#picn

Crash Landing

  Gary Cawood- Excavation March 28-April 14, 2014

Moraine Valley Art Gallery

9000 W College Pkwy, Palos Hills, IL 60565

  Gary Cawood is a Little Rock based photographer that started this series in 2006, titled Excavation. These images explore what he considers surface scars, the remains in our environments that are considered expendable.

Cawood’s project is about opening eyes, to make people aware of our environments, and the damage we cause to them, but that they are also resilient.

Requiem II 

Excavation is a project in which Cawood selected sites that were excavated a long time ago. Cawood states that, “ at first I focused on the surprising forms and colors created by erosion. Soon I began adding throwaways to the compositions. Like the land, much of the stuff we buy is considered disposable and makes its way to sites like these.”

  Globe

  This project is a narrative both found and set up, that creates quirky yet serious images that make you think about our current disposable culture.

Check Gary Cawood’s Website out, here, to see Excavation and his other works. 

  Robert Gurbo – Andre Kertesz Estate Curator

  Robert Gurbo is a great man for the job of curating the Andre Kertesz Estate. Mr. Gurbo talked straight, without notes or hesitation for an hour and a half. This man is extremely passionate about the work he has been trusted with curating.

Robert Gurbo talked about his days as a child, and how he was given a Kertesz photography book and how he was hooked. Mr. Gurbo never dreamed of meeting, working for and then curating his role models work.

The way this man talked was inspirational. The history he knew of Mr. Kertesz and his work was just amazing. Like I said he talked for over an hour straight about Kertesz’s family, his brother (his soulmate), his time prewar, postwar, his time he spent with painters in which he met his future wife(2nd), his time becoming Paris’s most well known photographer and his unknown status in New York. There is no way in which I can describe the breadth of this mans knowledge on both the man and the work.

I can only suggest picking up either André Kertész: The Early Years and André Kertész: The Polaroids, both of which Robert Gurbo is the author of. 

RISK, an ongoing exhibition (Feb 10-April 26, 2014), which explores art in a social space. RISK is a citywide exhibition, which has a “base” at The Glass Curtain Gallery, 1104 S Wabash Ave, Chicago IL. The exhibition is a mix of installation art, performance work, video, audio and interactions with the artists.

  While RISK is a citywide exhibition, I was only able to visit the collective artists works at The Glass Curtain Gallery.

  Walking in the first thing I noticed was a wood framed, yellow/gold painted structure with blinds on both sides and a picnic table inside.  This piece was called Lunch Room Expanse and A Personal Dinner Invitation: A Wedding to an Unknown Couple, created by Alberto Aguilar. This piece was created with the intent to invite a couple to get married in the space. An ad went out on Craigslist along with a guest list of 100 people. The artist also has various lunches in the space during its run, to just create a bond between people, a performance of getting to know one another, while he takes the back seat to the event.

  Faheem Majeed’s Shacks and Shanties is another structure built within the space. The purpose of this constructed shack is to give other artists a place to exhibit their work and perform on a stage placed outside the shack. The shack is built of found materials; discarded wood is nailed and screwed together to build the piece.

Not In Another Place, But This Place…(Happiness)  is a three channel video installation towards the back of the gallery, created by Kirsten Leenar. The video’s cast consists of police officers, students, community activists from the 48th ward and Alderman Harry Osterman. From my short time spent in this space I was able to view police men standing in place, an older man taping the floor of a stage in intricate designs and tid bits of acting from a younger crowd. It is definitely worth another visit to view the entirety of the video.

  RISK is so much more than what is in the space at The Glass Curtain Gallery. You can check out the events of RISK, here. The events go past the closing of the space at the Glass Curtain and the last event is May 6th. So if you have the time please check out an event that in your neighborhood.