Chicago Artist Writers

31/03/2020

Contributor Ciera Mckissick reviews the sonic group show at Weinberg/Newton Gallery​. The show is a partnership with WBEZ​ Chicago Public Radio and features the work of Gwyneth Zeleny Anderson, Jesse McLean, Sayward Schoonmaker, Sonnenzimmer, and Sadie Woods.

"Return to the Everywhere is centered around “truth, fiction, objectivity, bias, and belief,” topics that have been thrust forward in modern-day media in our current “post-truth” society."


https://chicagoartistwriters.com/return-to-everywhere-at-weinberg-newton-gallery/

28/10/2019

Contributor Jill Danto reviews Sarah Davachi's performance and composition for Lampo. Danto reflects on their training as a timpanist and the architecture of Rockefeller Chapel.

"While the French horns oscillate between active notes and silence, Davachi continues to carry the continuous flow of the piece—similar to the painted background of stratified strokes."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/sarah-davachi-la-brume-jaune-at-rockefeller-memorial-chapel/

24/08/2019

Contributor Manisha Anil Rita reviews the performative dinner as a component of "a yolk, suspended" the collaborative exhibition of Caroline Dahlberg, Mariel Harari, Azalea Henderson, and Maggie Wong at Annas.

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/letter-to-the-reader-a-yolk-suspended/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

16/08/2019

What we’re looking for:
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Chicago Artist Writers seeks at least two new members for its editorial team. These roles offer an exciting opportunity to work as an integral part of Chicago Artist Writers. We are seeking seasoned writers with editing experience to cover contemporary art within Chicago. Please note that we are currently volunteer-run. Our existing funding strategies prioritize paying contributors, but paying editors is a future funding priority as is full W.A.G.E. compliance. These would be good roles for someone wanting experience with art criticism, editing, or non-profit development.

You would be contributing to Chicago Artist Writers in the following ways:
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* Working as a part of a three-person editorial team.
* Helping to create coverage priorities and establish the production schedule.
* Working with writers of all skill levels to edit between 2-3 texts per month.
* Recruiting and developing relationships with contributing writers and galleries.
* Initiating and assisting in programmatic and outreach efforts, about 2-3 a year.
* Support and develop fundraising mechanisms, grant writing, and allocating the budget.
* Maintaining regular communication via email and monthly meetings.
* Serving as back-up assistance for social media, mailings, etc.

We hope that you’d have:
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*In-depth knowledge of contemporary visual art and contemporary art theory.
*Communicates effectively orally, in writing, and/or using visual media. Excellent command of the English language, knowledge/fluency in a second language is desirable.
*Experience of working collaboratively with a team.
*Contributes to advancing professional practice or scholarly activity in own area of expertise. Additional interests in social practice and/or justice is notable.
*Interest in planning, prioritizing and organizing collaborative partnerships (Chicago Artist Book Fair, EXPO Chicago, Common Field, etc.)
*Experience in art research and publishing in an editorial role is a plus.
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Roles will remain open until filled. Please share widely.

Interested people should contact Brit Barton, Managing Editor and Dan Gunn, Copy Editor, at [email protected]

14/08/2019

Follow CAW with articles to your email.
https://chicagoartistwriters.com/about/mailing-list/

03/08/2019

Contributor Annette LePique reviews Juan Molina Hernández solo exhibition “autoretrato o piel vieja y lo que sobra de una manda cumplida (self-portrait or old skin and remnants of a prayer answered) ” at Roman Susan. (closes today)

LePique writes,
"Conceiving of space where roots can grow, the consequences of transplanting roots, roots as both memory and memorial echo throughout the space, the exhibition’s beating bloom of a heart."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/juan-molina-hernandez-autoretrato-o-piel-vieja-y-lo-que-sobra-de-una-manda-cumplida-at-roman-susan/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

25/07/2019

Contributor Shir Ende reviews Nelly Agassi's exhibition at the Graham Foundation.

Ende writes,

"Agassi has allowed the presence of the past to overtake the room while lightly addressing the lavish lifestyle of its original residents."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/nelly-agassi-spirit-of-the-waves-at-the-graham-foundation/

12/06/2019

Contriubtor Annette LePique reviews Liz Magor "Blowout" at The Renaissance Society.

"It is this pinprick of tension that draws out an audience’s emotional response. Magor’s alteration of items like thrift store shoes, blankets, fabric, and stuffed animals, edge their material disposability and anonymity into a state of alterity."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/liz-magor-blowout-at-the-renaissance-society/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

29/05/2019

Editors Brit Barton and Dan Gunn on art and writing in Chicago and CAW's expanded mission.

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/on-art-and-art-writing-in-chicago/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

19/05/2019

Contributor Manisha Anil Rita reviews Robert Walton and Company's performance "Exhuming Johnny" at the Chicago Cultural Center. It was one of nine performances commissioned as part of the "Goat Island archive-we have discovered the performance by making it".

"The narrative is most compelling when each of the cast members shares a memory or message they would leave for people in their lives from the past. Their bodies are active and hypnotizing in the sequences of traveling back in time as they alternate and repeat their parts."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/robert-walton-exhuming-johnny-at-the-chicago-cultural-center/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

12/05/2019

Contributor Iris Bernblum reviews the collaborative performance of artists and musicians Lia Kohl and Katinka Kleijn, “Water On The Bridge” at the Eckhart Park Pool.

"They gather the instruments, struggling to wrap their bodies around them, use them as floating devices. More often than not the cellos do not cooperate."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/lia-kohl-and-katinka-kleijn-water-on-the-bridge-at-the-eckhart-park-pool/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

05/05/2019

Contributor Ciera McKissick reviews Sam Kirk's exhibition "The Alchemy of Us: A Journey of Identity". The exhibition draws on Kirk's research as a part of the Core Residency on gender visibility at the Chicago Art Department.

McKissick writes,
"The fabrication can be seen as a metaphor, resembling how identities are formed and stories are shared, multifaceted, and layered."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/sam-kirk-the-alchemy-of-us-at-the-chicago-art-department/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

24/04/2019

Contributor Jill Danto reviews Roni Packer's solo exhibition "P.S. My Favorite Color is Green" at Slow.

Danto writes,
"Packer’s paintings thus far have been defined by yellow. Not just any yellow, but a yellow which feels like it could eat you up and spit you out as another yellow thing."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/roni-packer-p-s-my-favorite-color-is-green-at-slow/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

21/04/2019

Contributor Holly Lee Warren reviews AJ McClenon's performance at Links Hall titled "Led Zeppelin Can't Steal My Daddy's Black". The work was a part of AJ's spring Co-MISSION residency.

Warren writes,
"There is no southern mystique."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/aj-mcclenon-led-zeppelin-cant-steal-my-daddys-black-performed-at-links-hall/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

17/04/2019

Contributor Cody Tumblin reviews the group show "All Well and Good" curated by Eric Ruschman for Circle Contemporary.

Tumblin writes,
"These strange images fill the space entirely and evenly across all surfaces in the same disorienting way that a disco ball’s dancing light causes the whole room to spin. AWARE’s fragmented projection suggests a constellation of suspended memory, ultimately disrupting the gallery’s own physical structure."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/all-well-and-good-at-circle-contemporary/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

14/04/2019

Contributor Emma Dwyer reviews Karolina Gnatowski's (kg) show "Some Kind of Duty" at the DePaul Art Museum. Dwyer writes about the intimate experience of viewing the largely autobiographical work,

"The artist had to live their whole life in order to acquire these objects and the emotions that went into making them. More apt labeling might be “1980-2018.”

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/kg-some-kind-of-duty-at-the-depaul-art-museum/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

07/04/2019

Annette LePique reviews the two-person show of work by Kevin Demery and Raelis Vasquez "Stateless" at baby blue gallery.

LePique writes,
"However, the inclusion of a dissected, broken swing-set provides a devastating intimacy to the piece; it both expands and signifies what is lost to the oppressive framework of black childhood and state-sanctioned violence."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/stateless-at-baby-blue-gallery/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

05/04/2019

CAW is honored to be included in Field Perspectives 2019, a co-publishing initiative organized and supported by Common Field inviting thinking that reflects on the future of the artist organizing field. The program, a collaboration between Common Field and nine arts publications, is published in two parts. Part One includes texts by Chicago Artist Writers (Chicago, IL), The Rib (Boston, MA) and Sixty Inches From Center (Chicago, IL). Part Two includes texts by The Artblog (Philadelphia, PA), BMore Art (Baltimore, MD), Momus (Canada), Terremoto (Mexico), The Third Rail (Minneapolis, MN) and Title Magazine (Philadelphia, PA). Generous support for Field Perspectives is provided by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts

https://www.commonfield.org/projects/2366/announcing-field-perspectives-2019

Field Perspectives 2019 is a co-publishing initiative organized and supported by Common Field inviting thinking that reflects on the future of the artist organizing field.

17/02/2019

Contributor Annette LePique reviews the 8 artist group show "object/item/material/me" at the *new space* Annas.

LePique writes,
"Unlike texts and art practices within object-oriented ontology that erase difference, object’s recognition of race, class, and gender allows for the show to develop strands of commonality and community."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/object-item-material-me-at-annas/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

17/02/2019

Fellow painter Cody Tumblin reviews Jenn Smith's solo exhibition of paintings "Divine Ventriloquism" at Apparatus Project

Tumblin,
"Lined with rows of corn on either edge of the painting, a half-finished white snowman shape sits on top of a Pepto Bismol pink background, a tiny red top hat perched on its head."

Read on CAW:
https://chicagoartistwriters.com/jenn-smith-divine-ventriloquism-at-apparatus-projects/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

04/02/2019

Contributor Holly Cahill reviews the retrospective of the late painter Deborah Boardman "Painter &" at the Hyde Park Art Center curated by Jessica Cochran. Cahill writes,

"By giving prominence to the site of production, Boardman points to the liminal space of the studio as an incubator of ideas that move out into the world."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/deborah-boardman-painter-at-the-hyde-park-art-center/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

04/02/2019

Arts writer and CAW contributor Kate Sierzputowski sat down with Mickey Pomfrey and talked about his new gallery, Mickey, how it came to be, and his history co-running the previous space Courtney Blades with Blake Harris. This interview was created in partnership with Gallery Weekend Chicago.

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/a-space-to-grow-into-an-interview-with-mickey-pomfrey/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

16/01/2019

Contributor Sara Rouse reviews Caleb Yono's solo exhibition "Sara Femme" at Produce Model Gallery.

Sara writes,
"Femme could be a drag persona, a body to search for, a homophone for the six-winged seraphim or the antidepressant Sarafem. This allusion casts shadows over the work, bringing to mind the beauty and divinity of a burning angel but also ferocity, struggle, metamorphosis and the unknowable."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/caleb-yono-sara-femme-at-produce-model/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

15/01/2019

Chicago Artist Writers commissioned artist-educator, writer, and researcher Kristi McGuire to write her essay "artists-run futuresex, or, on the husbandry of the libidinal economy" that considers how capitalism warps the experience of time, making even notions of "the future" suspect. McGuire humorously traces the issue through finance, museums, pop culture, and music history to arrive at some speculative suggestions for artist-run culture.

McGuire writes:

“This is nowhere, and it’s forever,” said the showrunner for Star Trek, or Quantum Leap, or Black Mirror, or The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer, perhaps themselves an artist confronting our macabre fe**sh of futurity as a “die-in,” pre-empting our regularly scheduled broadcast of the present."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/artists-run-futuresex-or-on-the-husbandry-of-the-libidinal-economy/

“artists-run futuresex, or, on the husbandry of the libidinal economy” by Kristi McGuire was commissioned by Chicago Artist Writers as part of Field Perspectives 2019, a co-publishing initiative organized and supported by Common Field. Field Perspectives 2019 invites thinking that reflects on the future of the artist organizing field. The program is a collaboration between Common Field and nine arts publications and published in two parts. Part 1 includes texts by Chicago Artist Writers, The Rib and Sixty Inches From Center. Part 2 includes texts by Art Papers The Artblog, BMore Art, Momus, Terremoto, The Third Rail and Title Magazine. Generous support for Field Perspectives is provided by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

07/01/2019

Contributor W***y Smart reviews the two-person show "Reckless Comfort" of work by Jesse Meredith and Mia + Máire at Extase.

W***y writes,

"Museum gift shops would be more exciting if they similarly operated on a cosplay model but that’s not their purview: the museum sells the souvenir of the visit, the merch table the immanence of identity. I don’t imagine I am joining the band when I put on their t-shirt but I am yet transformed, marked as a member of this special public of listeners—part of their fictional universe."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/jesse-meredith-and-mia-maire-reckless-comfort-at-extase/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

30/12/2018

Contributor Ciera McKissick reviews the work of Óscar González-Díaz and Matthew Wead in S-W-O-O-$-H at the Chicago Artists Coalition.

"The most striking work is the vinyl lettering on the wall reading “America is canceled, Mexico esta cancelado, and L’Canada est anulee,” while there is some poked humor behind it, underlying those words are dire issues."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/s-w-o-o-h-at-the-chicago-artists-coalition/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

19/12/2018

Contributor Gareth Kaye reviews Alejandro Jiménez-Flores delicate solo exhibition of paintings “… for them to endure, give them space” at Bar4000. Kaye writes,

"The haziness of not only memory, but visual apprehension as well, can be found manifest in the soft glow of the pastel, floating on top of the surface of the canvas like a gossamer."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/alejandro-jimenez-flores-for-them-to-endure-give-them-space-at-bar4000/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

20/11/2018

Contributor Sabrina Greig reviews the large group show at 6018NORTH "Living Architecture". The show surveys the work of immigrant artists in Chicago, offering a complex and intimate portrait of the experience of relocation.

Greig writes,
"Living Architecture problematizes the notion that the immigrant body is antithetical to the American identity by showing the way several ethnic and cultural identities have coexisted within American culture since its inception."

https://chicagoartistwriters.com/living-architecture-at-6018-north/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

11/11/2018

Artist and writer Alex Chitty started to review Gaylen Ge**er's solo-exhibition Supports at The Arts Club of Chicago but stopped and wrote something else.

"The texts in the elegantly designed publication accompanying the exhibit are open and generous but act as makeup on a pallor face. Lipstick, eyeliner, foundation, and blush are cosmetics used to emphasize but also to hide."

http://chicagoartistwriters.com/gaylen-gerber-supports-at-the-arts-club-of-chicago/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

31/10/2018

CAW Editor Dan Gunn reflects on Julius Cæsar's X: A Ten-Year Anniversary Show featuring work by current and former directors. The event marks an occasion to think about the meaning and impact of long-term artist-run initiatives.

"Considering that Julius Caesar is a space named after someone who gets stabbed to death by friends, the subtext of the exhibition is the relationships of the directors–to each other and to Caesar."

http://chicagoartistwriters.com/julius-caesar-x-a-en-year-anniversary-show/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

14/10/2018

Gareth Kaye reviews "not to scale" at Heaven Gallery. "not to scale is a two-person show with work by Matt Brett and Shir Ende that examines the human relationship to the built environment while offering some speculative architectures.

Kaye writes,
"The user of these strange shapes and shelters becomes aware of a multiplicity of potential functions and experiences contained within the structure that goes far beyond the depths of the image/thing’s surface. In this sense, the mutual interdependence of both architecture/object and the human body/object establish an actual intimacy by not privileging ease of use, but rather the action of use."

http://chicagoartistwriters.com/not-to-scale-at-heaven-gallery/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

13/10/2018

Worth a read. LoriWaxman on Eduardo Kac at Sector 2337 + The Green Lantern Press

http://temporaryartreview.com/an-art-not-of-this-earth-eduardo-kac-at-sector-2337/

Earth has been feeling especially small and dark lately. Perhaps it’s just the days getting shorter. Or maybe it’s the politics getting more partisan, the hurricanes more destructive, the healthcar…

26/09/2018

Contributor Elizabeth Lalley reviews Stella Brown's installation of ecological remnants of steel production at Steelworkers Park "South Works Geological Study".

"Slag, the non-iron parts of iron-ore, is a central point of Brown’s project because it clearly illustrates the visible human alteration of the landscape over time. On this land, the slag is compressed into the ground and even exists as an extended layer of bedrock along the lakeshore."

http://chicagoartistwriters.com/stella-brown-south-works-deep-geological-study/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.

24/09/2018

Contributor Max Guy talks with Amina Ross of cooperative Femme 4 Femme (F4F), whose members also include Ally Almore, Jory Drew, AJ McClenon, and Zach Nichol as well as Jared Brown, April's RESIDE resident at F4F. The five-month RESIDE program dedicates a space to the “visions and passions” of five emerging artists – all Chicago natives. Other 2018 RESIDE participants included Silvia Gonzalez, Imani Elizabeth Jackson, Angela Davis Fegan, and Luis Mejico.

Max, Amina, and Jared discuss the residency, and the ethos of the domestic venue that cultivates a femme community, centers blackness, and address the context of its location in Little Village.

http://chicagoartistwriters.com/residing-at-f4f-an-interview-with-jared-brown-and-amina-ross/

Chicago Artist Writers is a platform that asks artists and art workers to write traditional and experimental criticism that serves under-represented arts programming in Chicago.