On Saturday, September 17, Woman Made Gallery and the UIC Gender & Women’s Studies Program hosted a conversation led by artist and professor Joyce Owens about unequal representation of women and women of color in the art world. There was an audience of about thirty men and women of various backgrounds: artists, collectors, educators, and patrons.

It was a collaborative discussion, starting with the topic of women and their representation in the art historical canon. We went on to discuss the lives and art of specific Illinois women artists who have gone under-appreciated, particularly Anna Tyler and Margaret Burroughs. From there we touched on some topics that concern women artists in particular such as the struggle of balancing a family and artistic career, making money as a woman artist, learning how to value one’s work, promoting one’s work, supporting other women artists, collecting, and thinking critically about one’s work and how to be discerning about where you show it. Everyone in the audience participated in the conversation and we had a fulfilling and insightful discussion with many different voices represented.

After just graduating from Columbia College Chicago with a degree in Photography, this discussion was especially interesting to me, particularly when it came to the subject of MFA programs. During the conversation I learned that most MFA graduates will leave their fields ten years after graduating. Considering that most programs will cost around $100,000 (unless you receive financial aid or go to school in your home state) it is a large investment to leave behind after a few years. We brought up the costs versus the benefits of going to school in an art hub like New York or LA, but not receiving any financial aid. Many women in the discussion expressed that it does not matter where you go to school because receiving more education could never be seen as negative in the job market. They also said that you don’t have to take the art star route to become a successful artist, which is refreshing for a recent grad to hear.

Another point in the discussion that was relevant to me as a recent graduate was when Joyce Owens spoke about taking a critical approach to decision making when it comes to where and with whom one shows their work. Depending on the context, certain establishments or other artists have the potential to diminish the value of one’s work. It is not enough to say that your art is out in the world, but that the people and places showing your work value and care about it.

Finally, this discussion confirmed what I believe makes successful artists: having confidence and caring about your work, thinking critically about the world, and understanding that helping others helps you.

-Christen Calloway, Gallery Intern

Resources:

Joyce Owen’s tips for artists 

Advice to artists: for some, you may have to pretend at first:

1. Self identify that you are an artist
2. Have confidence in your work
3. Approach this profession as your business
4. Use your medium well
5. Work hard and often-every day is good
6. Be very self-critical
7. Find your voice and don’t be afraid if it changes.
8. Make what is authentic to you-don’t blindly follow trends
9. Write an artist statement, let a good writer edit it, and read other artists statements
10. Work more
11. Leave your studio sometimes, see art by others

Where you exhibit can improve your visibility or not.

1. Ask questions
2. Be clear about your expectations
3. Never show work you would not buy from someone else
4. Never donate work of your own that you would not buy
5. Consider where you donate
6. Meet new artists
7. Surf the net to find advice: there are a lot of good places
8. including CAR, CAC, WMG, Womenarts.org,
9. Pay-to-play galleries should be researched carefully
10. Send a thank you to everyone who writes about your work
11. Good luck!

Links to debates about the value of an MFA degree:

LA Gallery Owner’s own survey and statistics

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2011/07/mfa-is-it-necessary-debate.html

https://www.surveymonkey.com/sr.aspx?sm=nYLMW61uMOz03F7tnTAWwp8mjG1kPKbzfHcRS4p5gik_3d

New York Magazine article

http://nymag.com/news/intelligencer/venice-biennale-2011-6/

Mary King presents her work

On the evening of October 21^st, a group gathered at Woman Made Gallery for a dynamic presentation by the artist and educator Mary King on her solo show “War Stories”. Generously co-sponsored by the Gender and Women’s Studies Program at University of Illinois Chicago, the presentation included specific background information on the artist’s process in creating the series on display, as well as a history of her life as an artist and more general information on her art practice.

Mary King created “War Stories” through conducting extensive interviews with war veterans and survivors from the 2^nd  World War and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The pieces she presents are illustrative, occasionally abstracted images distilled from whole stories to depict single emotional elements that are sometimes climactic and sometimes simple details.

"Wounded in Two Places" - watercolor, color pencil, and liquid acrylic on paper, 12 x 15 inches

In her talk, King focused on these elements, explaining with great passion what each of her pieces illustrates- a soldier crying because he is not allowed to help the thirsty children he encounters in the desert of Iraq, a young German woman’s mother questioning her as to why she is late coming home after she has just been wounded by shrapnel, and smiling faces emerging from the beautiful tiles of the German subway system,  representing the excitement and glee of war against a symbolic backdrop of safety (the subways system served as a bunker during airstrikes).

This part of the presentation inspired a dialogue amongst the audience about the particular responsibilities of artists during times of war and struggle, and the ways in which all people have the capacity to be collaborators or at least complicit in the violence and suffering of war despite their relative removal from its reality.

King then went on to talk about how she became an artist, creating life size paper dolls in her one room school house when her teacher was busy attending to one of the other seven grades that shared the classroom. She spoke on issues of time, money, and discipline, describing how she has structured her daily life to support her art-making, through creating art first thing every morning, not answering the phone until the afternoon, and saving money by purchasing everything on sale and re-dying her black jeans so they always look fresh.

The final part of the presentation was an art activity in which King asked participants to illustrate their own stories of war, drawing quickly and directly so as to evoke a visual representation of the most emotional elements of the story. We then shared our drawings and the stories behind them. This was an excellent way to end the presentation. Not only did we gain some knowledge and understanding of one another and our experiences, the exercise also confirmed the value of Mary King’s process as a successful means of exploring and representing the complex reality of war and its effect on individuals.

-Ruby Thorkelson, Gallery Coordinator

(left to right) Jenna Lyle and Tyler Mills

Approximately 30 attentive guests enjoyed writers and performers Carrie Olivia Adams, Robin Fine/Sandra Santiago, Charlotte Hart, Virginia Konchan/Tyler Mills/Jenna Lyle, and Anne Shaw/Robert McClure.

Drawing from her book, Organic Spirits, Charlotte Hart evoked the essence of the natural world. Supplementing her poetry with rye and orange liquor, Hart engaged the audience in a fully sensory experience.  A performance by Carrie Olivia Adams successfully married film and the written word.  A video piece depicting slides of old medical x-rays provided visual evidence of the poet’s inspiration. In a dynamic spoken word collaboration, Robin Fine and Sandra Santiago called for the reestablishment of accepted female body norms. An exploration of sound proved an integral and intriguing component in the work of Anne Shaw.  The poets voice was layered over a prerecorded audio track played at sporadic intervals. The interplay between audio and text was further exposed by Virginia Konchan, Tyler Mills, and Jenna Lyle. Sound art composed from vivid poetic imagery generated a pulsating, multidimensional experience.

-Holly Bresnahan, Gallery Intern

Valpincon Bather (After Ingres) by Niki Grangruth and James Kinser, featured in the Girl, Please! exhibition at Woman Made Gallery in 2010

In 1992 the NEA came out with the statistic that although 48% of artists in America were women, only 17% of artists exhibited in galleries were women. The founders of Woman Made Gallery recognized this disparity and created WMG in order to address this problem. While the gap in equality has narrowed since then, there is still discrimination and inequality. Some people, including Ariel Ramchandani in her article “Women Artists at MOMA”, are asking: “How important is it for women to clamor for more representation in museums?”

It is extremely important. The exclusion of women artists in the art canon is appalling and should not be dismissed. In 2007, art critic Jerry Saltz criticized MOMA’s permanent collection: “There are 400 works of art on these floors, and 14 are by women.” Those are staggering numbers, and while quotas may not always be the best way to better represent women in art, there should be more equality in major museums. Including more women artists in canons, art history texts, and permanent collections at museums is crucial to understanding art, whether in a contemporary or historical context. Women have made art throughout history and their perspectives should be represented.

Last year, for the first time in the its history, the Whitney Biennial exhibited more women artists than men. This is a hopeful and inspiring change at a major taste-making museum. And as Ariel Ramchandani’s article outlines, MOMA has also exhibited more female artists in the past year. While these are great strides towards better female representation in art, there is still work to be done. Woman Made Gallery has been exhibiting female artists for 19 years, and almost 7,000 women artists have shown their art here. Woman Made has and will continue to support, cultivate, and promote the diverse contributions of women in the arts.

-Christen Calloway, Gallery Intern

Marjorie Koun’s Creation on Opening Night

On Friday September 9th Woman Made Gallery hosted the opening reception for The Project group exhibition, juried by Mary King.  Guests also celebrated solo shows All That Also Means to See by Maria Gaspar and War Stories by Mary King.

Despite the cool and rainy weather, more than 200 art enthusiasts arrived to view the work of the 20 exhibited artists.   The show demonstrated a variety of media that was interactive, interdisciplinary, solo and collaborative.

As a Women’s Studies major and a new gallery intern, I was particularly excited to experience and participate in the opening.  Prior to the event, I was able to witness the transformation of the gallery space as pieces were arranged and displayed to highlight their individual uniqueness and beauty.  Having never worked in an art gallery before, this was my first chance to experience art in a new and different way.  It was a special treat for me to witness the guests engage with the various forms of media and interact with the attending artists. Several pieces, including Marjorie Kouns’ performance, Body as Canvas, stopped guests in their tracks.  Using paint and glitter, Kouns transformed her subject’s body into a living canvas, simultaneously preserving the act on video.  Innerspace, by Indrani Ashe and Arum Prameshwari, is equally compelling.  The installation work employs dyed cotton and tulle as a metaphor for skin, achieving the expression of an imaginary space within the human body. Walking through the work, the lifelike colors and fabrics provide the viewer with an almost womb-like sense of comfort, as if standing inside a living, breathing body.

All That Also Means to See by Maria Gaspar

Solo exhibits by Maria Gaspar and Mary King are featured in the lower gallery.  WMG’s new multimedia exhibition space accommodates Gaspar’s installation, All That Also Means To See. The time-based work is comprised of an inflating structure which inhales and exhales every five minutes.  Gaspar also presents mixed media paintings inspired by landscapes and social spaces. These paintings feature ambiguous shapes, brown blobs, and other unnamed forms that seem to recall the blurred spaces of the imagination. 

Mary King’s solo show, War Stories, depicts emotional and personal perspectives of war.  The paintings are crafted from accounts of those directly affected by both World Wars, as well as the war in Iraq.  I had the opportunity to photograph the artist while she spoke to guests about her work.

Mary King (right) discusses her work

Because of my field of study, it was exciting to witness art’s ability to force the viewer towards a critical contemplation of the social and structural forces imposed by society. The work on display addresses and explores a myriad of issues;  the standards of beauty imposed on women, the changing landscapes threatening the safety of women, the exploitation of vulnerable groups in society, the consequences of existing gender relationships, human vices and insecurities, the establishment of individual identity, and the necessity of community spaces. Overall, the work feels like a celebration of the power, uniqueness and diversity of women.

–Jenifer Mooses, Gallery Intern

Neighborhood Gift Chain

On the weekend of July 29 through the 31st Woman Made Gallery (WMG) participated in the Milwaukee Avenue Arts Festival in Logan Square with our Neighborhood Gift Chain! Woman Made Gallery hosted the project in an activity tent where festival-visitors used art supplies to create their own personal art piece. After completion, each person came into the second tent where they exchanged their artwork for one made by someone else. Before leaving, each person posed for a photograph in front of our “From me to you – From you to me” backdrop holding the work they made to leave for someone else and the work they selected to take. The photos were printed out on the spot, and displayed on the outside wall of WMG’s amazing festival tent. 

WMG festival tent

The event was a monumental success and over 200 people participated in the Neighborhood Gift Chain! As a WMG intern and festival volunteer, I was astounded by the amount of creativity emanating from the WMG tent. People of all ages were eager to create works that ranged from small scale sculpture, paintings, drawings, and collages to everything in-between. We had an assortment of donated supplies, thanks to many contributors, and people found the most interesting ways to use objects such as sea-shells, doll heads, fabric, wire, and glitter.  As someone who makes art regularly, I found the most rewarding element of the event was hearing people say that this was the first time they have made art in years- and that they loved it. For those who were at the event, you all made such original work in such a short time- Don’t Stop, Keep Making Art!

Woman Made Gallery was blessed to have the support of Markus Giolas and WMG board member, Tammi Franke who donated the use of camera equipment, and a super-fast printer. Because of their donation we were able to print out photos in the tent right after we took them. As the weekend carried on our wall of photographs grew larger and larger, creating a visualization to our title “Neighborhood Gift Chain.” People had great fun re-visiting the tent and trying to find who took their artwork. We have since uploaded all the photos onto our facebook page and encourage you to tag-yourself and leave a comment on the photograph of whoever selected the artwork you made.

For me, the photographs demonstrate the importance of art events such as the Milwaukee Avenue Arts Festival by displaying the diverse group of people who participated. This free festival allowed for the larger Chicago community to collect and intermingle in Logan Square, support a range of arts organizations and individuals, and celebrate art inChicago! On a small scale, I felt like WMG’s gift chain reflected the larger tone of the weekend, which for me was about uniting over art.

festival-visitor making art piece

WMG was also blessed with the support of some incredible volunteers, who donated their weekend time to the gallery. We thank Ruby Thorkelson, WMG Gallery Coordinator, and tireless leader of the “Neighborhood Gift Chain” who worked the entire weekend all the way to the end of Sunday night with breaking down the walls of our tent.   It was a hot sunny weekend and we greatly appreciate the support of Nicole Weydert, Andrea Piekarczyk, Lyla Conrad, Kim Gust, Christen Calloway, Alex Lee, Meredith Lancaster and Monica Padilla. Thank you to everyone who came out to support us and we hope to see you at Woman Made Gallery soon!

                                                                                                                                                                                                                   -Kate Pollasch, Gallery Intern

Megan Diddle, Untitled

 On July 8th Woman Made Gallery celebrated the opening reception for its new group exhibitions “Underground”and “Seriously Funny”, and Gallery Coordinator Ruby Thorkelson’s solo show “Bodily Functions”. The opening reception was a full house of WMG supporters, artists, and new visitors. Ruby curated the “Underground” exhibition, which displays artworks in a range of media by twelve artists as well as a pop-up library of zines, comics, and self-published works. The “Underground” exhibition presented a visual and literary world of artists, many of whom are exploring subjects of gender identity. As a whole, the show highlights the malleability of sexuality and gender through a diverse range of artwork.

Pop-Up Library Opening Night

The pop-up library, created in collaboration with Chicago Underground Library, became a space for visitors to read and touch a variety of publications, as well as laugh, reflect, and share. On the opening night of the exhibition the library offered viewers time to explore zines and comics, some of which were created by artists whose work was also on the walls. Zines have a unique ability to instantly spark an intimate connection with their reader through the size, hand-produced quality, and personal artistic voice.

Ruby Thorkelson's solo exhibition "Bodily Functions"

Sharing WMG’s lower level, Ruby Thorkelson’s solo exhibition “Bodily Functions” boasted a dynamic collection of mixed media three-dimensional work, two-dimensional drawings, and a mini-comic. Exploring the concept of input and output in relation to the human body, the solo exhibition evoked a visceral connection between viewer and artwork. Visitors were found bending and twisting around the three-dimensional works in an attempt to connect with every angle and crevice they contained.              

 

The opening night of Woman Made Gallery’s newest exhibitions was an energetic event full of laughter, conversation, discussion, and support. The layers of zines, comics, two-dimensional, and three dimensional work intermixed throughout Woman Made Gallery creates an exhibition that can be re-visited on multiple occasions. For those who missed the opening, the exhibition will be up until August 18th and information on WMG hours can be found on our website www.womanmade.org.

                                                                                                                                      

–Kate Pollasch, Gallery Intern

Janet Bloch’s workbook, Strategic Marketing Tools for Visual Artists is full of such tips and advice. It thoroughly addresses everything from setting goals to writing a compelling artist’s statement, putting together enticing submission packets, and building good relationships with all kinds of people, galleries, and other staples of the “art world.” We were fortunate to have Janet in the gallery on June 5th to lead a fantastic workshop on writing artists’ statements, a challenging but very necessary part of getting one’s work out in the world.

The workshop began as a sort of meet and greet, with snacks and conversation, and then all of the artists and Janet gathered in a circle to discuss what they were hoping to get out of the workshop and what their experiences with writing artists statements had been. As the artists each spoke a bit about the work they do and how they’ve built or had trouble building artist statements, it was fascinating to see just how universal the need was for a better understanding of an artist’s statement.

A common misconception that came up in the workshop about the artist’s statement is that writing about one’s intentions somehow dilutes the visual power of the artwork. Many artists think that because they communicate visually through their work they shouldn’t have to also communicate with words. Janet’s workshop was great at addressing that—she suggests that an artist’s statement is your opportunity to communicate in a direct way what you investigate, observe, or want to express with your art by informing the audience about your specific motives and processes. This makes an artist’s statement both more informative and more personal and relevant to your work.

Janet and the artists spent the rest of the workshop discussing specific Do’s and Don’ts of writing an artist’s statement, and she had a very helpful worksheet to guide the artists through the process of creating and honing the perfect statement:

1. Do write an artist’s statement in the first person.

2. Do keep your “core” statement fairly brief. (150-200 words)

3. Don’t be generic in your assertions—if what you write can be said about most artists or artwork, take it out.

4. Do keep sentence structure concise. Beware of rambling, confusing sentences.

5. Don’t combine two separate ideas in one sentence. Use one sentence for each idea.

6. Don’t keep repeating yourself.

7. Do use active sentence structure (i.e. “I focus on ephemeral moments” not “I enjoy focusing on ephemeral moments.”)

8. Don’t be wishy-washy or dilute the meaning of your ideas—own your ideas!

9. Don’t set forth subjective statements as facts (i.e. “I see the physical world is alive with potential sacredness” not “The world is alive with potential sacredness.”

10. Don’t tell your audience what they see and feel or what the results of your work achieve. Tell them your intent and let the viewer decide if you were successful.

11. Don’t use obscure terms or references without explaining them. Connect the dots for the viewer.

12. Don’t cite an influence without explaining your artwork’s relationship to that inspiration.

13. Don’t be flowery, poetic, or cutesy. It make sound pretty, but unless it has real content and a purpose for being there it doesn’t belong in your artist’s statement.

14. Do read your statement out loud to yourself or others.

15. Do understand that writing an artist’s statement is a process.

You can purchase Janet’s book online here or come in to Woman Made Galley any time to pick up a copy!

-Elise Nagy, WMG Intern

Abstractions - View from Front of Gallery

Before this week, my only experience behind the scenes of an art exhibition installation was as an assistant to students who were putting up their senior thesis shows at Interlochen Arts Academy, where I went to high school. It was fairly easy—all of the artists were students at the school, most of their artwork was created in the same building as the exhibition, and each artist determined where and how their work was presented. Here at Woman Made, the process is completely different; as an intern assisting with the installation of Abstractions and two accompanying solo shows by Sandra Perlow and Ruth Eckstein, I was lucky enough to be part of each step, from packing up the work in the previous show, to arranging and hanging the new pieces.

The museum and gallery mentality of “please don’t touch” is so ingrained in me that it was a little strange to adjust to the idea that not only was I allowed to touch this artwork, but I should, to take it off the walls and package it up, then take out all of the incoming work and get it ready to be installed. There’s a lot of care in all of that bubble wrapping, and with Krista Jiannacopoulos’s 48-canvas piece  from the previous 14^th International Open, it almost became ritualistic. You wrap and you fold and you tape and you wrap and you fold and you tape and you develop a rhythm. 

Abstractions - View from Middle of Gallery

I began the week learning how to take apart a wooden packing crate—fun with power tools!—and ended with reading all of the artists’ statements, making sure they were ready to be printed, and then cutting them to size and affixing them to the walls next to the correct piece. It was a fun guessing game to figure out which statement went with which piece without looking at the artist’s name. Sometimes it was very clear that they went together, and other times it brought a whole new understanding to the work.

Once all of the technical issues were taken care of: when the artwork from the last show was sent away, the walls spackled, sanded, and painted, the new pieces unpacked, and the forms and instructions filled out, scanned and filed away (all of the important work that’s invisible but totally necessary for keeping everything running smoothly) we were left with the bare walls, the analytical work of “laying out,” or arranging the artwork, and the physical work of hanging it. The raison d’être, but time-wise a very small part of what went into putting the exhibition together.

View of Sandra Perlow's Solo Show

While it took fewer hours to arrange and hang, the amount of problem-solving effort that went into it was quite remarkable. Even as an art history student, I know that when I walk into a space I don’t necessarily analyze how the art is arranged. If it looks good, I know it. Because the show is comprised of work that is very strong as well as fully or semi-abstract, it was a challenge to arrange the pieces in such a way as to all be in dialogue without letting anything be overshadowed.

Since we could not take into account representational content in the arrangement of the various pieces, and they all contain so many strong colors, lines and varying statements, we had to find a way to show off all of the wonderful paintings and sculptures without letting any of them overpower or clash with one another. There are so many things to consider: color, size, media, content, line, “loudness,” whether a piece is very serious or a little playful, or too distracting when hung next to one piece but really complimentary hung  across from another. To place certain pieces together would be too obvious, others were too bright to be next to each other, others too similar or different in terms of texture, and the list goes on. I am not sure if this ability to arrange work comes more from intuition or simpl practice, but it was fascinating to observe the attunement of the gallery staff to these details within the installation process.

Opening Reception for Abstractions

The way in which the show came together was almost like alchemy, and with everything in its final place it is obvious that the pieces are not only fantastic on their own, but also deepened by the stories of the other work in the show.

-Elise Nagy, Gallery Intern

The audience listens to Catherine talk about her work

On Saturday, April 9^th Womanmade Gallery had the great pleasure of hosting an Artist’s Talk with Catherine Schwalbe-Bouzide. Her multimedia piece, By Hand, is part of the 14th International Open group exhibition that began in early March and will be up until April 28^th. The event was generously co-sponsored by the Gender and Women’s Studies Program at University of Illinois Chicago.

Working in and drawing inspiration from  Midwestern agricultural vernacular, Catherine’s work shows both how ubiquitous corn is in our everyday lives—from nearly all of the food we eat, to the fossil fuel we use—and how it has informed our cultural imagination. Whenever we think of rural life, we think of corn. She also addresses how our widespread use of corn has been blamed for many environmental problems: after all, “Twenty percent of our fossil-fuel consumption goes to agriculture; the average item of food travels 1,500 miles before it gets to your plate” –Michael Pollan. However, as Catherine pointed out in her presentation, “It’s not the corn’s fault!”

Catherine holding finished seedbombs with her piece, "By Hand," (porcelain, found corn husking tools, harvest table)

 Catherine says, “Why corn? It is solidly Midwestern, like I am.” Her work is clearly quite personal and informed by her experiences living in the Midwest, as a “corn fed girl” but it also transcends that to become universal. Her work explores how corn invisibly influences many aspects of modern life in the U.S. in particular, as we are the world leader in corn production. Using corn as a medium and conceptual  jumping off point, her work explores aging, agriculture, nature and science, plenty and want, reuse, food systems, and—what could be more essential and universal than this?—being human. Based in Chicago, she has grown corn in front of Lillstreet Art Center and keeps urban chickens (Annie, Winkie, Pennie and Vanilla) in her backyard. She has been a part of the Slow Food Luncheon, the Urban Farm Breakfast at First Slice Pie Café, the Art of Food class at Lillstreet Art Center, and “Harvest—a meal and exhibition,” also at Lillstreet.

Catherine’s work has taken her to Colorado where she had a residency in 2010 with the Colorado Art Ranch, working with water, local clay, and the arts as an agent for change. She is also part of the Fields Project in Oregon, IL, working on the Oregon Tilth Project in 2010, which was partially funded by a CAAP grant. She has worked in Wisconsin, curating a group exhibition, “Women in Grains” at the Woolen Mill Gallery in Reedsburg, and collaborating on the Iron Well “Potable” piece, “a gesture and celebration of public water in conjunction with Tapping into Solutions: The Future of Water conference.” Catherine and her mother, Helen Schwalbe, along with Laurie Ernisse, and Sheri and Addison Paape pumped water from a remarkably deep, old well and shared 100 terra cotta cups of that water with the public, celebrating and emphasizing the importance of potable public water.

Making seedbombs

At the end of her engaging presentation, Catherine brought out two bags of clay and a bucket full of corn seeds to make seed bombs, unfired clay balls filled with seeds that can be thrown into empty lots and urban fields, along the side of the highway, or any other patch of earth where corn could grow in a form of guerrilla planting, almost. As people gathered around the tables rolling the seed bombs between their palms, covering their hands in the grey clay, it was impossible not  to think of rural life and community, of coming together and the collaborative work of survival that so many people still do everyday in rural communities of the Midwest.

Thanks for a wonderful afternoon, Catherine!

-Elise Nagy, Gallery Intern