|
|
chicago home
classifieds newsletter signup 
events calendar
bars & clubs restaurants specials best of chicago 
food and drink
film and video music and clubs stage sports words art features |
|
|
 Eye Exam Bodies in the dirt
People are willing to kill and die for land, and actively do so every
day. "100 Cuts" at the West Loop's not-for-profit Gallery 312 examines
the political and cultural situation that informs our often-suicidal
relationship to real estate. Not necessarily internationalist by
definition, it's a somewhat biased selection on behalf of curators Larry
Lee of the Chicago-based Asian-American collaborative Project A and
Gallery 312's own Laura Kina; while artists from Ramallah and Beijing
appear, it's largely a collection of Chicago art. Regardless, it's
competently done. The title may sound like a play on the infamous
"death by 1,000 cuts" execution method of medieval China, but it has a
deeper meaning. While certainly not a preferable way to go, it's used
here as a more conceptual reference point for getting at questions of
how our bodies are connected to the land that sustains them.
In her 2002 two-channel video installation "Crossing Surda (a record
of going to and from work)," Palestinian artist Emily Jacir offers
perhaps the most recognizable interpretation of land divided up into
physical boundaries. Hardly a night passes when this ritual isn't
repeated for us in a national television news broadcast. Jacir records
her daily walk up the Ramallah-Birzeit Road from her home in a
Palestinian village, through Israeli checkpoints, to her job at Birzeit
University. It's the most bureaucratic and militarily complicated
process of moving one's body from one area of land to another, with
occasionally devastating consequences.
Millie Chen, in conjunction with Arabic vocalist Mayem Hassan Tollar,
has used approximately 1,000 square feet to produce a site-specific
audio installation, "Call." Using a halogen lighting setup, amps and
speakers, patrons are lured by a song selected by Tollar into a
wide-open room. As they approach the source of the audio, motion sensors
decrease the volume, making engagement with it impossible. Donald
Lambert takes another approach with "Changing Landscape," an
eight-section puzzle made of latex, graphite and polyurethane on wood.
Inspired by highly addictive world-domination board games like Risk, the
puzzle depicts a global map that can be effortlessly rearranged,
symbolically changing the socio-political relationships--and balances of
power--between territories. Social study
When city people start to get nostalgic for community, it's because
they've forgotten why they moved to the city in the first place. And
that somewhat neglected question of civilization informs "Social
Awareness (a study of identity, individual boundaries, and
self-definitions)," opening this Friday at Pilsen's Unit B Gallery.
Taking as its basis how social forces inform the individual, the work in
this show seeks to offer solutions that interfere with or subvert
conventional wisdom. Many of the selected works stem from a
Detroit-based curator Odie Rynell Cash's attempt to place or displace
people in social contexts at the intermediary of public and private. San
Francisco-based Sacha Eckes, for instance, offers drawings and paintings
with collage-style magazine illustrations for Mother Jones, Variety and
similar publications.
The only collective in the show, The Society for the Representation
of Society (SRS) undertakes a slightly more invasive tactic. A shadowy
group that keeps the identity of its members cloaked in secrecy, the SRS
claim to maintain chapters in the Midwest, Southwest, and Northeast
regions of the United States. As a mission, SRS members form
affiliations and engage in collaborations with individuals and groups,
such as Kansas City's Slop Art project, to develop cultural and
aesthetic critiques and perpetrate actions against dominant tutelary
forces. Their ultimate goal, as stated on the group's website, is the
"Immaculate Conception of Monsters," but for this project, the SRS has
settled for producing stickers (referred to as "notices"). Along with
accompanying photo documentation of current and past exhibits, the
stickers will be posted at hot spots for individual confrontation
throughout Pilsen. Look for SRS notices at phone booths, ATMs and other
places where the public may need a little distraction "from our consumer
culture." Artists in need
Housing and space to work in are always problems for artists, as are
such stuffy practical concerns as money, credit ratings, health
insurance and a droll host of other real-life issues all of which
uniformly increase the allure of transport to an imagined world. But in
response to these problems, this Saturday the Chicago Department of
Cultural Affairs in cahoots with the Department of Housing will offer a
day of one-stop shopping at Chicago Artists Space and Housing Expo. The
event takes place at the Chicago Cultural Center, with experts on hand
to offer every conceivable resource, from banks to realtors,
construction companies to lawyers versed in not-for-profit law. Also on
offer throughout the day are workshops to instruct on a variety of
subjects with such compelling titles as "Developing Storefronts and
other Non-Traditional Buildings into Usable Living, Working and
Performance Spaces," "Moving from rental to ownership: I'm an artist
how can I get a mortgage?," and "How to End the Credit Blues:
Re-Building Your Financial Health."
"100 Cuts" shows at Gallery 312, 312 North May, (312)942-2500,
through May 9. "Social Awareness (a study of identity, individual
boundaries, and self-definitions)" shows at Unit B, 1733 South Des
Plaines St., (312)491-9384, through May 1. The Chicago Artists Space and
Housing Expo takes place at the Chicago Cultural Center, 78 East
Washington, (312)744-8529, April 10, 9am-3pm.
Also by Michael Workman Eye Exam
Tip of the Week
Eye Exam
Tip of the Week
Eye Exam
Eye Exam
The answer
Eye Exam
Tip of the Week
Tip of the Week
Eye Exam
Tip of the Week
|
|
about Newcitychicago | about Newcity magazine | advertising | privacy policy | FAQ | employment |
