MartinJon

Glenn Wexler is an artist of light, shadow and graphics. Having always been an admirer of the work he does I thought I would post a few pictures from his recent show at the Elmhurst Art Museum


As you can see, Glenn is interested in what is between the lines, squeezed in the cracks and crevases of our subconcience. He exposes the light from within, and with a solid understanding and an intimate relationship with asian cultures Glenn is able to allow his works to be, without burdening them with overindulgent explanations.

I had a great time today at kasia kay art projects, hanging out at the Diane Christiansen show. Let me start by saying that this is a very understated show, at first it doesn’t seem like much. The show consists mostly of a number of relatively small oil paintings on plaster. These are not frescos; the oil paint is applied on top of cured plaster where the paint is layered and sanded, and layered and sanded. Many of the pieces in the show reference landscape, they create a significant amount of space and it should be said that Dine uses a number of techniques and styles to create her work.

All things being equal, the aforementioned points make this show a success. The reality of this show is much deeper than this though. The calm this show creates is downright curious. I say that because I feel that this show has something I just can’t put into words, something psychologically calming to the mind. The missing right angles from the plaster works edges soften the entire space, making everything easier to settle into. I don’t walk away from this show focused on any individual piece, but I walk away having had an experience.

Sometimes art wants to jump off the wall, other times it wants to jump into history, this show, although it will probably do neither of those things, will have affected a great many people. This is a wonderful collection of pieces that has an uncanny effect on the psyche, give it some time, take a breath and allow the work and the space to involve you.

In Chicago, far away from the height of this issue I look to the stalemate reached between Leicester City and Hull City for Nigel Pearson. As A hull Fan I have to say I am sorry to see him leaving, he has accomplished a lot here and done his job quietly and purposefully. I commend Hull City in allowing Nigel to speak with Leicester only after being approached by Nigel himself, something The Foxes didn’t wait for when Hull came-a-knockin’ 18 months ago. I recall the exit interviews that Nigel gave upon leaving Leicester, they were all of him saying ‘Well, I am moving; I was surprised Leicester allowed it’.

Leicester lets him go less than 2 years ago for somewhere in the ballpark of £600,000, he solidifies a team at Hull and is the impetus of a good start to a season that sees us in striking distance of promotion, and Leicester now want to swoop in and grab him for near the same amount they sold him for. I don’t know how business gets done in Thailand but that is not the way anyone I have ever met does business.
Let’s take a closer look at this

1 Pearson was let go from Leicester
2 Pearson is doing well at Hull
3 Leicester is flaunting how much money they are willing to put on the line to secure his return (£10+ million)
4 He will take Craig Shakespeare and Steve Walsh with him
5 Pearson is defiantly the right man for Leicester
6 Odds are that he will also poach promising players

Now Leicester is threatening the smooth transition buy being a bunch of bitches when it comes to coughing up the money that Hull are asking for. Hull are totally entitled to be asking for £1million at least, look at the list, you don’t tell the world you are going to free up £8million and not pay and extra £300,000 for a clean transition, its suicide.

Leicester are going to force Nigel Pearson to leave Hull on his own and suffer the consequences in court while trying to lead Leicester through a possible promotion run. This is all seeming like another huge mistake by Leicester with the victim being Nigel Pearson. Good luck to Nigel, but Leicester’s owners need to wake up and remember they have a goal and it shouldn’t be to create havoc in one man’s life.

I don’t blame Hull for standing their ground on this issue and it will only hurt the Leicester transition, because you know that Hull aren’t sitting on their laurels waiting for this to finish. They have plans and will execute them as soon as all of this is settled.

Panelists Elysabeth Alfano, the Creator and Executive Producer of Fear No Art, MartinJon, who is behind the video interview series ChicagoArts and Kelly Reaves the art editor at Gapers Block, discuss what attracts the press regarding covering art work. This Panel will be moderated by artist, author and professor Paul Andrew Wandless of Harold Washington College. So before you go to the first Thursday openings be sure to hit up this informative and artsy discussion.

Thursday October 6th
6pm - 8pm
Washington Hall
30 E Lake

This Saturday, after the big opening night of the art season, you might want to get a bit of the hair of the dog down at Prospectus Gallery in Pilsen. Walter Fydryck has been working on a new series of drawings that features prominently in this one man show. For a long time Walter has been inventing and perfecting a process of painting on Plexiglas, a few of these are present and help to understand the place where the drawings are coming from.

In the Plexiglas works we can see the layers that intrigue and inspire Walter’s work, those layers are easy to pick out in the drawings he is presenting us with. Walter’s new works start with a base of blue sponged on as an undercoating, this gives the drawings an odd depth and transparent quality, floating on which are outlines, mathematical symbols and silhouettes. The Imagery floats in space, without a ground to anchor the figures we have little choice but to concede that these are mathematical narratives. Our understanding of the figures and how they interact logically don’t always leave us satisfied, but when in our lives would we be totally satisfied anyway.

Prospectus Gallery
Opening Reception Saturday Sept 10 from 5pm - 10pm at 1210 W. 18th St.

So someone wanted a watercolor of a wolf with lasers shooting from its eyes. I like it.

MartinJon: "International contemporary artist living in Chicago and focused on improving the relationship between you and the arts."

Thats right 2 dogs 2 Lindsay's one in Toronto one in Utah, Go figure

This watercolor is heading up to Toronto.

Artist Conrad Freiburg opened a show of new work at Linda Warren yesterday July 8th, only a week after closing his long stint at the Chicago Cultural Center that yielded "It Is What It Isn't". Conrad's focus for the show at the Cultural Center was loss that he often explained as nothingness. His new show at Linda Warren "The Blind Light, the Pyre of Night" deals more with crisscrossing ideas about Science, Mathematics, Art and anything else that exists wholly or partially within nothingness.

It is often that we can find ourselves grasping at ideas whose existence is directly related to the amount of energy we give to thinking about them; the harder we try and understand, the faster the ideas seem to dissipate into that nothingness. This is the territory that Conrad creates, and the place that he invites us to explore. Conrad is presenting us with ideas about interconnectedness, hinting at how we relate to the universe and how it can be underestimated but at the same time be unnecessarily complicated by our own thought.



This show, which will be occupying the Linda Warren Gallery through August 31st, will also be host to an album release of Conrad's 'Undecagon'. Come to the Lind Warren Gallery on July 19th from 7-9 pm to help kick off an east coast tour promoting Conrad's new album. Special guest performances will include artists Mississippi Gabe Carter, Bill MacKay, Chuck Walker and Academy Records.

And for just checking out this post here is a sample from Undecagon

A month ago I found myself in Bloomington Normal for the One State Together in the Arts, the only conference for Illinois' entire creative community. While I was down there I met a number of people, one of which was Ife Williams who told me about her project “See Me Better”. Bringing together ten Community Organizations to create murals on boards that will be secured over windows of vacant properties in North Lawndale, south Lawndale and East Garfield.

Since late January, students and community members have been meeting weekly, brainstorming ideas for their mural concepts and designs, developing fundamentals in art, as well as participating in neighborhood field trips and history lessons. Classes were led by art students from a number of colleges around Chicago.

This Saturday June 25th the public will get their first look at the results of this project, from 10am -1:30pm at 1528 S Christina you will have the opportunity to meet the artists and talk with the organizations involved in the project, as well as partake in a community barbeque lunch.

Jim Nutt is amazing, I finally got over to the MCA and saw Coming into Character. This is a show of portraits over anything else, you have a selection of pieces from his Harry Who Days, which are also portraits, but all of those are over shadowed by his exploration in the imaginary women portraits.

When Jim Nutt was making his wild Plexiglas reverse paintings he used text to indicate and address things within the work, he also used mutations, growths and sales ads renderings. The use of all these devices was necessary to emphasize the work being made. Having painted them on Plexiglas the nature of these early pieces were to be slick, but in order for that to work with his style they had to be dramatic. This is where there is a huge leap from the early work of Jim Nutt and his Imaginary Women.

This series of portraits of women, extending back as far as the mid to late 80's, seems to break all the rules and yet they are a joy to be in the presence of. No longer utilizing text and objects to define the characters in his paintings, he invents patterns and techniques to describe and define. These women that Nutt is inventing stare out past the viewer in contemplation. We look in and are seduced, I want these women to exist because these works say so much; about me and how I see them, about Jim Nutt his approach to painting and his ability. Alas, these are invented, and they are exercises in painting, patterning and design. This show is the reason every design team should have a fine artists. and every museum should have a great designer.

I overheard one lady say she loved one piece in particular and just gushed over it, minutes later, husband in tow, she points to a piece next to the one she had previously addressed and said "Now that takes talent", I would have to agree with her on that. Almost all of these are squares, or just about, and most of them have the original painted frames, as I understand it, he painted his frames and the paintings at the same time, if the painting was altered majorly the frame would be readdressed to correspond with that change.

Of course this is an awful time to be blogging about this show because it is coming down this weekend, but for what it is worth, this exhibition shows Jim Nutt as a thoughtful and intense artists. Jim Nutt was a designer, an illustrator, this could have been his Achilles heal, but he worked within those limitations, not unlike Roger Brown, Ed Paschke or dozens of other Chicago artists, to excel at his chosen craft. It is great to look at this show as a Chicago artist, knowing how far we've come, and more importantly knowing who came before us.

ArtXposium is upon us once again, in it's fifth year in West Chicago IL, this multidisciplinary arts weekend is being brought to life by People Made Visible. "A non-for-profit organization with a mission to facilitate community while fulfilling the artistic, social, educational and cultural needs of the community through an innovative physical and web based presence."

I had the pleasure to speak with one of the featured artists Stine Marie Jacobsen who has been working with teens of West Chicago for her video project Detention Club. Stine has a history of working with reenactments of all sorts from popular films to urban legends, she enjoys repurposing stories to help get across ideas the story was not originally intended to address.

As any good Chicagoland native, I am aware that John Hughes filmed a lot of his movies in the area, especially Breakfast Club. This information led Stine to talk to the local teens of West Chicago about detention, not only as it relates to schools but how it translates to prisons and military detention centers like Guantanamo Bay. During the three weeks that this dialogue went on, Stine was surprised at all the things that could land a high School kid in detention, and found it remarkable how many of the teens she was talking with reiterated that they have never been asked about their thoughts of the process.

After all the talking was over everyone agreed to create a 1 hour silent protest within the West Chicago Community High School District 94 library. This protest was recorded and edited by Stine entitled "Detention Club" this 10 minute video will be played as a loop in the Gallery 200 Studio as a feature in this weekends artXposium.




Dates
Friday, May 20, 6 p.m. - 10 p.m., Opening Reception in conjunction with Local Music Night featuring: 51 Strings, John Keeney & Algebro.
Saturday, May 21, 9 a.m. - 8 p.m.
Sunday, May 22, noon - 4 p.m.


Location
203 Turner Court, West Chicago, IL 60185