One accidental achievement is based on uncountable travels from which the artist gains nourishment. – Fu Baoshi
I recently enjoyed the Cleveland Museum of Art’s exhibition Chinese Art in an Age of Revolution: Fu Baoshi (1904-1965). The stunning retrospective offered artistic insight into a dynamic and tumultuous time of change.
Posted in arts, cleveland, exploring, monday inspiration, viewing
Tagged arts, cleveland museum of art, fu baoshi, monday inspiration, viewing
Chicago is fortunate to be home to one of the world’s largest contemporary art museums. Here are five exhibitions to check out right now at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago.
IAIN BAXTER&: Works 1958-2011 [through Jan. 15]
This exhibition spanning over fifty years of work highlights IAIN BAXTER&’s focus on the environment, the role and experience of art, and contemporary trends in a multi-media collection of photography, found objects, and even taxidermy. He legally added an ampersand to his name in 2005 to emphasize viewer engagement and connectivity in art.
Ron Terada: Being There [through Jan. 15]
In his first American solo exhibition, Ron Terada employs signage, graphic design, music, books, and photos to examine identity, fame, and contemporary urban life.
Chicago Works: Scott Reeder [through Jan. 24]
MCA’s new local art focused series features Scott Reeder in his first solo exhibition. His deceptively simple style utilizes primary colors, wordplay, and spaghetti to challenge the perception of contemporary constructs.
MCA DNA: Dieter Roth [through Feb. 26]
Dieter Roth is best known for developing artists’ books, works of art created in book form and printed in small quantities. Roth donated a set of artists’ books to MCA after a successful exhibition in 1984 which he had helped design, including the suspension of the books on wire as seen in the current exhibition.
MCA Screen: David Harrt [through May 6]
In the filming of Stray Light, David Hartt was granted intimate access to the offices of Chicago-based Johnson Publishing Company. As the publisher of titles such as Jet and Ebony, Johnson Publishing has been an important presence in African American culture and the building’s 1971 interior was custom designed to reflect this status. The company’s move in 2010 and sale of the building has endowed Stray Light with the significance of cultural time capsule.
Do you like movies? Do you like music? Do you like movies about music?
The Chicago International Movies & Music Festival returns for its third annual installment April 14-17.
Twenty countries are represented in the 2011 film selection and music is at their center, as well as in the concerts, discussions, and exhibitions included in the festival. Although Wicker Park is the home base for this year’s CIMMfest, events are located throughout the city. All events held at the Chicago Cultural Center are free, although donations to the city’s storied center are encouraged.
“We strive to shed light on the interconnectedness of all people, around the world, shown through the lens of music and moving image, both recorded and performed live,” states CIMMfest’s mission. The extensive range of festival events accomplishes just that, broadening horizons, bridging the seemingly disparate, revealing the various manifestations of music’s evolving and enduring power. Musical focus on film includes Ministry, Mott the Hoople, Jose Gonzalez, Fishbone, Sarah Brightman, The Replacements, Alice Donut, Le Tigre, and a cameo by Olivia Newton John.
Film and documentary topics span the Internet’s influence on the music industry (for better or worse), England’s earliest endeavors in house music, the power of music held by international refugees, South by Southwest’s cultural evolution, dubstep’s roots at the Roxy in the 1970′s, and much more. Do you have an opinion on the best music video ever made? One CIMMfest panel will attempt to settle the ongoing debate.
Among the ten live concerts on this years itinerary are a Punk Rock Night at the Double Door as well as a performance by Eyes Manouche at the Cultural Center. This Slavic girl will be checking out the “gypsy jazz” trio consisting of a Croat, Serb, and Bosnian – just another example of connective power of music.
A compete event program is available at CIMMfest’s website. No word yet on the response if you arrive requesting the screening of Never Say Never.
Posted in arts, chicago, exploring, listening, music notes, viewing, wicker park
Tagged chicago, chicago cultural center, double door, listening, music & movies festival, viewing, wicker park
Today I bring you a decidedly less urban form of exploration. Over the course of six months, hiker Kevin Gallagher traversed the 2,181 mile Appalachian Trail and captured it in his short, Green Tunnel. Gallagher took 24 sequential snapshots each day during his epic hike along the trail from Georgia to Maine. His collection of over 4,000 slides was converted into a four-and-a-half minute film winding through the seasons and across the country. Gallagher takes us up hills, through valleys, mists, and meadows. We squeeze between craggy stone crevices and pass under lush verdant archways. There is even a cow or two.
On his website Gallagher describes the film as, “…an effort to bridge the divide from a contemporary America’s pace and outlook to the natural world’s slow rhythms, the film stands as an antithetically fitful and bombastic document of a measured and tedious exercise in endurance.” Insert your favorite Wordsworth quote and enjoy the lovely Green Tunnel.
At times your frenzied social schedule can take a toll. Your “usual” has lost its usual potency, your companions’ amusing sparkle is fading, and your feet hurt. At such times it helps to have a hideout.
Let me state outright,
The Hideout is not an establishment that everyone will enjoy. Located on a stretch of Wabansia off North Elston, surrounded by industrial buildings and city trucks sits a nondescript shanty-like house. Enter the low-ceilinged, tight-fitting front room and you will find the best kind of bar – a few favorite beers on tap, nice bartenders, and best of all, no pretense. Sure there are some hipsters floating about, but they blend in with union workers, vintage dressers, and nondescript folks just grabbing a brew. The demeanor is lighthearted and laid back; not too cool or too anything else.
I first arrive at The Hideout to experience The Interview Show, one of a series of regular events and concerts hosted there. On the first Friday of each month, guests from all walks of culture, business, politics, and community submit to an interview by Mark Bazer. Bazer, a columnist for the RedEye and the Tribune.com, keeps the conversations fresh and comical for the two hour show.
Fashionistas have flocked to Hideout for my first time at The Interview Show, a demographic I gather is typically underrepresented here. They want to see Tavi Gevinson, the fourteen year old fashion blogger. I hesitate to use oft-repeated descriptions of Tavi including “wunderkind” “phenom” and “sensation,” but her unique insight has become much appreciated by fashion fans, including myself. I have been following Tavi’s website for over two years, and her blend of intelligence and idealism combined with the youthful vulnerability that make her site more significant than “just clothes” is even more enchanting in person. While Tavi waxes poetic on the nostalgia of the 1990’s fashion (particularly Courney Love as muse), Bazer challenges, “I don’t know, I was there – you should have seen my dorm room.” Ones early teen years are not anyone’s most comfortable, but to recount those moments of experimentation (we are talking clothes here) online for all to see, takes balls. Tavi admits she doesn’t like to go back and read old posts. While the fashionistas bombard Tavi after the show and her image at New York Fashion Week a few weeks later appears everywhere, she describes the teenagers who yell from their car as she walks home from school, making fun of her blue wig.
Tonight’s other guests are equally interesting. Bethany McLean describes her latest book about America’s recent financial meltdown in compelling yet understandable terms. City Provisions founder, Cleetus Friedman, talks about the growth of his venture, completely convincing me to sign up for a Farm Dinner sometime this summer. Archer Prewett of The Sea and Cake chats about his latest projects and plays some new solo jams, so new they have not yet been named. Finally, the show is closed out by a rousing performance by Jazz-Gospel group, Come Sunday.
Just when I needed one, The Interview Show has become my new favorite monthly ritual. On tap for this month’s edition are Avenues Chef Curtis Duffy, Patrick Sansone and John Stirrat of The Autumn Defense, General Director of the Chicago Opera Theater, Brian Dickie, and comedienne Beth Stelling. The Interview Show takes place in the rear performance space of the joint. It’s roomier than the front area, but seats are limited so remember to arrive early.
Come Sunday closes out the show.
The next time I visit it is considerably quieter, although a Motown dance party rages on in the next room. Throughout the evening I glance over to watch the thinning crowd of revelers break it down. A full-figured songstress claps and grooves at the bar. It would appear some sort of wool hat match-off appears to be taking place, and I observe the competing styles that fill the room as their owners unknowingly imbibe. I doubt that it is ever very quiet, but a good place to sip and chat nonetheless. When it’s time to leave, a friend and I pile into his car and a third-party thrusts herself into his backseat. “You’re not Maggie,” she accuses. “Where is Maggie?” No. We are not. It seems innocent enough, but we lock the doors after sending her on her way, the streetlights are a little dimmer in this secluded corner.
Bootleggers, blue-collar regulars, and a stream of bands of varying degrees of fame have kept this hideout in operation since the 1930’s. As their website states, “It’s not for everyone, but for every one!” So now that you know where to find me…please don’t come looking.
The Hideout
1354 West Wabansia Ave.
Chicago IL, 60642
Posted in arts, chicago, drinking, events, exploring, hideout, impressions, noble square, viewing
Greetings friends! Please enjoy a guest post by my good friend, talented writer and cycling connoisseur, Mr. Nick Wright.
Marquee inside the Viaduct Theater lobby
In their infinite ability to bring the bipedal together, bicycles dominated sleet-covered streets this past weekend all over Chicago. The monthly Critical Mass took place Friday, and the Chicago Cycle Swap went down on Saturday—though for those dedicated riders, the Bicycle Film Festival packed the Viaduct Theater for back-to-back nights of short flicks featuring the urban bike culture around the world. Word from some Active Transportation Alliance advocates I spoke with was that every cycling-related event around town was packed. This is the first large cycling event I checked out since relocating to Chicago last month.
Front rows of the theater packed in. Extra chairs were fetched for people pouring in.
This year marks the 10th anniversary of the film fest, which Brendt Barbur started in 2001 after he was hit by a bus in New York City, according to the film’s website. By molding a near-fatal incident into a tribute of all types of riders—from nimble messengers to mud-menacing cyclocross racers—Barbur’s brain child has grown into a world affair, touring 26 cities. The remarkable blend of films ranged from short vignettes of BMX jumps to documentaries to intimate portraits of famous frame builders.
Local riders face off in Goldsprint competitions
After Friday’s showing, local riders faced off in goldsprint competitions, where you pedal as fast as you can on a stationary bike against one another while your progress is simulated and tracked on a screen. Think Wii bicycle, as it were. I got winded just watching them.
Headlining films included the Johnny Knoxville and Spike Jonze-produced Birth of Big Air, the story of BMX legend Mat Hoffman’s tribulations as one of the world’s top athletes (think Evil Knievel of BMX), and Line of Sight, a tantalizing, edge-of-your-seat documentary of the best urban riders as filmed from the helmet-cam of internationally-known cyclist-cum-videographer Lucas Brunelle. These guys aren’t Tour-de-France types. These are the riders skid-stopping their way through oncoming traffic, literally riding the line from Point A to Point B. What’s even more mesmerizing than the footage is Brunelle’s unflappable control of the camera as it stays on the riders as he’s trailing them through rush-hour traffic in New York. Check out the trailer here: http://www.digave.com/videos/
Bicycle valet parking underneath the Western/Belmont viaduct.
While the program didn’t highlight much in the way of commuters, utilitarian riders, or weekend warriors, it provided a glimpse into cycling sub-cultures that many rarely see. Terry Bloom, the Chicago local producer for the Bicycle Film Fest, told me that Chicago’s next installment of the festival should be this coming Fall. Keep your tires inflated so you can cruise over to the BFF when it rolls back into town.
- Nick Wright
Viaduct Theater
31111 N. Western Ave.
Chicago, IL 60618
Posted in cycling, events, exploring, roscoe village, viaduct theater, viewing
Art, history, culture, design, literature – more than a few of my favorite things coalesce so splendidly in museums. Call me a nerd, a really big nerd, but strolling through a gallery soothes my soul, affording both a calm contentment and a rush of inspiration the way only losing myself in a good book or absorbing a sweeping vista does.
With any new globetrotting mission, I strive to visit a museum in each destination. The local perspective gained is invaluable, as well as the dialogue on a global and, of course, personal level. Walking through a museum transports you spatially and temporally in a matter of steps. In the space of a few galleries you may zip from an ancient Egyptian tomb, to a Renaissance parlor, to Andy Warhol’s Factory. Yet when our demanding social calendars don’t allow hours to spare or the Wikipedia version of Rembrandt just won’t suffice, Google brings you their new Art Project.
The Frick is at your fingertips, the Hermitage in the palm of your hand, well at least your mouse is. Teaming up with a selection of some of the world’s most prestigious art institutions (17 at present), Google uses its Street View technology to open an art window on the world.
You can virtually traipse through the Tate, using your cursor to wander, or jump to a different area of the museum using the floor plan. Something catch your eye? Click on a work off the wall from the gallery view and that art work will open in your browser.
A great advantage to viewing artwork in person is the ability to marvel at the brushstrokes, the colors and construction which compose each work. Art Project’s high resolution representations allow the user to zoom into each art work, easily navigating its surface and exploring its most intricate features.
The clean interface and intuitive drop-down menus enable easy maneuvering between museums or works in each museum. Vital information about each work and museum is displayed at the right of the page, including artwork and artist history, viewing notes, location in the museum, and videos. You can even create a collection of your favorite pieces, you know for future reference when you finally come into that inheritance.
One of my favorite pieces from the Smithsonian collection is located at the Freer Gallery in Washington, D.C. Originally constructed to display the owner’s china collection, Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room, is functional whimsy at its finest. Of his luminous decorative mural, James McNeill Whistler said: “Well, you know, I just painted on. I went on—without design or sketch—putting in every touch with such freedom…And the harmony in blue and gold developing, you know, I forgot everything in my joy of it.” My own photographs do not do the Peacock Room justice, but now I can visit any time I like using Google Art Project.
Exploring endeavors can be difficult during the winter months, but Google Art Project affords you some of the world’s most distinguished works from the comfort of your couch. Right now I’m missing NYC, so I think I’ll take a turn through The Met and reminisce about my trip there last month. Meet me at Manet?
Posted in exploring, google art project, impressions, link love, viewing
