I just started reading Six Nonlectures by E.E. Cummings and I love it. Each time I set down my book I fantasize about being a Harvard grad class of 1936 (or earlier) and I want to write in that canonical W.A.S.P.-y  literary style. A style first introduced to me in middle school through The Great Gatsby and Catcher in the Rye, and later impressed upon me in college through Burroughs, Stevens, Kerouac, and other dudes. These frequently referenced stories are part of an American myth that I can’t seem to shake.

My friend Paul Cowan knows what I’m going through. He recently released a collection of short stories entitled The Music and the Wine that follow a series of unnamed protagonists through everyday scenarios. The vignettes are about “nothing,” meaning ideas that are hard to describe: why your favorite pants are your favorite or what it feels like when someone steals your jokes. Paul once told me that he thought reading fiction was indulgent and his writing is decidedly enjoyable.

The Music and the Wine is a bizarre homage to the great American novel. In Wilke Dairy Co. Cowan acknowledges his indirect nostalgia for a time that only really exists in retrospect. He celebrates the Midwest and the 1950s. In Wilke Dairy Co. the narrator recalls a perfect night making out with Ann Wilke, a dairy heir, in her parents’ basement. The narratives are funny, nearly satirical, and my favorite is about a divisive social butterfly. It begins, “It’s a thin line between love and hate. And I never walk that line.”

The Music and the Wine is available from Paul Cowan and Golden Age. On Saturday, March 27th 7-10pm please join us at Golden Age for Alla Prima, a show of new works by Paul Cowan. Visit www.shopgoldenage.com for more information.

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This week: Philip von Zweck talks to Andreas Fischer!

Andreas Fischer is a Chicago-based painter and Assistant Professor of Painting and Drawing at Illinois State University (Normal,IL). Over the past ten years, his work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in New York and Chicago, including a 12 × 12 solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. He received a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, an MFA and MA in Art History from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and studied at the Universität der Künste Berlin. He was awarded an Artadia artist grant in 2004 and his most recent exhibition were held at Hudson Franklin Gallery (New York), Gahlberg Gallery (Glen Ellyn) and the Hyde Park Art Center.

This announcement landed in my inbox this week and I thought I’d pass it along. It sounds like a fantastic opportunity for aspiring curators who are still in school (and in fact, it’s aimed at student curators only). The Chicago Artists Coalition (CAC), as part of their “Around Town” program and in partnership with Merchandise Mart and Art Chicago, is launching its Merchandise Mart/CAC Pop Up Gallery, a new six-month exhibition opportunity for student curators and student artists (undergraduate or graduate students are eligible). THE DEADLINE FOR THIS IS MARCH 12TH, so if you are interested, apply soon! Details follow:

“CAC Around Town creates alternative exhibition opportunities for CAC Artist Members including pop up galleries, restaurants, office lobbies, cafes and more. By joining CAC, artists are eligible to participate in Around Town where they can attract new and diverse audiences.

Beginning in March, 2010, CAC will manage a new gallery space in the Merchandise Mart, a location that welcomes more than three million visitors each year. With 150 showrooms and over 4,000 professional designers, Merchandise Mart offers an unparalleled opportunity for artists to be discovered and commissioned.

Curators select the artists for their proposed exhibition. Both selected curators and artists must be currently enrolled students.
EXHIBITION INFORMATION:
• Three curators will be selected to develop shows that will be up for approximately 6 weeks
• The gallery measures 1900 square feet, with 4,200 square feet of possible exhibition space
• Shows will be promoted city wide to over 60,000 Chicago residents
• CAC will host a reception for each show
APPLICATION GUIDELINES:
Email to pepper@caconline.org by 5:00pm, March 12.
Application must include:
• Curatorial Statement (200 words or less describing their vision for the show)
• Resume
• Two References

Curators must be CAC members to apply.
There is no application fee.
Curators may only exhibit student artist work.
Selected exhibiting artists must also be CAC members.
The cost of a student one-year membership is $45

(for more information on CAC membership benefits, visit www.caconline.org/services). Following the application, runners-up will be interviewed in the gallery space.

Administrative Contact is Pepper Coates;
Email application to pepper@caconline.org by 5:00pm, March 12.

The folks at Temporary Services are puttin’ on a Fair in conjunction with their current Gallery 400 show, Art Work (January 26 through March 6, 2010). This Friday and Saturday from 12-6pm Bad at Sports will be there, selling t-shirts, giving away stickers, and recording your questions on video for our upcoming exhibition at apexart!

Please join everyone at the Fair for two days of art, books, talks, things for sale, things for free, and more….including short discussions about the work of various participating organizations scheduled throughout the day.

The whos (as in, who will be at Fair):
Antena
AREA Chicago
Bad At Sports
CAFF: “Find us in the real world motherfuckers!”
Gallery 400
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
WhiteWalls

The whens, wheres and hows:

Friday, February 26, Noon – 6 pm
Saturday, February 27, Noon – 6 pm

Two days of art, books, talks, things for sale, things for free, and more!

Organized by Temporary Services in conjunction with ART WORK: A NATIONAL CONVERSATION ABOUT ART, LABOR, AND ECONOMICS • www.artandwork.us

LOCATION
G400 Lecture Room & Gallery 400 at the Art & Design Hall, University of Illnois, Chicago
400 S. Peoria St (at Van Buren)
www.gallery400.aa.uic.edu • 312-996-6114

And while you are there:

Check out The Free Store, a concurrent exhibition at Gallery 400 taking the form of “a nomadic, temporary free store that irregularly visits a variety of Chicagoland neighborhoods.” The Free Store asks you to get involved by coming to the store, bringing stuff you want to give away, and taking stuff that you want. There is no restriction on what you can take. You don’t even have to haggle!  Just take it!

**Items can be dropped off at Gallery 400 during open hours. The Free Store organizers are always happy to accept donations (everything except for people, animals, and illegal/toxic substances).

Over the last 48 hours a story has been jumping around the Chicago art world stirring the minds and causing the hand wringing of countless people. Much of the talk has sadly been via email, Twitter, Facebook & other secondary venues of communication. That story is of the article in the Chicago Tribune about the artwork & marketing done by Patrick Skoff. Mr. Skoff has been taking his work and leaving it around town for people to take for free while giving hints as to locations over the internet.

Some people said it’s bad arts coverage, some people railed against it as playing to the base of humanity, some even wondered what Chicago art coverage has come to post Artner. The general consensus was that this isn’t Art’s coverage and better work is getting skipped; my thoughts are reprinted below from facebook (yea classy I know)……

It’s Entertainment coverage not Arts coverage (and correctly categorized). Honestly is anyone surprised since we continuously seem to exclude/ignore/insult/talk-around the main stream people who read the tribune?

I agree the work/story isn’t that notable (even though I do give kudos to the artist arranging this with the reporter, don’t think for 1 second Christopher Borrelli just happened to be there, this was coordinated, the reporter is as much the artist as the artist in this event) but am I shocked that people will eat this story up in the lack of anything else? No.

People want art in their life, I have seen it, everyday Joe and Jane urban, suburban & rural people love art they just are not being spoken to or at least not spoken to in a vernacular they have any chance to engage in.

Is this new? No. Will this change soon? Probably not. The only thing that grinds me is how everyone is so “shocked” that this is going on every time it happens. I don’t mean you guys as much as people I have had conversations with over the last 5-10 years.

Every time this happens everyone is “amazed” that this gets coverage and not something of more merrit. That is because we don’t talk to them in a way they would be interested or understand and we leave it to people like Borrelli & Skoff to fill the gap.

I swear I feel like Michael J Fox in the “American President” some days, I know I can come off as venal at times but people want Art, they want what that can offer (the creativity, the hope, the joy for the new) and the only people who are doing the talking are people that have nothing really to say. I don’t blame them but we can’t be shocked when the only words that get out are treasure hunts. When by and large everything they love and want we label as modernist and scoff at. There has to be a way to bridge the gap?

Feel more then free to comment by calling 312-772-2780 or emailing us and keep up the good work Chicago even if no one is writing about it.

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