Staying Alive - various artists, various galleries and museums, Chicago, Illinois

Art in America, April, 1999 by Susan Snodgrass

Once again this spring, Chicago's international art fair along with new gallery openings and museum restaffings--brings some renewed vigor to a community hard hit by the post-'80s bust.

Each May the art world turns its attention to Chicago, home of the annual contemporary art fair first launched as the Chicago International Art Exposition in 1980, then reestablished as Art Chicago in 1993. The fair's economic impact is considerable, affecting both local and global markets. Total 1998 sales, dominated by photography and photo-based work, reached $40 million, while 38,000 art cognoscenti descended upon the fair at Navy Pier.

For nearly two decades, this event has defined the rhythm of the Chicago art world, which often uses the occasion to organize special exhibitions and showcase its brightest stars. Last spring was no exception, and with the added attraction of the 17th International Sculpture Conference, which prompted the city to declare May International Sculpture Month, Chicago saw a wealth of activity it has not witnessed for quite some time. More importantly, both events brought focus and purpose to an art community that in the last couple of years has experienced considerable change and significant losses. Together, fair and conference provided an opportunity to reflect on the transitional state of Chicago's contemporary scene.

Although the conference itself avowed a narrow, conservative definition of the medium's practice, several sculpture-related exhibitions organized for the occasion by the city and various local venues were worthy and provocative. "Reality Bites: Approaches to Representation in American Sculpture," curated by Ed Maldonado at the Chicago Cultural Center, was a modest yet cohesive survey devoted to the concept of reality as explored by 12 American artists over the last 30 years. Featured alongside well-known figures Robert Gober, Hans Haacke, Donald Judd, Joseph Kosuth, Claes Oldenburg, Charles Ray and George Segal were Chicagoans Jo Hormuth, Mary Patten, Vincent Shine, Thomas Skomski and New York-based Joe Scanlan.

The artists' conceptions of reality varied, of course, although many works were united by larger social and formal themes. Several artists included in the show use the human figure to iconoclastic ends. Skomski's male and female Bodybags (1995), headless torsos cast in Hydrocal from sacks of potatoes, actively seek to disrupt our idea of the real, offering a cynical commentary on sexuality and identity in the modern age. Other works in the show depend on the playful transformation of everyday objects. Among the most successful of these were Hormuth's fetishistic baseballs covered in elephant hide and her wall of monumental wool-and-resin pansies. Similarly rooted in the commonplace are Scanlan's domestic fabrications (candles cast from empty Pop Tart and soup-mix boxes; bookshelves and a bathroom floor made by hand) and Shine's realistic plant specimens, meticulously crafted from artificial, sometimes toxic, materials. Both Scanlan's and Shine's works also evoke the ironic psychological content of Gober's objects. Less ironic is Patten's video installation Conspired (1990-98), a disturbing inquiry into the incarceration of a real-life political group, the Resistance Conspiracy 6. Engaging thorny political issues, this work raises important questions regarding art's definition and purpose, and it was particularly resonant in the context of the Cultural Center, whose diverse programming and strong educational mission reach a broad range of audiences. As the makeup of this show suggests, the Cultural Center is one of the few Chicago art institutions careful to balance its schedule among local, national and international exhibitions, often compensating for the lack of museum support for Chicago artists.

The Renaissance Society, on the campus of the University of Chicago, plays a similar role. Under the directorship of Suzanne Ghez for 25 years, it organizes exhibitions of national and international figures, such as Raymond Pettibon, Cristina Iglesias and Willie Doherty, who have all shown there recently, as well as shows of important Chicago-based artists, for example Kerry James Marshall (who presented new work last spring [see A.i.A., Nov. '98]) and Judy Ledgerwood (whose exhibition there closed recently). The Arts Club of Chicago has also been a stable force in the city since its inception in 1916, although its programming does not include Chicago artists. Since it moved to its new building east of Michigan Avenue in April 1997, director Kathy Cottong has organized ambitious exhibitions by such well-known figures as Louise Bourgeois, Stephan Balkenhol and Paul Thek. Works by Richard Tuttle will be on view this May.

The Terra Museum of American Art, under new director John Hallmark Neff, is in the process of redefining its mission. From its founding in 1980, the Terra has been devoted to 19th-century American art. Since his appointment in September 1997, Neff, whose background is in modern art, has sought to expand the Terra's mandate to include broader, more contemporary offerings. (Neff was previously the director of the First National Bank of Chicago's art program; from 1978 to 1983 he was director of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago.) Coinciding last spring with the opening of the fair was "1998: New Artists in Chicago," a juried exhibition of work by Chicago-area graduate students that marked a significant departure for the museum. Co-organized with the city's Department of Cultural Affairs, this uneven but lively gathering showcased new trends in Chicago art by 39 emerging artists (25 were featured at the Terra; 14 at the Cultural Center). The exhibition was dominated by sculpture, installation and photography whose content, concerned primarily with identity issues and popular culture, reflects larger art-world tendencies and themes. Responding to the city's increasingly limited opportunities for younger artists, the Terra hopes to make "New Artists in Chicago" a biannual event.