Bad at Sports » Bert Stabler

Top 5 Weekend Picks (4/13-4/15)

stephanieburke — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 13:00:33 +0000

1. It’s Getting Hot in Here at Chicago Artists’ Coalition

Work by Sarah and Joseph Belknap.

Chicago Artists’ Coalition is located at 217 N. Carpenter St. Reception Friday, 6-9pm.

2. With Other People, With Other Sons at Heaven Gallery

Work by Ryan Chorbagian, Hao Ni, and Patrick McGuan.

Heaven Gallery is located at 1550 N. Milwaukee Ave. 2nd Fl. Reception Friday, 7-11pm.

3. Temporal Figuration at LVL3

Work by Andrew Holmquist, David Brandon Geeting, and Jade Walker.

LVL3 is located at 1542 N. Milwaukee Ave, 3rd Fl. Reception Saturday, 6-10pm.

4. limes and bricks suck pink you tasteless hunk or just limes and brick suck pink or tasteless hunk at Terrain Exhibitions

Work by Claire Ashley

Terrain Exhibitions is located at 704 Highland Ave. Oak Park. Reception Sunday 12-4pm.

5. Objet Petit Ahh…, and Benefit for Version Festival 12 at Co-Prosperity Sphere*

Curated by Dayton Castleman and Matthew Dupont, with work by John Airo, Kristen Althoff, Anna & Meredith, Nick Black, Lisa Brosig, Stephanie Burke and Jeriah Hildewine, Jessica Calek and Dan Streeting, Abby Christensen, Melissa Damasauskas, Kaleb Dean, Aaron Delehanty, Jim Duignan, Ben Fain, Karl Gesch, Aron Gent, Ricki Hill, Gabe Hoare, David Hooker, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Anais Maljan, John Medina, Thomas Moreno, Heather Mullins, Jake Myers, Catie Olson, Haynes Riley, Blake Russell, Chris Santiago, Rana Siegel, Charles Smith, Bert Stabler, Basia Toczydlowska, Emily Van Hoff, Johanna Wawro, and Jen Zito.

Co-Prosperity Sphere is located at 3219 S. Morgan St. Reception Saturday 6-11pm.

*The author has work in this exhibition

How to Draw Your Own Door : An Interview with Edie Fake

Caroline Picard — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 13:00:15 +0000

Edie Fake’s first graphic novel, Gaylord Phoenix (Secret Acres) was eight years in the making. An erotic and sometimes violent psychedelic spirit quest, the book compiles the adventures of its central birdman who travels far and wide in search of self-knowledge and passion. It’s a two-colored interior, with a rich vocabulary of symbols and innuendo, from magical dwarfs to crystal splinters and tubular genitalia. The drawings are lush and decadent yet they resonate with a kind of personal touch too. When I put the book down I felt like I had been left with a piece of cartoon chalk—what will no doubt come in handy at such times in the future when I find something blocking my path (you know, because cartoon chalk draws doors through walls). This book is liberating and joyous and why not—for shouldn’t life be the same? Pain and vulnerability can lead to insight.

Despite the epic proportions of this one body of work (and here is a great interview about GP specifically) Fake has worked on other projects as well, participating in performances, working as a tattoo artist and developing an alternative history of Chicago. I wanted to ask Fake more about his work and how it flows together in an effort, I suppose, to explore his underlying and hybrid ideology. In some ways I surprised myself—I asked a lot of questions about tattoos. I’m curious about what tattoos mean in our culture, (perhaps especially because I’m spending the month in Providence and tattoos are really and truly all over the place). How are tattoos different from drawings? And where do those paths cross. Edie Fake seemed like a good person to talk to.

Caroline Picard: What happens to you when a drawing of yours is tattooed on someone’s arm? In other words, does the significance of the drawing change? How would you compare a tattoo with a drawing’s relationship to the world when contextualized by a book/on a page?

Edie Fake: I think a couple of things happen in a couple of different ways. First off, drawing a tattoo for someone is sort of like finding the perfect gift for someone you barely know. Part of a perfect gift is that it is entirely wanted and sort of surprising and I think it also has to have a little personal flair, some indication of who the giver is and why they would choose to give such a thing. So just the drawing/planning itself is already a lot more collaborative than just thinking about what you’d draw on your own. Then, you start tattooing someone and it’s a whole other thing. It’s a blood ritual and it’s craftsmanship and it’s fun and painful and casual too. I was only tattooing for a couple of years, but when I was working on someone there was this whole new process of understanding each line drawn, and also an understanding of why this tattoo was going to fit the person getting it. I think I was looking at the stuff I was tattooing like it was different sorts of heraldry. The person wearing the tattoo is a huge part of what the drawing becomes, both physically and energetically. That’s the biggest difference throughout the process. With drawings on paper I usually am pushing out a drawing with my own vision, and then it can have a really singular presentation. Tattoos temper your own version of how things should be with someone else’s ideas and I really love it because it can really push the way you draw into some strange places trying to figure out the common ground where “what someone wants” meets “what you want to give to them.” I’m not tattooing now, but I miss it a lot and I miss the way it pushed my drawings. I’m starting to casually put my feelers out for another apprenticeship here in Chicago.

CP: I’m interested in how you use drawings to empower and embolden ideas you have about fluidity and gender identity–Can you talk a little bit about how the medium enables your philosophy/ies?

EF: I’m not sure if my thoughts are organized enough to bring up anything worthy of being a philosophy! I do identify as a transsexual and I do think a lot about the expansiveness of language, the importance of self-definition and how that all relates to complicating gender and sexuality. Collapsing and expanding meaning of words and images can work towards a wild and playful vision of sex positivity as well; that’s what I strive for in drawings.

Multiple meanings are critical – I really think that’s what keeps visual, verbal and physical language alive, the way that new interpretations will always be added to the heap. I make a lot of work based on innuendo and word play. Coded meanings and visual decadence can provide a place where drawings can snap into something that complicates gender and implies new systems. For me, it’s impossible to articulate queerness in a direct and definitive way because it doesn’t exist like that – it’s much better pieced together through a drawing with many things happening, the interplay of different codes, sly language tricks, a collision of symbols, because all these things together gets more toward the idea of a border-less, boundless queer gestalt.

CP: Do you believe in a Utopia? (not necessarily something to implement, but something to work towards?)

EF: I don’t believe in some true, universal, obtainable utopia, or any kind of unified vision for a utopia, at all. However, I have experienced periods in my life I would definitely call “utopic” where I’ve felt amazing energetic kinship to those around me, or even just to myself… I should add, these were not periods that were free of problems or hardships, but they were times of feeling deeply connected to what I was doing and how I was living. Constantly scheming and trying to help others with their schemes.

I think the world is shitty and hard, really lovely things always fall apart, pain, violence, heartache and futility reign supreme. Flying in the face of that, a utopia notion in my head can push me forward, and encourage me to try to create good energy and critical work. Utopia as a constant push to conjure up how things could be better, and then the working your ideas into realities.

CP: In some way I was thinking about the utopia question because of the on-line project A Gay Utopia. I was wondering if you could talk a little about that–how did the project get started? What was it like developing work for an on-line and shared context?

EF: Before the Gay Utopia Online Symposium, I felt like the term was floating in the air a lot, especially the air over Chicago. In my experience, it was being used as sort of a rallying cry, to envision working for each other, creating networks, sharing resources, and helping each other build the things we wanted to see in the world. When I went on tour with Lee Relvas in 2006 she delivered this brilliant soapbox speech as part of our performance that culminated with asking the audience “Are you ready for a Gay Utopia?” Well, the answer to that was yes.

I’m unsure of how the Online Symposium started, but that project was the brainchild of Noah Berlatsky and Bert Stabler. It’s a wild grouping of folks that they brought together, and I’m really proud of the work I did for the project. There’s a wide range of how people approached the work there, and I think I approached it as someone who feels like “Gay Utopia” is a concept that nourishes me and is integral to how I see the cycles of my life tumble out. The Gay Utopia shares a lot with the Temporary Autonomous Zone and I am really invested in both of those, so I wanted to create a comic that reflected falling down that rabbit hole. When I settled on a long scroll down drawing, I also decided that the most important thing for me to show in the images was the close combination of destruction and ecstasy, love and fury going hand-in-hand, fueling each other. That’s a big part of my lived experience.

CP: I was thinking about tattooing again, and your description of its gift-quality. It made me think too about how you describe community and connectedness as being somehow central to those moments of utopic experience. In many cultures, it feels like tattoos have ritualistic significance–it’s a sign given at the coming of age, for instance, or after some epic experience. I was wondering if you feel like tattoos have a ritualistic resonance in your experience and what that might be?

EF: It’s a funny thing- it IS totally a ritual, and there’s this formal setup to it, but when you’re in it, it can seem casual. I guess I should call it “important casual” though – it’s a nice shared energy with tattooee and tattooist totally concentrating on what’s going on. As I was learning, I did tattoos on a lot of friends and I think that certainly had the pleasant effect of getting closer to people in a new way, through this little ritual, that wouldn’t have happened otherwise. It’s very much an act of trust too, which plays into making it powerful.

CP: What do you hope your work, say like Gaylord Phoenix, accomplishes in the public sphere? I’m asking partly because you talk about your drawings as though they reflect a personal process–like, it’s the space where you can really center yourself around an interior landscape. That said, I feel like the book is incredibly welcoming and playful and generous–so it feels like a world where I am invited to participate. I’m interesting in how that dynamic might play into the way you think about your work.

EF: Ideally, I make drawings that are about possibilities and potentials. Considering it now, I suppose I’m making objects that try to occupy or push towards a world I’d like to live in. I’m always borrowing energy from powerful scraps of language that roll my way, trying to recognize patterns and kinships and teaming it all up visually. With that in mind, it’s amazing to hear that the drawings can turn around and give out their own little powers. It’s so great when it when it feels like there’s sharing and exchange happening because I definitely hope for something large, lovely and real.

CP: I was also reading that you do some performance work as well–can you talk a little bit about that? And maybe what it is like to physically embody something, (vs. describing it 2-dimensionally).

EF: I do occasionally do performance work. To me it seems much more like conducting a public experiment, whereas displaying a finished drawing is like showing off the answer to a long series of problems. Performances are so dependent on your openness and the openness of the audience and they hinge on both the clarity of your purpose and also your ability to convey that purpose in a non-didactic way. It’s usually a medium I use when I have a cluster of ideas floating around my head. To perform effectively – it is so hard! For me, performing is maybe the hardest, so I try to listen to my heart about it and know when I’ve got something cooking, and if I’m not really feeling it knowing to throw in the towel and forget it, I’ll just do some drawings, which I always have ideas and methods for.

Go here for more glimpses of Edie’s work.

Top 5 Weekend Picks (7/1-7/3)

stephanieburke — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 14:00:09 +0000

1. Solastalgia at Johalla Projects

Work by Jenny Kendler.

Johalla Projects is located at 1561 N Milwaukee Ave. Reception is Friday from 7-10pm.

2. Doubt Implies Guilt at DIG

Work by Bert Stabler, Nick Black, and Jasime Young.

DIG is located at 2003 N. Point #3. Reception is Friday from 6-9pm.

3. Either/Or/Both at Threewalls

Work by Hans Peter Sundquist, Samantha Bittman, Michael Milano, Casey Droege, and Stephanie Brooks.

Threewalls is located at 119 N. Peoria St., #2C. Reception is Friday from 6-9pm.

4. Transmit/Transmute at Comfort Station

Work by Adrian Moens.

Comfort Station is located at 2579 N. Milwaukee Ave. Reception is Saturday from 7-10pm.

5. Thieves In The Light at Julius Caesar

Work by Jesus Gonzalez Flores.

Julius Caesar is locate at 3144 W Carroll Ave, 2G. Reception is Sunday from 4-7pm.

Nomadic Studio’s “Form and Content of Writing” Panel at DePaul University Tomorrow Night!

Claudine Isé — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 14:01:44 +0000

Hello again – I’m back with another quick plug for y’all. Tomorrow night, Chicago arts writer/administrator/curator Thea Liberty Nichols has organized a panel on the “form and content” of arts writing as part of Nomadic Studio, which is presented at DePaul University Museum and organized by the Stockyard Institute for the yearlong collaborative Studio Chicago project….jesus I can’t keep up with it all. Anyway…here is the pertinent who, what, whys and whens of this particular panel, which I think should be really interesting and if it isn’t I will be partly to blame because I will be on it, along with Patrice Connolly, Abraham Ritchie, Bert Stabler and the aforementioned Ms. Nichols, who IMHO has the one of the best names in the world.

Come see us discuss, and participate in the discussion! Also, please check out the whole slate of programs that are part of Nomadic Studio at the Stockyard Institute! And you can read more about the Nomadic Studio project on ArtSlant, right here.

6-8pm –Thursday, September 23rd

DePaul University Art Museum; 2350 N. Kenmore Ave., Chicago IL 60614 | 773-325-7506 | Directions |

Form and Content of Writing w/ Thea Liberty Nichols, Patrice Connolly, Claudine Ise, Abraham Ritchie and Bert Stabler

Panelists will engage in a casual discussion that examines the form (newsprint, published monographs, online journals or blogs) and content (criticism, interviews, exhibition reviews, press releases or scholarly essays) of their writing. Their individual practices, including the texts that inform and inspire them, will be examined alongside the colleagues and organizations with which they collaborate. In conjunction with Studio Chicago, the ways in which their studio environment, and indeed the city itself, contextualizes their practice will also be explored.

Abraham Ritchie is a writer as well as the Editor for ArtSlant: Chicago, the creator and administrator of The Chicago Art Blog on the ChicagoNow network and WordPress, and also writes for NewCity. He has previously written about art for Madison Newspapers, Inc.

Thea Liberty Nichols is an arts administrator, independent curator, and writer who lives and works in Chicago. Along with managing Intuits Study Center, she also acts as Co-Director of 65GRAND

Patrice Connelly is the Curatorial Associate for BMO Financial Group’s Corporate Art Collection where she crafts catalog texts describing and contextualizing the art works in their holdings. She has been contributing freelance art exhibition reviews to Newcity since 2008.

Bert Stabler is a teacher, writer, curator, and artist living in Chicago. He feeds on the living.

Claudine Isé has worked in the field of contemporary art as a curator and writer. Isé was Associate Curator of Exhibitions at the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio. Assistant Curator at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles and an art critic for the Los Angeles Times. She currently writes for artforum.com, art:21 blog, ARTnews, New City, and badatsports.com.

Top 5 Weekend Picks! (2/26 & 2/27)

stephanieburke — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 14:10:46 +0000

1. Pamela Fraser at Golden Gallery

Golden Gallery, generally a crowd pleaser, is putting up another strong show. This round it consists of works on paper by artist Pamela Fraser. The works (from what I could find and discern) are all abstract, hyper-color pieces. Is “eye candy” a bad word in the art world?

Golden Gallery is located at 816 W. Newport Ave. Opening reception is Friday from 6-9pm.

2. Alumni at David Weinberg Gallery

I went to SAIC for grad school, but I don’t believe that gives me a complete bias for SAIC grad work. However, when I see good work from my fellow alums, I got to give it a shout. David Weinburg is putting on an exhibition of “recent” SAIC grad work, including that of Amy Mayfiled, Noelle Allen, Helen Maurene Cooper, & Michael Ratulowski. If you haven’t seen their work yet (which, if you’ve been in Chicago a while, is unlikely) make sure you stop by. If you already know their work, head over for a refresher on why they’re awesome.

David Weinberg Gallery is located at 300 W. Superior St. Opening reception is Friday from 5-8pm.

3. FAIR at Gallery 400

As part of the ongoing exibitions Art Work and The Free Store, Gallery 400 is hosting FAIR. FAIR is, and I quote, a “two-day local maker and publisher fair” including mini events and presentations by the following participants: Antena, AREA Chicago, Bad at Sports, CAFF, Esteban Garcia, Golden Age, Green Lantern Press, Half Letter Press, Terence Hannum, Harold Arts, Imperfect Articles, InCUBATE, Clifton Meador & Guests, David Moré, No Coast, Onsmith Dog Stew & Monkey Nudd Wine, Pros Arts Studio, Proximity Magazine, Radah & Team, Spudnik Press, Bert Stabler, threewalls and WhiteWalls.

Gallery 400 is located at 400 S. Peoria St. FAIR will be happening Friday and Saturday from noon-6pm.

4. After Before at Swimming Pool Project Space

No more weaving in the Swimming Pool. Now it’s time for time travel. And I quote, “The exhibition subtly bends the space time continuum by making the future seem like the present or even the past. Daniel Baird’s fallen Space Station, Sherwin Ovid’s keenly rendered diamonds and Caleb Charland’s celestial photographs are all in conversation with another moment, another place, another realistic parallel now.” Rad.

Swimming Pool Project Space is located at 2858 W. Montrose Ave. Opening reception is Saturday from 7-10pm.

5. William Eggleston at The Art Institute of Chicago

And I quote, “A key figure of the last half-century, Eggleston is often credited for singlehandedly ushering in the era of color art photography. His motivation was simple and decidedly everyday: ‘I had wanted to see a lot of things in color because the world is in color.’” You cannot fuck with Eggelston. Oh, and HE’S GOING TO BE THERE SIGNING BOOKS!

The Art Institute of Chicago is located at 111 S. Michigan. Eggleston will be signing books from 3:30-5pm.

SALAD-CHURCH-EXERCISE

Meg Onli — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 18:05:47 +0000

Featuring work by:

Michael Bancroft, Noah Berlatsky, Dayton Castleman, CThrough Outfit, Chelsea Culp, Derek Erdman, Gina Grafos, Jacob C. Hammes, Jaime Lynn Henderson, Hideous Beast, Thaddeus Kellstadt, Paul Mack, Rachel Pollak, Yvie Raij, Oliverio Rodriguez, Christopher Santiago, Dewayne Slightweight, Edra Soto, Bert Stabler, Matthew Steinke, Susannah Kite Strang

Curated by Bert Stabler

Co-Prosperity Sphere
3219 S. Morgan, Chicago.

Open hours 1-4 pm Saturday July 11, Saturday July 18. Closing party Saturday July 18,

For more info check out Proximity’s site.

Top…4? for 7/3, 7/4 & 7/5

stephanieburke — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 02:15:43 +0000

Here’s what I’d go to, if I were you…
1. Co-Prosperity Sphere

Bert Stabler is bending you brain this 4th of July with SALAD-CHURCH-EXERCISE: A show about self-improvement through self-denial. With work by over 20 local artists, a massive salad potluck, and taglines like, “While large-scale organs of control, such as schools, hospitals, and prisons, enforce the social contract through a restriction of choice and a remote delegation of authority, personal or cultural techniques for redirecting and mastering libido, the inner primordial chaos we carry within, can be found in the options represented by salad, church, and exercise.” How could you go wrong. You can take the Orange Line to Ashland, Saturday from 2-6pm.

2. Julius Cæsar

For the day after Independency Day, lets raise our torn jean jacket clad arms an Question Authority! Mmm…high school. But seriously, Kaylee Rae Wyant and Jerome Acks are doing something cool over at Julius Caesar called Hear Here. Framed as work “examining the many ideals and complexities encompassing freedom, democracy and revolution” it should be interesting to contemplate after a flag choked day of “patriotism”.

3. BEN RUSSELL

How many ways can you put your own name on a show? Well, if you are Ben Russell, as many as humanly possibly. How is “Ben Russell, presented by Ben Russell, at Ben Russell” for ya? Weird thing is, it ain’t a solo show. Ben Russell is a new space in Pilsen, go there and check out work by Marco Kane Braunschweiler, Martine Syms, Paul Chan, Miguel Cortez, Roxane Hopper, Julie Rudder, and Kelly Kaczynsk are doing their performance piece at 9pm the opening night. Drop by for the Sunday opening from 6-10pm.

4. MCA

As a celebration of the closing of the Bucky Fuller exibition, the MCA is hosting Jen & Ira & You at the MCA Meet Buckminster Fuller Meeting the Hippies in Golden Gate Park, a performance piece by Jennifer Karmin & Ira S. Murfin. Ever wondered why hippies loved this son of the atomic age? Well, here’s your chance to find out. The performance is free with the cost of admission, so if you get into the MCA free, you’re good to go.

Bad at Sports » Bert Stabler

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