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Chicago Contemporary & Classic
Art Chicago in the Park
Author: Marisol Martell
ArtNexus No. 57 - Jun 2005
|  | As it does every year in the spring, the City of Chicago held a new edition of Art Chicago. This time around the event included a new art fair: Chicago Contemporary & Classic. With the argument of creating a fair to cover twenty-first-century expectations, CC&C attempted to establish a concept capable of defining its maiden voyage as a fair that includes a wide array of expressions and periods.
Some interesting projects and spaces at the fair should be highlighted. Some of them had an experimental character, and brought freshness to the conception and presentation of many galleries. Among the most interesting projects were installations by Salvador Díaz and Tracey Snelling at Brown Bag Contemporary. These two young artists continually reinforced their installation at the fair, and as a consequence the public was able to interact with them. Snelling recreated the city with a project of buildings in small scale; one could hear voices, music, and light coming from the apartments, capturing the spirit of the city in her piece. At the other end, Salvador Díaz designed his space as the display window of a closed establishment that was covered with newspapers from different places. Díaz altered these newspapers with texts and figures as part of his commentary and highlighted those news items that have become common for so many due to the globalization of information.
Equally interesting proposals could be found in the section devoted to Currents. Kunsthaus Santa Fe from Mexico brought sculptures by Ana Quiroz, and photographs by Tania Candian and Daniela Edburg. The latter’s pieces are from her graduation thesis at the San Carlos Academy, a significant group of works where the artist places “dead” women in environments such as kitchens, showers, or gardens. Perhaps one of the most attractive is Muerte por shampoo, compositionally close to David’s Death of Marat. Edburg creates truly moving scenes that evoke, metaphorically, the different types of “deaths” which women face socially, and which are determined in many instances by social stereotypes.
The work of Brad Kuhl and Monique Leyton, presented by Carol Jazzar (Miami), also dealt with the subject of social controversy linked to crimes and accidents. Both artists’ pieces were done using adhesive tape on canvas, with high contrasts of color. The forcefulness of the color, added to the violence of some of the scenes, helped these works capture the public’s attention. Another gallery taking part in Currents was Solar Latin American Art & Design (New York), which made an interesting appearance with pieces in varied styles and techniques. Works by María Schone, Lucía Pizzani, and José Pacheco are worthy of mention.
The presence of Latin American galleries was significant, particularly considering the quality of their proposals. Diana Lowenstein (Miami) came with a large selection of the artists it represents; among them it is worth mentioning Laura Kina’s work, Cold War Love Story (the true amazing story of Hitomi Soga and Charles Jenkins). A poster in the manner of movie advertisements recreates the story of Hitomi Soga, kidnapped in 1978 by North Korean agents; twenty-four years later she returned to her country married to Charles Jenkins, a former American sergeant accused of desertion. The true story is filled with various circumstances. The situation of this family is currently being debated as a humanitarian case and as one of those situations encouraged by the Cold War. The artist’s treatment of the story, covered by the world’s main newscasts and newspapers is interesting, and presented in the manner of Hollywood.
Juan Ruiz Gallery and Ascaso Art Gallery came from Venezuela. The former brought over an excellent selection of works by Kcho, among them some small sculptures, representative of the artist’s figuration; and canvases and paper that were examples of the vast range of materials and techniques mastered by the Cuban artist. Ascaso brought several of its recognized artists such as Alirio Palacios, Carmelo Niño, and Cornelis Zitman’s attractive sculptures.
Durban Segnini (Miami) presented a solid selection of works by Fernando de Szyszlo and Antonio Seguí. Adamar Fine Art, also from Miami, presented an ample inventory of its artists. Galería Praxis (Mexico) brought Bruno Widmann, Ofill Echeverría, and Claudio Gallina.
Chicago-based Aldo Castillo gallery presented important pieces by Lam, Matta, and Salvador Dalí, alongside contemporary artists like Eladio González, Luis Fernando Uribe, and Lorna Marsh. Castillo also exhibited a selection of works by Ecuadorian artist Estuardo Maldonado.
Few non-Latin American galleries presented works by Latin American artists, not even those such as Botero, Matta, Lam, or Fontana, who are never absent from art fairs. Among the few who did was Galerie Yoramgil (California), which exhibited a large group of works by Argentinean artist Gustavo López Armentía. The pieces employed the various techniques and expressions the artist works with, from well known canvases with his particular discourse about maps, journeys, and cities, to sculptures.
It is necessary to highlight some galleries, such as Marion Meyer, Mark Hachen, and Leila Mordoch from Paris, whose presence always raises the quality of an art fair thanks to the presentation of important works from the modern and contemporary scene. Galleries such as Praxis New York/Miami, Pan American Gallery, Walter Fine Art, and Jerald Melberg were present at both CC&C and Art Chicago with works by Latin American artists.
Art Chicago in the Park
Chicago’s traditional fair, Art Chicago, moved to a tent located in Butler Field. Despite the logistical problems that participants and visitors faced, the fair had a large number of galleries. Among the Latin American galleries, Pan American gave priority to Latin artists, unlike its presentation at CC&C, where it did not show even one. It brought a wide representation of works by Cuban artists such as Kcho, Roberto Diago, and perhaps for the first time in an art fair, works by Raúl Martínez, a member of Grupo de los Once who became one of the pillars of Cuban painting in the 1960s and 1970s.
Spanish galleries again had a significant presence during this edition, and new ones participated, such as Galería Luis de Burgos Arte del Siglo XX, and La Rivera Galería de Arte. Forum New York’s booth with works by Charles Matton, Steven Assael, and paintings by one of the masters of social realist painting, Raphael Soyer also bears mentioning. Also noteworthy was the presence of important contemporary art pieces such as Jeff Koons’s work at John Szoke Editions; Richard Serra’s very beautiful editions of black and white metal, at Gemini G.E.L.; and Tony Oursler’s sculpture at Marion Meyer. All were pieces that added a special interest to the fair.
Stray Show and International Invitational were separate sections that had small spaces inside the fair. Within them was Liquid Blue Gallery (Miami), a new project by two young gallerists who included in their selection the Cuban artists known as Guerra de la Paz.
The local public’s enthusiasm was meager for both CC&C and for Art Chicago, in contrast to previous years.
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