Clare Rojas closing reception

In addition to the multitude of art shows opening tonight in Chicago, including The Printer's Ball and Lauren Feece & Chris Silva's show at the Believe Inn, there's also a closing reception for the huge Clare Rojas installation at Kavi Gupta Gallery in the West Loop. It's one of the best shows I've seen here this year. They'll be open tonight from 6 to 8 pm. If you go you can also visit the Public Works show next door at Andrew Rafacz Gallery which is going to be open from 6 to 9 pm.



Clare Rojas closing reception
6 - 8 pm, Friday, July 31, 2009
at Kavi Gupta Gallery
835 W Washington
Chicago, IL

PIcking Scabs

The Picking Scabs skateboard art show is kicking off tonight in Pilsen. Featuring work by artists Zore64, Demon, CZR PRZ, Hyde, Fact, and many more.

Picking Scabs
Friday, July 31, 2009 7pm - late
2128 S Halsted
Chicago, IL

Atomic Sketch Night, Chicago

Tonight's the 1-year anniversary of Atomic Sketch Night in Chicago. Each month various artists convene to draw the night away. You get to listen to music, watch artists at work, and buy their finished art when it's done.

The featured artist for tonight is John Airo and the panel artists are:
Emmy Star Brown, Carlos Arteaga, Joey Potts, paranoidgirl, Torreyanna Barley, Brooks Golden, Joyce Vallejo, Michelle Mashon, Blütt, SUPAQOOT, Ethan Hutchinson, and Ryan P. Young.

Atomic Sketch
Thursday, July 30, 2009 from 6 to 10 pm.
Evil Olive
1551 W Division
Chicago, IL

Mating Call

Chicago artists (now living in Puerto Rico) Chris Silva and Lauren Feece have a new joint show opening this Friday at the Believe Inn.

Info from the Believe Inn site...
We are a recently married couple who have been enjoying the processes & challenges of collaborating and also find ourselves influencing each other in our solo work, both artistically, and more generally speaking, as human beings...so the idea of "mating calls" seems fitting in more ways than one. In the act of "mate calling" the would be lovers make calls to each other until their sounds weave into a sweet love song or just plain sweet love. That seems to sum up nicely (and a bit idealistically) how these collaborations have been taking shape.

This will be a small showing of some of the individual and collaborative works we've made within our last 2+ years of living in Puerto Rico. We live on 16 acres of land - basically a small plot of jungle along a river - and try our best to only leave the property for survival supplies and beach time. The isolation and break from the hustle of the city has been lovely and is creating a nice space to explore new directions and re-examine the roles we wish to play as artists. This show will be going up just before our first wedding anniversary and strangely enough we have just been slotted for another collaborative show which happens to be opening up the day before Valentines Day... we're starting to wonder if all of our shows will be so incredibly cute.

Mating Call - Chris Silva & Lauren Feece
Opening Friday, July 31, 2009 from 6 to 10 pm
Believe Inn
2043 N Winchester (1 blk N. of Armitage & 1 blk E. of Damen Ave)
Chicago, IL

The show will be up through August 23rd by appointment.

Public Works

Info from their site...

Public Works is a group show that features four artists who've spent years in Chicago working within the independent art and music communities: Cody Hudson, Justin Fines, Andy Mueller, and Chris Eichenseer. Longtime friends, the four men have parlayed their street-level art styles into careers as internationally recognized graphic designers. The new pieces presented in Public Works are wholly representative of the dual-influences of fine and commercial art in the artists' lives, the gallery covered in an egalitarian display of screenprints, a digital pastiche of color blocks, Greco-Roman statues, sardonic portrait photography and Dungeons and Dragons references. Accompanying the new work is a wall thick with retrospective rock posters, album covers and street images that bump and overlap, a physical manifestation of the artists' intertwined pasts and common futures.

Andrew Rafacz Gallery
835 W. Washington Blvd. Chicago
July 31st - August 29th
Noon to 5pm Wed - Sat or by appointment

Opening
Friday July 31st 2009 6pm to 9pm

The Printer's Ball

I checked this out before when it was held at the Museum of Contemporary Art. It looks like this year's event is going to be much bigger. Info below from their site...

Fifth Annual Printers’ Ball
Ludington Building
1104 South Wabash Avenue
Friday, July 31, 2009
5:00 PM - 11:00 PM
Admission to the Printers’ Ball is free and open to all ages.

Founded by Poetry magazine with other independent Chicago literary organizations, the Printers’ Ball is an annual celebration of print culture, featuring thousands of magazines, books, and broadsides available free of charge; live readings and music; letterpress, offset, and paper-making demonstrations; and much more. This year’s Printers’ Ball is co-produced with Columbia College Chicago and the Center for Book & Paper Arts, and is set to take place in the landmark Ludington Building, former home to the American Book Company. Select events during the Printers’ Ball are being recorded for Chicago Public Radio’s Chicago Amplified.

Sneak previews of Printers' Ball publications, preparations, and secret invitations are available at the official Printers' Ball blog, Chicago Poetry Calendar: http://chicagopoetrycalendar.blogspot.com.

Goontastic!

Prolific Chicago street artist, Goons, has unveiled his new site, www.goonswood.com. All the better to enjoy the denizens of Goon City. From his tiny lil' stickers to his life size portraits, his characters are always a happy sight to behold.









He has work available for sale on the site, as well as a lot of great pictures documenting his street work.
www.goonswood.com

Get It Together

From the Post Family's site...

Get It Together: Assemblage Collage and Collaboration
July 24, 2009, 7:00 pm-11:30 pm

Free
Location: Co-Prosperity Sphere 3219-21 South Morgan St. Chicago Illinois, 60608
Join us Friday July 24th from 7-11:30pm at Co-Prosperity Sphere for a three dimensional freak out of color, form and material. Walk the aisles of a hand-made grocery store created completely out of paper, shoot hoops on a 3 story high basketball net, or just sit down at our collage table and create some work of your own.

After the opening and subsequent hangover, come back on Saturday July 25th from 2-5pm for an art-making BBQ throw down as we combine our creative energies to make collages which we will hand-deliver for free to the people walking around this great city. So drop on by, check out some good stuff and make some of your own. We will have magazines, scissors and glue on hand but feel free to bring your own collage materials to throw down.



Participants and other info at www.getittogethershow.com

Co-Prosperity Sphere
3219 S Morgan St
Chicago, IL

Run, Blago, Run

Come out this Friday and see what our ex-Guv and his hair are up to. This 3-day show will feature work based on ex-Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich and his poufy mane o'hair.

Info from their site...

Run, Blago, Run! Show is based on Rod Blagojevich’s now classic black Nike tracksuit and jogging pose. Maybe you’ve seen stencils of him jogging or lighting campfires in Chicago. Or maybe you’ve heard the self-professed ‘hard working cowboy’ compare himself to Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The Run, Blago Run! Show will allow these dreams (or nightmares) to come true. Juried by actress Joan Cusack, legendary house DJ Derrick Carter and artists Ray Noland aka CRO. 10% of show sales donated to Street-Level Youth Media.
Artists include: Mireya Acierto, Scot LaFavor, Dan Lacey, Diederick Kraaijeveld, Ray Noland, Tariq Rafiq, Amanda Rivkin, and Jeff Zimmerman.

Run, Blago, Run!
Group Art Show

Opening Reception
Friday, July 24th, 2009, 6 to 9pm.
with DJs Sol Son & DIZ
Show continues Saturday and Sunday, July 25 & 26, 12 to 7pm.

1925 N. Milwaukee Ave.
(Milwaukee & Western) Just north of Wicker Park Fest

Brought to you by CRO. A kickstarter Project. Sponsored by StickerRobot

This World & Nearer Ones

Light projections by Anthony McCall.

NYC's Creative Time has another one of their great projects running this summer. Titled, "This World & Nearer Ones", it consists of installations by 19 artists spread throughout Governor's Island.

Governor's Island was a military base for nearly 200 years. Abandoned in the mid-90's the island is now maintained as a historic site by the State of New York and the National Park Service. Half the island is open to the public, while the south portion is undergoing demolition and redevelopment.

Each time I've gone to New York, Creative Time has never let me down. From a video & installation art show in the base of the Brooklyn Bridge, to Mike Nelson's insane "Psychic Vacuum" show in an abandoned building in the Lower East Side, to the Stephen Powers/ESPO-led transformation of the handpainted signs at Coney Island, Creative Time has led me to explore a lot of great, hidden parts of NYC.

The following pictures show a cinderblock wall from the city of Culiacan, Mexico. The wall is pockmarked with bullet holes linked to organized crime shootings. Artist Teresa Margolles had this wall transported from her hometown to Governor's Island for this show.


A free ferry boat leaves every hour from the Battery Maritime Building, which is next to the Staten Island Ferry Terminal.
Open all summer on Fridays from 11 to 4 pm and Saturday and Sundays from 12 to 6 pm.

Blast from the past

So I succumbed this morning to the the entity that is Facebook because I was tired of people asking if I was on there and then looking at me sadly when I said no. I linked up with people I knew and I just now heard from my friend Jenny from grade school.

Among her posted photos was our 5th grade class picture. I had actually lost that picture, and several other ones, after I had finished photocopying them for a birthday card I had made for Jenny when we were in high school together. I didn't think I'd ever see this picture again, so in spite of the hours of wasted time I have to look forward to on Facebook, I'm glad that she posted this...

There are a lot of great people, and one strict but very creative and dedicated teacher, in this picture. It also reminds me how mixed my school was. My best friend was Korean and I went to three classmate's Bat Mitzvahs in 8th grade there as well. Thanks Jenny!

Chicago battle

The Estria Invitational Graffiti Battle will be held today in Chicago. 16 artists will compete for the chance to win a trip to Oakland to compete in the final competition. This is part of the Life is Living festival that will also feature free performances by Saul Williams, Rebel Diaz, and from what I heard, Pharoe Monch.

Saturday July 18, 2009 9:30-3:00, winner announced at 3:30pm
Clarendon Park in the Uptown neighborhood
4501 N Clarendon Ave
Chicago, IL

Unusual Suspects

Info from their site...
Unusual Suspects, is an art exhibition that has roots in power and originality. It showcases 15 artists, whose work has evolved out of a certain amount of artistic isolation from the traditional art world. Which has allowed each of them to develop unique bodies of work with various non-traditional styles and techniques.

Laboring throughout a lifetime of heart and soul, all are truly dedicated in achieving a permanent mark with their art on the world. Artist line up includes, Casper, Ish, Risk, Uneek, Zore, Hyde, Tsel, Flash, Kingdom, Pilot, Rooster, Thor, Poem, Traz, Flex.

2612 Space is an alternative artist-run space located at 2612 W. Nelson Avenue in Chicago’s “Northwest Nowhere” Industrial-triangle, a corridor bordered by Belmont Avenue, Elston Avenue, and Rockwell Street along the Chicago River North Branch.

2612 Space - Unusual Suspects – July 17th 2009 – 8-11pm
2612 W. Nelson Avenue, TURD Floor - Chicago, IL. 60618

After Party at Lava Lounge - 1270 N. Milwaukee

Second Hand Smoke

Mr. Thor has just completed this groovy drawing for Michiana band, "Second Hand Smoke". Available on a t-shirt soon.

Donuts!

They're back! And this time they're fuzzy. Kid Robot has just released a plush version of two of Heidi Kenney's donut keychains from her Yummy Donuts series.

Available in both strawberry and chocolate jelly-filled, and in a 12" and heartier 24" version, they're sure to warm the cockles of your heart or look cool on your couch.

Dog Stew and Monkey Wine

Artists Paul Nudd and Onsmith will be presenting new prints at Chicago's Spudnik Press in the West Town neighborhood. They will also be asking visitors to the opening to draw a fly for display.

Onsmith Dog Stew & Monkey Nudd Wine
at Spudnik Press
1821 W Hubbard Suite 308
Chicago, IL

Opening reception is Friday, July 10 from 6 to 10 pm
The show runs through August 6, 2009

Volcanoes for beginners

Opening tonight from 7 to 10 pm at Rotofugi.
1955 W Chicago Ave
Chicago, IL

The exhibition runs through July 31, 2009.

Duh

New Print - BOOKWORM, originally uploaded by Johnny Ryan.

For the bookworm with bad habits in your life, a new 6-color silkscreen print by Johnny Ryan. Check out this print and three more new ones at Johnnyr.com.