EXHIBITION VIEWS

Dana Hemenway 
@ BARELY ART FAIR
VERNISSAGE: Friday, September 20th from 6-10pm
LOCATION: Julius Caesar Gallery, 3311 W. Carroll Ave., Chicago, IL

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Pictured: 
Untitled, 2019
Site-specific installation with electrical outlets, power-strip, extension cords, fluorescent, blacklight, and incandescent light bulbs
Dimensions Variable

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​Pictured: 
Installation Views of Barely Art Fair

​The Outlet Gallery proudly presents Dana Hemenway at this year’s Barely Art Fair. For this project, the artist has constructed a site-specific work that deliberately unifies the mission of The Outlet Gallery with the unique parameters of The Barely Art Fair. Hemenway will exhibit a floor-to-ceiling wall of fully functional electrical outlets that power a range of fluorescent, incandescent, and black-light bulbs. In order to power this booth, a bright, neon electrical cord will make its way through the back of the booth and into the larger exhibition space – purposefully alerting viewers to the needed electrical power from a nearby outlet. 
 
Hemenway’s piece converses with the various aspects of utility in artmaking.  While she fully relies on the utility of her materials (in this case electrical currents, outlet hardware, and power cords), she is very invested in what calling attention to the aesthetics of such utility can reveal (in this instance, her choice in lighting and pronounced color palettes of the needed electrical cord). With a practice focused on presenting work that intersects these conversations, Hemenway brings to light both the architectural and social forces of built environments. She recently remarked, “the walls, floors, and ceilings we inhabit tend to be prescribed for specific functions––horizontal planes suggest utilitarian items, such as light fixtures and rugs, and the vertical planes imply items with aesthetic purposes. The same object presented on a different plane could cause a shift in how it could be appreciated and how it is valued. When these subtle shifts occur and aesthetic items move to the floor, or functional items let go of their utility and travel to the wall, how might this upset what we take for granted and allow possibilities to emerge?” Following this line of thought, for this particular project she has recomposed the common electrical outlet into a patterned grid that humorously powers an array of brightly colored bulbs that dangle outwards and create an atmospheric glow. By joining these bulbs, outlets, and power cords together she intends to pluck these domestic materials into a newly configured possibility for aesthetic expression. 
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Dana Hemenway is an artist based in San Francisco. She received her MFA from Mills College and her BA from University of California Santa Cruz. She has had residencies at the Bemis Center for Contemporary Art (Omaha, NE), ACRE (Steuben, WI), SÍM (Reykjavik, Iceland), The Wassaic Project (Upstate New York), Root Division (San Francisco, CA), and is a charter resident of the Minnesota Street Project's Studio Program (San Francisco, CA). Dana is the recipient of The San Francisco Arts Commission Individual Artist Grant, a Southern Exposure Alternative Exposure Grant, and in 2017 she was awarded her first Permanent Public Art Commission for SFO’s Terminal 1, which is scheduled for completion in early 2020. Dana has exhibited her artwork locally, nationally, and internationally. From 2015 – 2017, Dana served as a co-director of Royal Nonesuch Gallery, an artist-run project space in Oakland, CA. She is represented by Eleanor Harwood Gallery in San Francisco, CA. 
Jason Lazarus
SUPPORT NOT PROTECTION

Pictured: 
813-591-0964 (Monument for Sex Worker Solidarity Network, Tampa, FL)
80" x 108"
S5630 Waterproof LED lights, solder, electrical cords, artist tape
​2018


​SUPPORT NOT PROTECTION is an exhibition arising from recent conversations between Syd Eastwin of the Sex Worker Solidarity Network of Tampa, Florida and artist Jason Lazarus. The exhibition announces the newly established SWSN Community Self-Defense Fund, invites donations from allies, and introduces a light monument created for this occasion by Lazarus. A reading by Lazarus, created by the SWSN, will occur at 8pm, March 23rd at The Outlet Gallery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

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The Sex Worker Solidarity Network, started in October 2017, is a grassroots, horizontal movement in solidarity with all sex workers as well as other movements that support the working class and the marginalized. Founded on the principles of intersectionality, solidarity, and self-determination, SWSN has been leading the opposition to the City of Tampa’s recent resurrection of an anti-LGBT bathhouse ordinance that, in the words of SWSN, ‘does nothing to stop human trafficking and does everything to create discrimination….it is evident that this ordinance is not actually designed to stop human trafficking but is rather designed to push undocumented or possibly undocumented persons into the for-profit prison system..with immigrants and people of color constantly under attack, we must not allow our county to become a beacon of even more harm. Instead, we must band together and offer solutions that work to actually HELP human trafficking victims and not harm anybody.”

In response to the ordinance that targets workers rather than proprietors, they have recently petitioned for the enactment of full immunity for sex workers: any person in a massage parlor, bathhouse, private home or other establishment who dials 911 or the human trafficking hotline to report sexual violence shall be immune from arrest or prosecution (including immunity from deportation or immigration detainment). Their full petition can be read and signed here:
https://www.change.org/p/hillsborough-county-commission-create-real-solutions-to-end-human-trafficking-not-discrimination.

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Emerging social justice organizations thrive on the interplay of mobilization, action, and the recalibration of text and symbols–not only for raising conscious awareness, but for also creating new forms of consciousness. Multiple hierarchies are facing new scrutiny through critical activism whose messages are direct, frontal, and timely. 

Artists and activists have much to learn from each other--as Claire Pentecost observes, “I’ve been told that artists should just be artists, and activists should just be activists, because otherwise we get bad art and lame activism. Such prescriptions reinforce the preference for recognized forms of mastery while pre-empting emergence and ignoring the fact that art, activism and other living forms require continuous renewal.”

Powerfully direct messaging in the form of hashtags and cardboard signs comes at a cost, what about the complexities of the lives at stake? Abstraction is a privilege in our age, and it is activists who, uniquely forced into direct messaging, and embodying compounded marginalization, most deserve the time and space to linger in nascent forms. 

The social justice work of SWSN is proposing a new form of consciousness, Support Not Protect, that for many, is a leap rather than incremental change. It should look familiar and feel courageous to practicing artists--they are ahead of their audience and filled with conviction. 

To make donations to the newly established SWSN Community Self-Defense Fund, visit
https://www.sexworkersolidaritynetwork.org/community-defense

For more information:
Facebook.com/sexworkersolidaritynetwork 
Twitter: @SWSolidarity 
Email: sexworkersolidaritynetwork@gmail.com 
Web: sexworkersolidaritynetwork.org


Sally Nicholson
Pictured: 
"Do you want it on or off?"
Durational Performance (approximately two hours in length)
Extension cords, pencil, artist's body
​2018

​*Poster and Illustration by Rich Vincent.
David Del-Francia
...quietly turning on 


“ SCENE: A GROWING NUMBER OF AMERICA’S ELITE ARE QUIETLY TURNING ON. It is not uncommon for people on these trips, especially with new chemical drugs, as opposed to organic ones, to develop the illusion that they are themselves computers. Similarly, where once psychotic children identified themselves as bunnies and cats and other beasts from the fun animal world, now they identify with cars and television sets.  This, of course, is not so much a hallucination as a discovery. The computer is a more sophisticated extension of the central nervous system than ordinary electric relays and circuits. When people live in an environment of such circuitry and feedback, carrying much greater quantities of information than any previous social scene, they develop something akin to what medical men call “referred pain.” The impulse to get “turned on” is a simple Pavlovian reflex felt by human beings in an environment of electric information. Such an environment is itself a phenomenon of self-amplutation. Every new technological innovation is a literal amputation of ourselves in order that it may be amplified and manipulated for social power and action. Naturally, such amputation is associated with pain that is referred not so much to the body as to brain centers. As Lowenstein points out: “There is hardly a brain center outside the reach of pain pathways.” Most people are in the habit of associating technological innovations with the physical upset to their customary routines and customers.”
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-Marshall McLuhan, “War and Peace in the Global Village.” 1968 
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The Warming Hive

Pictured:
The Warming Hive, 2017
Architectural Rendering
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           Conceived in collaboration with The Open in Milwaukee’s Riverwest neighborhood, The Warming Hive is a pneumatic (air-filled) structure designed by a group of undergraduate and graduate architecture students at University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee in Fall 2016, taught by Whitney Moon.

           The Warming Hive realizes a collaborative student research and design project exploring pneumatic technology in relationship to mobility, sociability, environmental responsibility and pedagogical advancement. Adaptable to a variety of site and seasonal conditions, this pneumatic structure offers capabilities of implementation and transportation that cannot be matched by traditional construction: it is inflated in under three minutes, and can be easily packed up and transported to various locations throughout the city. Designed with built-in pneumatic seating, and an insulated, fireproof, and projection-friendly skin, The Warming Hive provides a thermally comfortable winter shelter for exhibition, cooking and gathering.
 
           Because The Open is comprised of several curatorial platforms—The Outlet Gallery, the Nicholas Frank Public Library (NFPL), Microlights, The Oven, and the Designers Talking Library—the objective of this temporary architectural installation is to engage multiple programs simultaneously, while providing an outdoor gathering space for gallery visitors during an opening event. In addition to being “plugged-in” to The Outlet Gallery—an electrical outlet curated by Cowan inside the gallery--The Warming Hivewas designed to engage, both thermally and socially, The Oven—an outdoor brick oven run by artist John Riepenhoff. For this opening event, Peter Sandroni, the head chef at La Merenda & Engine House No. 3, will be cooking in The Oven, in collaboration with ceramicist Shelby Page. Sandroni’s culinary delights will be prepared in Page’s custom earthenware, and enjoyed in the comfort of an inflatable environment.


​Greg Stimac

Pictured: 
Red - Touch - Yellow
Extension cord, electrical tape, taxidermy snake eyes, electrical current
​2017


          There was a dog barking, down there by the creek. And it caught both of our attention.  So, trying to see, one way or another, what was going on, we turned our heads, stretching our necks left and right.  It’d been a long summer. But this morning the air was crispy and clear, and just by breathing in, your lungs knew the day would be of good weather...or, at least that’s what they hoped. Reaching for one long breath, and then letting it go; the dog’s bark was getting more excited, and we could tell she was moving further upstream.
            “Strike, Lightnin’, Strike!”, Benjamin began shouting.
            Benjamin was a windy fellow. And whenever he got excited—which was almost only on account of that dog—he took to calling her Lightning. It wasn’t her name, but he liked saying it. It almost never rained around here.
            “Strike, gosh darn you, strike!” He kept on. “There’s folks, loads of ‘em. And them you can’t hurt! But now—go on, Lightnin’!”
            Relaxing my neck for a moment, I turned his way. “I wonder just where in heck she’s gotten herself about now.” Gesturing to get running, my body tensed up, and I continued, “just where in heck are we bound now?”
            “Yeah?” Benj asked, taking off besides me.
            “Yeah.”
            “Well, I know one main thing.” He thought aloud as he took off into the brush.
            “Yeah?”
            “Seein’ as…” Benj paused, getting caught up in the weeds.
           We were nearing the creek. The water sounded as crispy and bright as the morning had done. It probably tasted just as fresh as well. The dog kept on barking. She’d quit moving, though, it seemed, on account of her voice was now ringin’ out constant.
I didn’t say anything back to B. I could see that he was kept occupied for the time. And, I’d figured he continue on his thinking to me when it felt right by him. Besides, he hadn’t been here long—he’d only come to the house three or four days before. Each night, also, he never slept too sound, as there was more commotion in the dark than what I normally remember. And I hadn’t got too close to him; figured he’d skip town before makin’ that possible. I liked him, though. His shouting.
          “Like I was saying,” He yelled back as he skipped, tip-toed, on some rocks to the other side of the stream. “Seeing as I ain’t been here long. Yea, really, I’m practically nothing but a stranger here.”
            His pants got wet when his last step landed his leg clean into the water.
           “HA!” he burst, at the top of his voice.
            I laughed, too.
         “Strike, Lightnin!” The dip in the cool water somehow brought him back to purpose. “Roar and rumble, break and bang…that sky ain’t never as muddled as this ol’ world!”
            I kept laughing, but I was thinking he was right. I’d never thought about it that way. And we were getting nearer to the dog.
           “But, I know. I know.” I told him as we moved, “I’m just a stranger here, too.” On point of fact, I’d been staying at the house—which for certain wasn’t belonging to me—for only just a few months. “Except, in being here,” I kept speaking, “I’ve found a new way to spend my times these days.”
           “What’s that?” he asked, rubbing a fly or two off his arm.
           “I’ve been watching the clouds move. Watchin’ them move from the West, then all the sudden break South. Thinking on finding out what they mean.”
           “What do you mean? Why’s that? They’re just clouds. They shift, break, and form in all sorts of ways. No meaning around it.”
           “I guess its just a new way of my doing something I never done before.”
           “A new way?” He wondered, thinking I wasn’t making much sense now.
           “If you’ve never done it before,” he asked, distracted by the commotion of the dog, “then what’s got you saying that the way you’re doing it is new?”
           “Just is. –Don’t know why.”
           Lightnin’ was just coming into view, still barkin’ and hollerin’. She’d caught something.

          Above text, by Scott Cowan.
          February, 2017
 

Jennie Jieun Lee
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Poem: "Litter Tower" by Nancy Loeber

Pictured:
The Devil You Know
Porcelain 
​2016

Mike Kloss


Rebecca is in a reflective mood after Woody and Kelly's wedding. Rebecca vows to change her life. Her symbol of change is stubbing out the cigarette she is smoking; the last cigarette she vows to ever smoke (I would never quit). After that act, she dumps the cigarette filled ashtray into the wastebasket in the bar office. The next day Sam, who was called in by the fire department, arrives at the half burnt down bar. Hysterical, Sam really wants to believe this fire is just another gag by Gary, but the reality of the matter sinks in. Once he realizes that he has insurance to cover the damages, Sam settles into the mindset of rebuilding the bar, while still wondering what caused the fire. The fire marshal tells Michael that the cause was a smoldering cigarette in the wastebasket in the office. Rebecca knows that she once again was the cause of this major screw-up. Others devastated by the fire are Norm, whose "home" is damaged, and Cliff, who had a bagful of undelivered mail stashed behind the bar which is now burned to a crisp. After Rebecca lies to Sam, telling him the cause of the fire was faulty wiring (which Sam is kicking himself for not fixing, although meaning to do so for years), he finds out that his insurance deductible is $25,000, money he doesn't have. Trying to get a loan, Sam is turned down by every bank in town. He has to resort to Plan B: cashing in his baseball pension, maxing out his credit cards, moving into a cheaper rent apartment, and selling his beloved Corvette. Will Rebecca finally admit to her role in the fire, and if so, will Sam forgive her?
 
This is what happened on Cheers not at The Hills Esthetic Center.
I wish it we were a sitcom.
 
Faulty wiring was indeed the culprit…
And we were not rebuilt the next episode.
 
I am not Rebecca I am Sam: so is Ron, so is Leo, so is Caleb.
Mike Kloss is an artist based in Chicago or Wisconsin sometimes.

Pictured: 
Installation View
Charcoal on outlet face, xerox transfer on watercolor paper
​2016
 
Cody Tumblin

Shape of an ear in flannel 
Purple blue and yellow
It's got flowers, who doesn't like flowers
There's a spider/ spiderweb combo earring
The silver is definitely fake 
Not really sure what that's about 
Maybe it's like a "cool" metaphor
Or a Halloween leftover 
Kind of weird imho
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

Pictured:
tread softly
Dyed flannel, thread, button-hole, earring
2016

Alec Regan 

​The Outlet began its programming with Milwaukee-based artist, Alec Regan's The Open Mist. Sticky skin and sun burned air still linger after nightfall but some have ways of brewing cold in the cellar. Is that a porthole to Spencer's Gifts, an HVAC, or perhaps an online purchase? 

Pictured:
The Open Mist
Ultrasonic fogger, water
​2016