BOLT Residency is a highly competitive, juried, one-year artist studio residency program.The Artist-in-Residence program offers emerging and established artists a platform for the investigation, experimentation, and development of ideas regarding contemporary artistic practice while living and working in the city of Chicago. The program's mission is to help artists advance their career in an environment that allows for expansive thinking and opportunities to engage with their co-residents in a group setting, as well as with influential artists, curators, and educators through individual studio visits.BOLT Residency provides six (6) professional open-plan studios and a 400-square-foot gallery space for a solo exhibition. The program is non-residential: no room/board is offered.&nbsp;

BOLT Residency at Chicago Artists Coalition

Chicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present <a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-muyjyuy-ftuikdrju-b/">Longing Compass</a>, a solo exhibition of new works by the BOLT artist-in-residence, <a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-muyjyuy-ftuikdrju-n/">Karen Dana Cohen</a>. The exhibition will have an opening day on Friday, June 25, by appointment only, from 3-8pm. Please reserve your time <a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-muyjyuy-ftuikdrju-p/">here</a>.“A sound – uttered by whom? – and then nothing.&nbsp;A word – written by whom? – and then a blank.&nbsp;Listen to the nothing. Read the blank”.&nbsp;Edmond Jabès&nbsp;At first, I was a little disenchanted by the fact that the practice had to be relocated again into the household basement, that my new rehearsals were relegated to occur underneath stories of laundry and other domestic human material. Quickly, I realized that to be underground was in fact constructive. This other space gave me remarkable creative freedom and also protected me from being surveilled. From inside my cave, I could safely exist outside “normal” conditions of the worlds. This enabled for a rhythm where I reclaimed unseen domestic labor as a bodily experience. The move allowed me to jump from the kitchen to the studio with ease, straddling two performative uses of the body - one as a medium of care while the other as a longing compass.&nbsp;The state of precariousness took over myself to the point of not knowing where the boundaries were nor where the stage began. Each studio session was treated with respect, vulnerability and spontaneity, accepting that I was going to be interrupted by my children multiple times. I knew that there was going to be space growing between our hands as our whole world was reduced into a home. I grew patience. The basement is the dug out foundation of the house. Strong and critical to the structure, yet still vulnerable.&nbsp;No one could tell me how to use my own resistance because at the margins, we always belong to unbelonging. We can only really understand from standing in the periphery. As Cecilia Vicuña said:“I haven’t felt the need to name or claim certainties where there aren’t any, but instead I’ve been able to offer all the uncertainty that displacement offers me. Uncertainties that confuse me and crack open my experience of being singular, leaving me to resonate and discover that I also know the language of interconnectivity”[1].&nbsp;Objects in close proximity to paintings seem like artifacts collected from the life we once had. Depicting the nostalgia of human gatherings, of a circle of friends, of using body language and glances to communicate with others, work together. I think about this as I remain in my safe corner while the storm passes. Will this exhibit bring people together? We are only able to make sense from the question. The idea of collective contribution has never been more important. To belong and give to a community, and how to do that while the world is collapsing. This is the kind of compass that draws circles from a pivot point, not necessarily the compass that dictates the direction to travel.The planting down of the pivoting foot and the drawing of the line are some of the gestures here. Flexible within boundaries... firm but searching to describe those boundaries in these works. The vacancy presents itself free to put all energy into a choreography, a circleness of solidarity because there are no demands. These canvases undercut the very notion of “improvement” they circle back into a group, into the edge in which one can be a part of something bigger than the individual.&nbsp;It is the center that holds the space open, keeps it together, and guards it safe from outsiders. It can be winded to accommodate more, and narrowed when people leave. The center of the circle is the pivot, the focus, and the essence even when it is empty. It represents the purpose and intention of the collective. It is not the outside of a pot, or a room that is essential, but the empty space each creates inside, when its purpose is realized. The circle way involves mutual agreements of sequence to reenact flexibility.&nbsp;The positioning of myself in the basement is as the needle piercing the ground, driving itself like an anchor to a lower point to swing from... extending to find the absolute furthest ripple.&nbsp;- Karen Dana Cohen&nbsp;Karen Dana Longing Compass (2021). Installation detail. Oil on canvas and acrylic painted paper clay sculptures. Dimensions variable.&nbsp;

Longing Compass

Extended: January 6 - January 21, 2021 by appointment only. Please reserve your time <a href="https://calendly.com/chicagoartistscoalition">here</a>."When a building is destroyed, it leaves a hole in a succession of facades, sometimes revealing intimate traces still there on the party walls: bathroom tiles, a faded poster. Such vestiges look extremely outdated, miserable and touching, while being doomed to be bulldozed. But what is even more disturbing than these faces without volume is the possibility of a volume without a facade."&nbsp; - Hélène MeiselChicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present BUILD YOUR SELF, a solo exhibition by BOLT Resident, Tamara Becerra Valdez that opens on Friday, February 21, with a reception from 5-8pm.The works presented in BUILD YOUR SELF stem from Valdez’s deep interest and continued investigation into the archaeology of contemporary, banal material culture and human interaction, individually and collectively, produced with the urban landscape. Valdez gathers found objects, such as door handles with broken key locks, confetti remnants from last night’s party, handwritten notes and photographs, and carefully sets them on or into nooks and recesses of sculptures or architectural details in the gallery. Through a combination of found and crafted objects, preserved and discarded, Valdez constructs a series of new sculptures made from detritus and set in a subtle reconfiguration of space—introducing spatial and architectural interventions in the gallery.Molds and casts of trash and debris remark on the loss and degradation of our eroding environment. The result could be described as an attempt to index and archive the total event of a small, individual moment. Rusty and worn, weathered or destroyed, the sculptures support the left behind, ditched, dumped and discarded into new modes of meaning and values.Such traces collected are a reminder of the beauty of wear and tear on the surfaces of everyday life— and the impact of a journey that has been taken. Tripping. Falling. Missteps. Stumbling moments. Another attempt to pick oneself up, again. Image courtesy of the artist.More About the ExhibitionLearn more about the artist's interests in identity, infrastructure, and environmentalism, and witness the creative influences that inspired BUILD YOUR SELF. &nbsp;“Traveling simultaneously fast yet slow, my still yet moving alternate body sings a wordless and wondrous song in the company of my multitudinous self.” - Pauline Oliveros, “The Earthworm Also Sings” (1992) As stated by Pauline Oliveros and told to me by my dear friend Paige Naylor, Deep Listening is “learning to expand the perception of sounds to include the whole space/time continuum of sound” and “…discerning the effects on [our] body-mind continuum, from listening to others, to art and to life.” In many ways, acoustic ecology connects us with our understanding of the world and witnessing its changes, for better or worse. What does the ear want to hear? Bearing witness is a valuable way to process an experience, to give empathy and express support, to lighten our emotional load with another. Can the seeds hear Cecilia’s melodies singing to them as she plucks them for preservation? Can the whales feel his human heart vibrating in the water from their first encounter? Who wrote this confessional on the wall for me to find? "It matters what matters we use to think other matters with; it matters what stories we tell to tell other stories with; it matters what knots knot knots, what thoughts think thoughts, what descriptions describe descriptions, what ties tie ties." - Donna Haraway, “Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene” (2016)READ <a href="https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5febb87ed1fb535fde2559b4/t/5ff51ffcf4875c2b8f6081bf/1609900029046/PaulineOliveros_The+Earth+Worm+Also+Sings.pdf">“The Earthworm Also Sings” by Pauline Oliveros</a> &nbsp;worlding ripping nature is a 1.5 hour YouTube video playlist I created to accompany the re-opening of my exhibition, BUILD YOUR SELF, at the Chicago Artists Coalition. The video playlist attends to the promising and the threatening in the world amassing a tune-in to the sound, the image, the self, the animal, and the earth—herself. This playlist serves as a resonating landscape of the inner workings and musings taking place, apart and simultaneously, within my mind. Enjoy the program in its full length or have the sounds and images accompany the ongoing of your everyday. I’ve included videos from remarkable and influential artists, poets, filmmakers, and musicians such as Anna Arismendez of Caña Dulce y Caña Brava, Cecilia Vicuña, Jose Olivarez, May Ayim, and others.Download a supplementary read of “The Earthworm Also Sings” (1992) by Pauline Oliveros on the @cacoalition website.WATCH <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAlFSKeYeAqwUxAHqPKWp2H0odJldDhZD">worlding ripping nature</a> YouTube playlist program&nbsp;&nbsp;

BUILD YOUR SELF

<blockquote>"When a building is destroyed, it leaves a hole in a succession of facades, sometimes revealing intimate traces still there on the party walls: bathroom tiles, a faded poster. Such vestiges look extremely outdated, miserable and touching, while being doomed to be bulldozed. But what is even more disturbing than these faces without volume is the possibility of a volume without a facade." - Hélène Meisel &nbsp;</blockquote>Chicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present&nbsp;<a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-xedrjk-dlvzir-j/">BUILD YOUR SELF</a>, a solo exhibition by <a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-xedrjk-dlvzir-t/">Tamara Becerra Valdez</a>&nbsp;that opens on&nbsp;Friday, February 21, with a reception from&nbsp;5-8pm.The works presented in&nbsp;BUILD YOUR SELF&nbsp;stem from Valdez’s deep interest and continued investigation into the archaeology of contemporary, banal material culture and human interaction, individually and collectively, produced with the urban landscape. Valdez gathers found objects, such as door handles with broken key locks, confetti remnants from last night’s party, handwritten notes and photographs, and carefully sets them on or into nooks and recesses of sculptures or architectural details in the gallery. Through a combination of found and crafted objects, preserved and discarded, Valdez constructs a series of new sculptures made from detritus and sets them in a subtle reconfiguration of space—introducing spatial and architectural interventions in the gallery.Molds and casts of trash and debris remark on the loss and degradation of our eroding environment. The result could be described as an attempt to index and archive the total event of a small, individual moment. Rusty and worn, weathered or destroyed, the sculptures support the left behind, ditched, dumped and discarded into new modes of meaning and values.Such traces collected are a reminder of the beauty of wear and tear on the surfaces of everyday life— and the impact of a journey that has been taken. Tripping. Falling. Missteps. Stumbling moments. Another attempt to pick oneself up, again. This event is free and open to the public.&nbsp;Image: Courtesy of the artist&nbsp;

Build Yourself

Reception: Jan. 3, 5-8pmChicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present Very Fine On Both Sides, a BOLT exhibition featuring new sculptural, textual, painterly and video-based work by artist-in-residence Latham Zearfoss. The exhibition opens on Friday, January 3, 2020 with a reception from 5-8 pm. Very Fine On Both Sides uses absurdist humor and the metaphorical potential of the palindrome to disarm the dystopian energy of our calcified political present. Palindromes are a self-satisfied form that serve no clear purpose beyond the trivial. In this regard, they present a fertile, almost funny parallel to mainstream political discourse, which continues to excuse the ideologies of rape culture and white supremacy through an insitence on false equivalencies. Or as President Trump infamously said, there are very fine people on both sides. Further, Very Fine On Both Sides proposes that new articulations of resistance are more important than ever by rendering reactionary politics of any kind as flaccid and even narcissistic - mirror image of its opposite, attached at the hip.Latham Zearfoss produces time-based images and objects about selfhood and otherness. Often collaborative, these works ask: how do we come to know ourselves as social human subjects? Across media, the work is anchored in the belief that identity is a cumulative, political effect, inherited through a kind of collective bargaining. These themes find evocative, sensual resonances through dramatic shifts in color and light, reverberating soundscapes populated by disembodied voices, queerly uncanny iterations of the not-noticed and everyday, and “soft borders” - spatial markings of undetermined significance that invite participation, transgression, even penetration.Latham Zearfoss works in Chicago, where they produce time-based images, objects and experiences about selfhood and otherness. Outside of the studio, they contribute to collective motions toward joy and reflection through social projects such as a queer dance party (<a href="http://www.chancesdances.org/">Chances Dances</a>), a critical space for white allyship (<a href="http://makeyourselfuseful.info/">Make Yourself Useful</a>), and an itinerant conference on socially-engaged art (<a href="http://openengagement.info/">Open Engagement</a>).&nbsp;Latham graduated from&nbsp;<a href="http://saic.edu/">The School of the Art Institute of Chicago</a>&nbsp;with a BFA in 2008 and the&nbsp;<a href="http://artandarthistory.uic.edu/">University of Illinois at Chicago</a>&nbsp;with an MFA in 2011. They have exhibited their work, screened their videos, and DJed internationally and all over the U.S.&nbsp;Image: Courtesy of the Artist.&nbsp;

Latham Zearfoss: Very Fine on Both Sides

Chicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present An Orange Dragon, a solo exhibition of new work by Devin T. Mays. The exhibition opens on Friday, September 27, 2019, with a reception from 5-8pm.A self-described shaman, Devin T. Mays has created new work that interrogates his desire to believe. Much of his work, in its manifestation and engagement, requires a level of persistence and patience. One might say that same level of presence is needed to believe. Through memorabilia of his past, a collection of moving images and finds from a flea market, he will try his best to materialize a miracle.About the ArtistDevin T. Mays' practice is an auto-ethnographic investigation of the in-between -- an intermediate&nbsp;space navigated by the social polarities of his identity. These social polarities, ranging from corporeal to celestial, demarcate spaces that define an in-between. This in-between-ness is&nbsp;measured both horizontally and vertically – horizontality as a measurement of time and&nbsp;verticality as a measurement of transcendence. Time tests the durability of polarities and&nbsp;transcendence tests the limits of their existence. This visual language develops a&nbsp;vocabulary that defines and redefines the in-between being explored in his practice, and&nbsp;the iterative formal gestures create conceptual underpinnings that create grammatical&nbsp;rules for the work. By creating conditions that infiltrate, imitate and mine his familial,&nbsp;spiritual and cultural landscape, the work proposes and repositions what’s in-between.&nbsp;Image: Devin T. Mays, All Things are True, 2019, HD video still&nbsp;

Devin T. Mays: An Orange Dragon

Closing Reception: <a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-pihlltk-dlvzir-t/">The ANNUAL BREAKFAST</a><a href="mailto:karina@chicagoartistscoalition.org">(rsvp)</a>, Friday, September 20, 9-11amChicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present&nbsp;<a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-pihlltk-dlvzir-j/">Preview 9: A Boldness to Dare and Try</a>, featuring works of art by&nbsp;Leticia Bernaus,&nbsp;Karen Dana Cohen,&nbsp;Jacquelyn Carmen Guerrero,&nbsp;Alejandro Jiménez-Flores,&nbsp;Tamara Becerra Valdez, and&nbsp;Latham Zearfoss.Curated&nbsp;by&nbsp;Asha Iman Veal.The six dynamic visual artists in the exhibition demonstrate a mastery of the formal and conceptual, as tools to advance their creativity and confront social challenges. They are dedicated to their respective crafts and have triumphed in unexpected artistic environments, despite opposition that may stifle their creative expression or personal identity. In various assertions, this group of artists redefines and claims culture and space as her/his/their own, without apology.This exhibition is presented in conjunction with&nbsp;EXPO ART WEEK&nbsp;Image: Jacquelyn Carmen Guerrero,&nbsp;MYTH OF CQQCHIFRUIT, 2015, video, 10 min.&nbsp;

Preview 9: A Boldness to Dare and Try

Closing reception and publication launch in partnership with Service Bureau at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago’s editioned print series The FOLD.For more information about the exhibition and its programming, click <a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-pvhdid-dledja-j/">here</a>.&nbsp;Image: Mev Luna, Digital Deliverance: White Saviorism and the Screen, 2019.&nbsp;

Closing Reception: Far from the distance we see

Live recording of Archives + Futures podcast with Ivan LOZANO.<a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-pvhdid-dledja-y/">www.archivesandfutures.net</a>&nbsp;

Live Podcast Recording: Archives + Futures

In conjunction with exhibition Far from the distance we see&nbsp;&nbsp;Image: Mev Luna, Digital Deliverance: White Saviorism and the Screen, 2019.&nbsp;

Gallery Talk: Amara Nayeli Oviedo in conversation with Mev Luna

<blockquote>“The proliferating subaltern...indicates how the powers of the subject remain with us, that the strategies of the modern Will to Truth, the tools of science and history, remain the productive weapons of global subjection.” – Denise Ferreira da Silva, author of 'Towards a Global Idea of Race'</blockquote>The Toltecs, and later the Mexicans, believed that projection from the spiritual world into the physical was possible. Mahtactli on ce ilhuicatl or ‘the Eleventh Heaven’ is the location of the four spiritual energies of Tezcatlipoca, sometimes described as the ‘invisible god’ due to the scant surviving representations. Mahtactli on ce ilhuicatl is visualized by a square formation,[1] with each of the four spiritual energies occupying one corner, with scores of movement between intersecting lines of mother-thought and father-thought forming an x or cross in the center.[2] When enacted, the tracks rotate around the central axis, drawing a circle within a square. Far from the distance we see uses this geometric configuration and its spiritual significance to instigate audience participation, as the viewer must navigate the space according to predetermined routes in order to fully access the imagery contained within. Architecture elicits a compulsory performative equivalent to our contemporary experience of screen mediation.A solo exhibition of new work, Far from the distance we see investigates various manifestations of physical and experiential confinement: Luna considers both corporeal confinement within the carceral state and the inescapable labor economy of late capitalism, alongside conceptual confinement within an imposed subject formation and position. The notion is explored both literally––through the specific embodied experience of moving through a constructed space––as well as through didactic and transcendental means. To fully experience the work, the viewer must navigate a complex site-specific structure packed with unlikely references to contemporary lived experience.The architecture referencing Mahtactli on ce ilhuicatl contains a multi-channel video installation accessed via cubicle partitions treated with a privacy film designed to obscure only the content displayed on the video screens. The open concept cubicles reference an outmoded form of office space and economic stability, and the shift to precarious labor, not just by the artist as freelancer, but by workers in many fields across the global gig economy. The video-essay at the center begins with a digital calibration process based on a series of sequences used by marketing surveyors to establish a “baseline” for emotional response to consumed media. Luna’s video similarly seeks to create a baseline for interpreting the footage that appears after the calibration takes place. The installation necessitates two parallel forms of viewership: participants experience both watching unobstructed content, and watching others experience the same content made inaccessible by the privacy screen.The essay format of the video is echoed in the inclusion of a draft of Luna’s essay Digital Deliverance: White Saviorism and the Screen. Installed as an experimental large-scale publication on a blueprint hanger for architectural drawings, this unusual presentation indicates a work-in-progress. In the essay, Luna critically evaluates the enthusiasm of the private sector to mediate human-to-human contact within the correctional, immigration, and healthcare systems. In analyzing advertisements for video-conferencing services in popular media, they draw on Althusser’s theory of interpellation to affirm that these forms of mediation apply to the same demographics of bodies. Considered an “accessible” and “affordable” alternative in response to the demands of overcrowded detention centers and a failing healthcare system, these methods render unmediated experiences such as in-person visitation and court proceedings, a privilege available for those outside of the marginal classes.The sibling piece to Digital Deliverance,Touch-Trace is much smaller in scale. Deliberately eschewing the white gloves typically associated with the conservationist principles of the archive, this piece converges the legible with the tactile, and welcomes any residue left behind. Made of a shiny, non-toxic, mercurial-like metal, the work requires a small gesture – the participant’s touch – in exchange for an impermanent mark. The fingerprint, commonly associated with ‘booking’ in the criminal justice system, is no longer a record of an individual body but a traveling marker. Thus through the act of reading, the viewer embeds their biometric data onto the document, while the metal –which melts with body heat and solidifies at room temperature–becomes a temporary record, using the audience as a vehicle through which to enter the world outside the gallery.The complex physical architecture and interwoven multi-media content of Far from the distance we see manufactures a viewing experience both intimate and alienating, reflecting the lived experience of the individuals for whom it was designed.[1]&nbsp;Olivier, Guilhem, Mockeries and Metamorphoses of an Aztec God, Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2008.[2] Magaña, Sergio, 2012-2021: The Dawn of the Sixth Sun The Path of Quetzalcoatl: The Path of Quezalcoatl, Italy: Blossomingbooks, 2012.Artist BioMev Luna (b. Houston, Texas, 1988) is an interdisciplinary artist currently living and working in Chicago. Through a research-based practice and self-reflexive methodology, Luna’s practice rethinks history to identify the fictions that govern contemporary life and speculative futures. They work between live performance, video installation, new media, and text. Luna's works have been exhibited in group exhibitions at Oficina de Arte, México City; PRIZM Art Fair, Miami; Threewalls, Chicago; and the Oliver Arts Center, Oakland. Luna's time-based works have been presented at Artists' Television Access, San Francisco; MIX Queer Experimental Film Festival, New York, SFMOMA San Francisco; and Defibrillator Gallery, Chicago. Luna was a 2015-2016 fellow at the Shapiro Center for Research and Collaboration, a 2017 SOMA Summer participant in Mexico City, and a 2018 Art Matters Foundation Fellowship recipient.This project is supported in part by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency through federal funds provided by the National Endowment for the Arts.&nbsp;Image: Mev Luna, Digital Deliverance: White Saviorism and the Screen, 2019.&nbsp;

Far from the distance we see

"The collection of sands that have been selected chronicles what remains of the world from the long erosions that have taken place, and that sandy residue is both the ultimate substance of the world and the negation of its luxuriant and multiform appearance."-&nbsp;Italo Calvino, Collection of SandChicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present "Temporarily Removed," a solo exhibition by BOLT Resident, <a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-ndidkuy-dledja-t/">SaraNoa Mark</a>.Art in its earliest incarnation was painted on and carved into rock, establishing the coexistence of image, meaning and place. The exhibition "Temporarily Removed" asks what becomes of materials that are extracted from their places of origin.Landscapes touched by wind and water are worn away over time, carved first with creases and cracks, and ultimately ground into sand, making visible the repeated actions of the elements over expanses of time. Low relief sculptures in the exhibition count time by recreating drawings made on the earth by natural processes in clay.When a landscape completes this geological journey, stationary stones are transformed into a more restless substance. The color, size, and shape of sand particles are specific to their geographic origins, yet sand is migratory. It rushes down riverbeds and blows in a dusty cloud from the Sahara to the Gulf of Mexico. We travel untold distances to connect with this legacy of stone and water. And at times we reverse this journey, bringing the portable components of these landscapes back as collectors, researchers, miners, and thieves.Seeking to understand the impulse to collect land, Mark displays an assemblage of sand gathered from around the world, through travel, personal relationships, and Internet commerce. Sand samples are invariably identified by their place of origin, but their ability to be gathered belies a static understanding of object, place, and borders. Mark’s collection presented in ceramic sandboxes is arranged as a border-less geography. Drawing extensively from museum displays —the primary public repositories of relocated objects—re-purposed museum materials are used to create much of the work in the exhibition. Museum armatures exhibited alongside the sand collection and low relief sculptures crafted from a recently disassembled museum wall meditate on the absence of displaced objects from their places of origin.About the Artist<a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-ndidkuy-dledja-i/">SaraNoa Mark </a>(b. 1991 New York, NY) pursues a drawing practice that reflects a desire to evidence the constant and invisible activity of time. After graduating from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, SaraNoa Mark was recognized with a travel scholarship that supported a visual pilgrimage to Europe’s museums, cave paintings, and natural sites. Mark’s work was supported by a grant from The John Anson Kittredge Fund. She has been an artist in residence at The Lois and Charles X. Carlson Painting Residency, Sedona Summer Colony, Art Kibbutz, and the Montello Foundation. SaraNoa Mark is a Director at the 4th Ward Project Space in Chicago. She also works as a museum guard at the Oriental Institute, building an intimate relationship from its antiquities collection. SaraNoa Mark is currently a BOLT resident at the Chicago Artists Coalition.For more information click <a href="https://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-ndidkuy-dledja-d/">HERE</a>.&nbsp;Image:&nbsp;Temporarily Removed, 2019

Temporarily Removed

Chicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present&nbsp;M&nbsp;ㄅ&nbsp;V&nbsp;ㄍ&nbsp;M&nbsp;ㄍ&nbsp;ㄇ&nbsp;ㄒ&nbsp;&nbsp;II : Architecture of Consolation, a solo exhibition by BOLT Resident,&nbsp;Cathy Hsiao.&nbsp;Architecture of Consolation&nbsp;is the second of four movements of the artist’s&nbsp;Songbook for Sculpture&nbsp;cycle.&nbsp;In her second movement, Hsiao explores&nbsp;through&nbsp;multiple collaborations&nbsp;the networks of cultural production and circulation between&nbsp;the&nbsp;East and West, this time starting with a single image of a Japanese woodblock and expanding into an architectural tableaux.&nbsp;For more information, click <a href="http://news.chicagoartistscoalition.org/t/i-l-nilidlk-dledja-t/">HERE</a>.

M ㄅ V ㄍ M ㄍ ㄇ ㄒ  II : Architecture of Consolation

Show runs: November 30- December 20Chicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present&nbsp;Preview 8, a group exhibition featuring​ the 2018-2019 BOLT Artists-in-Residence​.Preview 8&nbsp;presents works by&nbsp;Danny Giles,&nbsp;Erin Hayden,&nbsp;Cathy Hsiao,&nbsp;Mev Luna,&nbsp;SaraNoa Mark,&nbsp;Devin T. Mays. This group show reveals new works by each of the artists in anticipation of their solo exhibitions occurring in 2019.&nbsp;Preview 8&nbsp;is curated by Jared Quinton.Open Studios NightDuring the opening reception of Preview 8, visit the&nbsp;BOLT Open Studios&nbsp;to see other works by the Artists-in-Residence. &nbsp;

Preview 8: Opening Reception

Opening Reception: Friday, November 30, 6-9 pmChicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present&nbsp;Preview 8, a group exhibition featuring​ the 2018-2019 BOLT Artists-in-Residence​.Preview 8&nbsp;presents works by&nbsp;Danny Giles,&nbsp;Erin Hayden,&nbsp;Cathy Hsiao,&nbsp;Mev Luna,&nbsp;SaraNoa Mark,&nbsp;Devin T. Mays. This group show reveals new works by each of the artists in anticipation of their solo exhibitions occurring in 2019.&nbsp;Preview 8&nbsp;is curated by Jared Quinton.Open Studios NightDuring the opening reception of Preview 8, visit the&nbsp;BOLT Open Studios&nbsp;to see other works by the Artists-in-Residence.

Preview 8

THIS EVENT IS FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC.Chicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present AfterGlow, a solo exhibition by BOLT Artist-in-Residence, Melissa Leandro.&nbsp;AfterGlow presents the work of Chicago based artist Melissa Leandro as she reflects on specific familial and cultural realities that coalesce experiences from her everyday life and family histories. Leandro’s exhibition introduces a hodgepodge of domestic vignettes through the use of uniquely upholstered furniture, woven and embroidered textiles, collaged plastic tablecloths, and plaster sculptures created by herself and father.Leandro leads us through an alternate reality that is both inspired by and at odds with the idea of, “where we call Home.” She is influenced by family memories of her mother working as a housekeeper, her grandfather’s house in Costa Rica, and her present day collecting of knick-knacks, mementos, personal ephemera and detritus during her travels within and outside of the US. Leandro translates a collection of drawn marks and cyanotype prints to imbue familiar household objects with her lived experiences. Her exhibition brings together motifs and objects of domestic life that are both sentimental and gaudy, specifically presenting the viewer with a hyper-vivid, and outlandish living room setting that echoes Leandro’s hybrid culture as a first-generation US citizen moving between Costa Rica, Miami, Chicago, and abroad.By employing materials that have a relationship to domestic spaces — the home, the kitchen, the family room — her installation twists assumptions on how we perceive decorative patterns, kitsch imagery, and cheap, domestic consumable materials. These printed plastics and woven cloths, often used for cheap décor in the home, have the ability to take on a different cultural status that disconnects them from their intended home and function, and leads us to an otherworldly setting.ARTIST BIO<a href="https://melissaleandro.com/home.html">Melissa Leandro</a> (b. 1989, Miami, FL) is an artist who works between the media of drawing, painting, and textiles. Leandro's woven and embroidered surfaces explore her composite cultural identity through means of intuitive mark-making. Reflecting on her family memories, past and present travels, she considers how her environments fragment identity and place.Leandro was awarded the Toby Devan Lewis Fellowship (2017) and the EAGER Grant for research and collaboration (2016, Shapiro Center), both for her studio work at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). She was awarded the Luminarts Fellowship (2017) from the Luminarts Cultural Foundation, Union League of Chicago. Leandro was a BOLT resident at the Chicago Artist Coalition for 2017-18, and was named one of Chicago's Break Out Artists of the year for 2018. Her studio work is featured in LUXE, Luxe Interiors + Design Magazine as part of their Chicago Style Maker edition (June 2018).Leandro has attended ACRE Residency, Wisconsin, Roger Brown House Residency, Michigan, The Weaving Mill, Chicago and TextielLab, The Netherlands and the Jacquard Center, North Carolina. She has exhibited nationally and internationally, and is currently represented by Andrew Rafacz Gallery in Chicago. She holds a BFA and MFA from SAIC and is currently teaching at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago as Lecturer and is the Assistant Director title of the Fiber Material Studies department.

AfterGlow

Opening reception: Friday, March 30, 6 - 9pm

colossal gap comes from the perceivably empty space between it all. This perception is evoked by the metaphorical blank areas we tumble into, grasping to make sense of them, or distort them, as they relate to the intricacies of our lived experiences. John Cage&rsquo;s quote, which muses on the impossibility of pure emptiness, is the impetus for the exhibition. colossal gap highlights the generative moments in the seemingly nothing that are embraced by the exhibiting artists.

New works by Adler, Liu, and Moore collapse the gulf between ideas and memories, nothingness and traces, to create interstitial spaces for new experiences. By reprocessing audio and visual information, the artists illuminate the malleable form of empty time and space, and its power to multiple meaning and expression.

colossal gap is curated by Jamillah Hinson.
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colossal gap

Keeping Record brings together fragmented memories and the emotional detritus of coming to terms with the notion of self.&nbsp; Using history and dialogue as materials, Derrick Woods-Morrow connects stories of his youth with the struggle to understand a deep-seated urge to do violence to bodies&nbsp;&ndash; to your body&nbsp;&ndash; to his body [Black] &ndash; to their bodies.

affect interactions&nbsp;&ndash; from the holy vibration to otherwise mundane things&nbsp;&ndash; as he reaches back to his past&nbsp;&ndash; as a meditation on safe futures

A new essay by Kamilah Rashied will accompany the exhibition.

Keeping Record

Chicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present&nbsp;Public School, a solo exhibition by BOLT Artist-in-Residence,&nbsp;Jeffrey Grauel.

Public School&nbsp;brings together two new bodies of artwork by Grauel: hooked rugs, their outmoded-grade-school-subject-matter covered in layer of shag; and, wooden sculptures inspired by a bamboozling childhood visit to a Southern Californian ghost town amusement park. The labor intensive process used to produce one set against the illusion of natural laws defied in the other.

A new essay by&nbsp;J. Nicole Brooks&nbsp;will accompany the exhibition.

Opening reception: Friday, February 2, 2018 from 6-9:30pm&nbsp;

COST: Free and open to the public

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