Last weekend’s warm weather provided inspiration to take a trip to the Krasl Art Center.  Located in St. Joseph, Michigan, (about 100 miles from Chicago) the Center sits in picturesque surroundings, just blocks from Silver Beach and Lake Michigan. 

Many pieces from Krasl’s permanent collection surround the Center’s property and also dot the beachfront, on view to the public and unsuspecting beach-goers.  Krasl’s contemporary sculpture focus within their permanent collection was established shortly after the Center’s opening in 1980. 

Inside Krasl, visitors find a main exhibition gallery as well as the artlab – a smaller venue dedicated to more experimental installation, time-based media, and sound/light pieces.  On view now through June 2 in the artlab is Brian Knowels’ Spewniverse.  The exhibition consists of site-specific installation and animation using foam board, screenprinted papers, recycled fragments from previous installations and televisions with looping animations. 

Also on view through June 2, the main gallery exhibition is The Floating World: Ukiyo-e Prints from the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art, showcasing 50 ukiyo-e prints from Japan's Edo Period; part of a three-year national tour and organized by The Lauren Rogers Museum of Art, located in Laurel, Mississippi. 

In addition to rotating exhibitions, a variety of classes and educational programs are offered for children and adults.  Learn more about Krasl Art Center and plan a day-trip to explore for yourself.

Michael Dunbar, Allegheny Drift, 1995, steel

Burt Brent, The Heavyweight, 1994, bronze

Kirk Newman, Gulwave, 1983, bronze

Benik Motevosian/Genzink, Moon Dream, 2001, steel

Coming up at the Chicago Art Source Gallery in Lincoln Park is an exhibition titled Chicago Six, opening Thursday, April 4 and featuring diverse works from the following Chicago artists: Mark Phillips, Eric Holubow, Sheila Ganch, Lynn Basa, Kristin Komar and Michelle Gordon. The focus of the group show is to allow each artist to represent what they find inspiring, challenging and rewarding about living in Chicago. Though these Chicago-based artists are not all originally from Chicago, they have all made the city their home.

The six artists I will be discussing cover a wide range of mediums such as printmaking, photography, sculpture and painting, while still representing the theme of Chicago life found in the buildings, the people and the busy streets in each work.

Mark Phillips works with metal, printmaking and paint to represent the gritty El stations, the graffiti-clad walls and the busy streets that have become visual embodiments of his urban life in Chicago.

Eric Holubow photographs abandoned churches, theatres and warehouses in an effort to capture the beauty in these dilapidated structures, revealing a different side of Chicago architecture.

Sheila Ganch shapes abstract sculptures portraying the people that grab her attention in the city, such as the form of a couple bent over a table in thought, maybe waiting for their food at a local restaurant or playing a game of chess in the park. By creating different bodies in varied positions, Chicago becomes their common denominator. 

The three painters in the exhibition see the city in more abstract, color-filled ways. 

Lynn Basa creates tableaus of color springing forth from city lights and buildings.

Kristin Komar pairs unnatural shapes and colors on a background of dripping paint that represents the man-made buildings placed up against natural parks and lake and river.

Finally, Michelle Gordon piles color upon color to portray the diverse spectrum of people and places that life in Chicago has to offer.

Chicago Six

April 5-June 22

Chicago Art Source Gallery

1871 N. Clybourn Avenue, Chicago, IL 60614

Thomas Robertello Gallery recently opened a show this past Friday featuring two artist: ceramicist Sarah Hicks’s show Pop Garden shows concurrently with Hilder Asgeirsdóttir Jóhnsson’s Strata. As both artists are exhibiting together in the gallery’s space, their rather unique works of art find ways to complement each other.

Chicago-based Hicks offers a variety of ceramic sculptures of imagined morphologies rendering her minimalist pop-surreal sensibilities. Hicks’s eccentric pieces are created from reassembled molds of mass produced and found objects. As Hicks wishes to investigate ornamental and highly stylized forms, she uncovers abstract as well as obvious correlations between their origins and knick-knack toys. She creates these hybrid works by a method known as slip trailing, in which she pours ceramic slip into a plaster slab where shapes are then drawn. This gives Hicks the chance to craft a two-dimensional form in a fluid method. She then treats the surfaces with intense colors, patterns, textures and glazing techniques to give the pieces a whimsical yet chic feel. These works demonstrate Hicks’s interest in the connection of the familiar and foreign pushing back on one another.

The Cleveland-based Icelandic artist Hilder Asgeirsdóttir Jóhnsson creates abstract and textile art that removes the detailed, vivid points in her photographs from her journeys to Iceland to simple and abstract hand–woven works. Jóhnsson documents her travel through Iceland, and uses the photographs of this stark landscape as the beginning point of her studio practice. She sorts through photos of trips to her native country, editing and then selecting images that really captivate her. She then distils the images to their most fundamental forms creating almost topographical studies. She then paints the drawings onto two separated silk threads that she weaves together to form a single woven piece. The abstract forms she creates are hard to recognize as the original Icelandic landscapes, but there is still a glimpse into this natural place and memory with which Jóhnsson first started.

This show seems to reveal a connection between Hicks and Jóhnsson though they are two very different artists. Both call for their original subjects to be minimized to the point of unrecognized form. In this form is where the viewer may then begin to understand the artists’ goal in their work.

Visit the exhibition to discover the connection between the two unique artists. The show runs through April 6.

Thomas Robertello Gallery

27 N. Morgan St.

Chicago, IL 60607

812-345-1886

www.thomasrobertello.com

Hicks

Johnsson

“I feel that in art there are no limits for the creator among any kind of expression. For me, what I am asking in my world is to bring the deepest elements of my existence up to the surface and transfer all the hidden personal codes to bring my personal signature to the universal and global world. As the Ancient Greek philosopher, Heraklitos said, everything is fluid, and as a subscriber to this philosophy, I believe in global logos. It is very important for me to jump from painting to sculpture and from sculpture to music and to any other kind of art in order to find the traces, which will drive me to the global truth. I think that this is a very fundamental reason for someone to live, to exist.”               

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 -Kostis Georgiou

In the latest exhibition at Hilton|Asmus Contemporary, Greek sculptor and painter Kostis Georgiou presents Pixels.  The show opened Friday, February 15, welcoming over 200 visitors excited to see some of Georgiou’s work. A pixel is the smallest element of an image that can be illuminated or darkened, and Georgiou’s works fill the gallery with brightly colored paintings and sculptures of simple detail and beautiful forms that boast a vitality that is very welcome in the dreary days of this Chicago February.

 Georgiou, known for his sculptural work in which he creates small figures – on view now at Hilton|Asmus Contemporary – as well as large works that can be up to 9 meters tall- as seen in France’s Peyrassol Vineyards. These simple form sculptures have a fluidity that can only come from the aforementioned global logos- this plan that governs all, passing from one form to another, just as his sculptures pass from one shape to another. With a focus on the simplistic shape Georgiou attempts to represent deep elements of his human existence, while creating works that boast beauty in both movement and form.

 Though known for his sculptures, it was Georgiou’s paintings that first caught my eye. They are brightly colored, with a very surreal and dreamlike sense to them. With thick, quick brushstrokes, moving around the canvas like a dance or song, each painting causes the viewing to travel around the work quickly, still understanding what is represented. Each one tells its own story and calls the viewer to stop and contemplate what the subject is thinking, doing or believing.

 It takes a talented artist to find success in representing his own existence in both painting and sculpture, and Georgiou does so with flair. From his 9 meter tall sculptures, which could easily be found in a large open space such as Millennium Park, to his colorful paintings of subjects swimming under the night moon, Georgiou’s work was able to take me into the artist’s world and I hope you will be able to stop by Hilton|Asmus Contemporary so his work may sweep you up as well.

Hilton|Asmus 

716 N. Wells St.

Chicago, IL 60654

312-475-1788

www.hilton-asmus.com

Below are some photos of Georgiou's work as the gallery.

This past weekend I had a chance to check out Andrew Rafacz Gallery’s current group show Lake Effect/ Nor’easter: Part I in the West Loop. An exhibition of two parts collaboration with LAMONTAGNE, a gallery located in Boston. Each gallery will feature works represented by the other. Part II will take place at LAMONTAGNE opening in Boston on December 15. Featured artists in Part I include: Tory Fair, Jeff Perrott, Daniela Rivera and Joe Wardwell.
 
The aim of the show is to give Chicago a unique glimpse of the vitality of the work created by artists working and living in the Bay State.
 
I enjoy the idea of a two part collaborative show in different cities, functioning as a sort of artist swap, giving the other city a friendly glimpse of different work. The works themselves were lighthearted. Tory Fair’s cast resin sculptures Sculpture From Above and Pink Crate Sculpture struck me as innovative and a little strange, in an unexpected way. Fair’s palette utilizes a soft pink - a color I’m not typically drawn to - in a satisfying manner along with bright yellow and metallic silver. The way the sculptures are positioned casually on the hardwood floor instead of formally on a pedestal, adds to their contemporary air. These sculptures have a presence of being honest, and give off the idea of hope that art can connect to the viewer without being too serious.
 
Daniela Rivera’s oil paintings are arranged with some hung on the wall in a grid, and others trailing off into two stacks onto the floor. All twelve canvases are painted varying shades of green, reminiscent of summertime grass. Rivera’s paintings are easy to relate to, giving an intriguing mix of nostalgia and that refreshing, forbidden feeling of not wearing sandals in the summer while sipping on homemade lemonade.
 
Fair’s sculptures and Rivera’s paintings stood out to me in the group show. Jeff Perrott’s abstract large paintings and Joe Wardwell’s graphic paintings were both interesting, unfortunately I didn’t relate to them as much as I would have liked. Overall, the show was refreshing, contemporary, and the works were playful.
 
Be sure to check out the exhibition for yourself - the show runs until Saturday, December 22. Andrew Rafacz Gallery is located at 835 W. Washington Blvd, Chicago.

Tory Fair, Sculpture From Above, cast resin, 18” x 14” x 12”, 2012 and Tory Fair, Pink Crated Sculpture, cast aluminum and resin, 15” x 15” x 14”, photographer: Erin McGuire

Daniela Rivera, Growth, oil on canvas on panel, 24” x 24” x 2 ½ ”, 2011, photographer: Erin McGuire

Daniela Rivera, Growth, oil on canvas on panel, 24” x 24” x 2 ½ ”, 2011, photographer: Erin McGuire