channeling: An Invocation of Spectral Bodies and Queer Spirits, organized by Ethan White and Latham Zearfoss.

Also, "check us [Alogon] out at the NEXT fair in booth 4014! We are showing selected works from previous shows and trying to be genuinely nice and available people willing answer any questions about the space.

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Roots & Culture is having their Second Annual Fundraiser and Art Fair Decompression Party featuring a silent auction of dozens of artworks by R & C artists and distinguished friends, live music by Pit Er Pat, surprise guest DJ's, drinks, and as always, tasty snacks!
Roots & Culture
8pm- Midnight
1034 N MILWAUKEE
CHICAGO, IL 60622
>WEBSITE

Roots also has a booth at the NEXT fair with work by Mike Andrews,
Isak Applin, Sarah Conaway, Ryan Fenchel, Sabine Gruffat, Jamisen Ogg, Carmen Price, Kristen Vandeventer and film and video by Andy Roche, Michael Robinson, and Lisa Williamson

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Finally, in a little bit of mixed interest plugging:
Gary Rattigan: Things Go Wrong Quite Often
at
65GRAND
Opening Reception: Saturday, April 26 (7-10PM)
April 26 - June 07, 2008
1378 W Grand Ave at Noble St. (entrance on Noble)
312-719-4325
>WEBSITE

I got involved with 65GRAND through visiting it as a writer, my first piece for TimeOut Chicago was a review of Rattigan's last show. Now I'm more involved as an artist than as a critic who is interested in the program (alough I still am). So I don't get to plug this space and review it like a used to for conflict of interest reasons. But this show is still awesome and you should check it out. I also have a piece up. So how's that for disclosure/nepotism!

Enjoy your weekend dear art lovers.

Artropolis & Version-towne

So the art fair week is upon us. There is way too much to do. I'm not even going to try. I'm just selecting what interests me and will try check those things out. And I know I’ll still be missing out on lots of good stuff. And I won’t even make to all the things I wanted to, anyway. But it won't be that big of a deal. I'm not going to worry about, "what this means for Chicago", and if it's all, "just a meaningless Bacchanal of art-as-commodity incest." I won't say, "this gallery shouldn't be here," or "that artist doesn't deserve the attention," or "it should be me!" Even though I'll probably feel all that. I'll Just have fun and enjoy the events.

It would be great if some of this could be spread out. Especially since there are so many times during the rest of the year that things are dead around Chicago. But for now, we have Artropolis, where some five fairs are taking place all inside the Merchandise Mart. It's all smartly under one roof, but things are still spilling over all across the city.

Of course the main reason for all this is main fair, Art Chicago, which finally seems to be more than just turning around but actually gaining forward momentum this time around. The real point of interest, however, is the NEXT fair. Basically because NEXT is a mixture of established and emerging galleries, emphasis on the emerging ones. This means the newer art and artists. Of course not all of it will be good, but this is where the–what, “avant garde?”–is. There is no good term. “Cutting edge,” “fresh,” “young,” “new,” none of these work very well. But the point is, you will not be seeing endless booths peddling Jim Dine and Andy Warhol prints. It’s also invitational. There are bound to be some bad choices, but it is a much better approach than, “if you can scrape together the booth fee, you’re in.”

I don’t think there will be anything groundbreaking at either fair. Why would that even be expected? But there will definitely be some worthwhile and interesting art from around the world, including a generous amount of local representation.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, and end of the city is VERSION>08. Which this year takes on the concept of “Dark Matter:”

In 2008, Dark Matter is all around us. Us artists, us activists, us outlaws. All of us, we are engaged in a culture war and economic struggle against establishments in all their guises. We form communities to counter the alienation of everyday life, and the commercial and institutional structures that stifle reality. We desire another world.

Shades of Guy Debord.

Version fest is already under way, and continues through the 27 of April. Where Artropolis gets its mandate from the wealthy, the established and the commercial, Version gets it from the young, the resourceful and the DIY. There is a lot of cross over, however. You will see visitors and participants from both camps at all the venues and events. And at NEXT you find the Version Fest affiliated Proximity Magazine, and the unfortunately named Reuben Kincaid Artist Management (also “artist management”?). Anyway, Proximity is described as:

Proximity is a Chicago-based magazine dedicated to contemporary art and culture. Our mission is to amplify discourse on local and global art ecologies. We hope to serve as a map - of artists, collectives and alternative spaces, as well as commercial galleries, museums and universities - connecting and cultivating sustainable creative communities.

> ARTROPOLIS
> ART CHICAGO
> NEXT
> VERSION

Yve-Alain Bois: Pseudomorphism: What to Make of Look-alikes?

The Open Practice Committee, a group that fosters dialogue between the theory and practice of art at the University of Chicago, has a series of movie archives from recent talks at the on its website. Of particular interest is Yves-Alain Bois’ presentation “Pseudomorphism: What to Make of Look-alikes?” His talk focuses on the practice within history and curating of drawing connections between works based on superficial similarities that don’t necessarily correspond to the intent, meaning or content of the piece. What Bois terms “genetic.”

> PSEUDOMORPHISM
> OPC

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The Univeristy of Chicago has fostered groundbreaking study in the fields of atomic weaponry and neo liberal capitalism.

Notable faculty and alumni (including prominent fictional characters) include:
John Ashcroft, Harry Burns & Sally Albright, John Dewey, Roger Ebert, T. S. Eliot, Ralph Ellison, Enrico Fermi, Milton Friedman, Philip Glass, Edwin Hubble, Henry “Indiana” Jones. Jr., Leopold & Loeb, Jack McCoy, Barack Obama, David Rockefeller, Philip Roth, Bertrand Russell, Carl Sagan, Antonin Scalia, Susan Sontag, Leo Strauss, Kurt Vonnegut, Paul Wolfowitz

The NEXT List

Corey Arnold • Kitty & Horse Fisherman • 2007 • C-print • 16 x 20 in • Richard Heller Gallery

The NEXT art fair has released its list of exhibitors. Next is the invitational “emerging” part of the Artropolis cavalcade the last weekend of April later this year. It’s a little confusing since some of the galleries’ names appear as exhibitors at both Art Chicago and Next. But it looks to be a decent roster that will provide for some good viewing with some pretty prominent spaces to the lesser known.

Names that stick out for one reason or another include (some of which are on the Art Chicago list): DCKT, Finesilver, Goff + Rosenthal, Richard Heller, Houldsworth, Jack the Pelican Presents, Darren Knight Gallery, Leo Koenig inc., Yvon Lambert, Mixed Green, Parker’s Box, Pierogi, Daniel Reich, Roebling Hall, Timothy Taylor, Winkleman, Zwirner & Wirth

Local spaces include: BucketRider, devening projects + editions, Kavi Gupta (of course), Roots and Culture, Carrie Secrist, Walsh, Western Exhibitions, Tony Wight

Bodybuilder & Sportsman has officially changed its name to Tony Wight, with a new website and all. It’s kind of sad. Bodybuilder & Sportsman was a good name, and galleries named after the name of who owns them get kind of tedious.

> NEXT
> ART CHICAGO
> WIGHT