Join us today at the C-PS for  this show: Watie White: Survey February 3 – 17, 2012 Opening Friday, February 3rd 6-8pm Survey The Chicago Project is highlighting the work of artist Watie White. An intermediary, whose traditional selection of mediums, printmaking, painting and drawing, benefits White’s exquisite skill in interpreting our fundamental experiences. A catalog of the Chicago Project will be available at the Teachers Lounge Project Space at DePaul University. The Chicago Project is curated by Jim Duignan.

Do not sleep on this Chicago.. Animated video by The Eternals, Terri Kapsalis & Rob Shaw Prints by Damon Locks Opening on Saturday, February 4, 2012, 7:00-9:00pm Screenings of the animation at 7:30 & 8:30

Experimental Sound Studio 5925 N Ravenswood, Chicago, IL 60660  Google Map Us > P. 773-769-1069

" As part of our Sun Ra/El Saturn Commissions series, ESS asked Damon Locks (The Eternals) to create a new artwork responding to ESS’s extensive archive of Sun Ra recordings. In lieu of a solo work, he teamed up with writer/performer Terri Kapsalis, The Eternals’ Wayne Montana, and animator Rob Shaw to collaborate on an 18-minute video. Throughout the process, Locks has been working on a new series of related prints that will be on display in ESS’ Audible Gallery through April 4. At the opening of the exhibition of these prints on Saturday February 4th, the video—Noon Moons—will screen at 7:30 and 8:30pm. "

About the Artists Damon Locks is a visual artist/illustrator and musician who received his BFA at the School of the Art Institute. His visual work often revolves around people and their landscape with narrative themes of protest, unrest, and tension woven throughout. The processes used to reach these ends enlist media such as drawing, photography, digital manipulation and silk screening. His taste leans towards the dirty, the antiqued, and the distressed, thus lending a warmth and tactile quality to both his screen prints and his digital prints. He is currently working on a project with Domestic Workers United and The Center for Urban Pedagogy to design educational material describing the Bill of Rights for Domestic Workers in NYC. Terri Kapsalis is a writer and performer.  Her most recent books are The Hysterical Alphabet and Jane Addams’ Travel Medicine Kit. She co-curated the exhibition Pathways to Unknown Worlds: Sun Ra, El Saturn and Chicago’s Afro-Futurist Underground, 1954-1968 and co-edited two books of related material.  She is a founding member of Theater Oobleck and teaches at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. The classically uncatagorizable Chicago based band The Eternals performs regularly as both a trio and duo. Their latest album Approaching the Energy Field was released in 2011. Core members Damon Locks and Wayne Montana have been collaborating and performing music together since the late 80's and have steadily embarked on an exploration of the vast, mysterious musical universe. With this project The Eternals find themselves embracing the more intuitive, unconscious side of their palettes. Sometimes directing, sometimes responding. For this piece, The Eternals limited their resources to instruments and tones inspired by Sun Ra. Rob Shaw is a director from Philadelphia, PA who now lives and works in Portland, OR. After graduating from the University of the Arts with his award winning animated short “Dirty Summer Fridays,” Shaw moved to the west coast to animate on various television shows, video games and music videos, always working on his own projects after hours. With five years experience as a professional animator, Shaw made the jump to commercial director at Bent Image Lab. There he began directing numerous animated commercials for clients like Zune, Guitar Hero, Fruity Pebbles and Verizon, to name a few. He has also directed numerous music videos like They Might Be Giant's “I'm Impressed” which won a Gold Plaque at the 2008 Chicago International Film Festival. In 2010, his film “the Machine” won best animated short at the Atlanta Film Festival. In 2009, Shaw worked with Taxi Two on the Koodo “El Tabador” campaign which Strategy Magazine named one of five Brands of the Year in 2010. Shaw has just finished an animated segment for Portlandia season two, set to air in February. Special appreciation and thanks to John Carroll and his Mitchell Elementary after-school percussion group for their participation in this project. Poems read by Carlos Diaz and Angelina Medina. EXHIBITION HOURS:09.16.11-10-31.11Saturdays & Sundays, 1:00pm-5:00pm, or by appointment

The creators of Proximity and Lumpen are launching another publication this Spring. It's called Mash Tun: A Journal about Craft Beer The Mash Tun is a paean to craft beer. It follows the pleasures and aesthetics of craft beer and how it intersects with food, culture, and society. The Mash Tun will feature interviews and profiles with brewery owners, beer lovers, brewmasters, beer distributors, scientists, industry impresarios, coopers, bottle makers, bar owners,  home brewers and anyone who loves and is part of the process of making beer. There will features about figures in the industry as well as historical narratives. Short and long form entries will be interspersed with recipes, comics and photography featuring participating breweries, bars and restaurants. The  Mash Tun will be a four-color, 120-160 + page, perfect bound publication that takes the from of a journal and it will be published by Public Media Institute (PMI), producer of Lumpen, Proximity, Materiel and other periodicals. PMI is a non profit arts organization that produces publications, festivals and host cultural events in Chicago and sometimes elsewhere. Our home is in Bridgeport. We will launch Volume 1 Issue 1 during Craft Beer Week Chicago (Mid May 2012) If you like writing about beer then you should participate. Send us a one paragraph pitch, a writing sample or two, and email edmarlumpen (at) gmail.com  We have room for a few more pieces. Our deadline for texts on Issue 1 is March 1, 2012.

Small Manufacturing Alliance (SMALL) SMALL is a new organization that promotes companies and individuals who make locally manufactured products. The goal of the organization is to amplify awareness of products made in the Chicago Metropolitan area through events, promotions, media and trade shows. SMALL will emphasize that sustainable businesses are the key to our economic well being.  The organization will assist these local manufacturers with legal aid, seminars, marketing services, incubation services and other resources to help grow their business endeavors. SMALL will be launched this May during Version Festival. We will create a department store like space called the SMALL Showroom at the gallery Co-Prosperity Sphere located at 3219 S Morgan Street in Chicago that will be open for the entire month of May. Think of it as the People's Macy's. Products will be displayed in the showroom for one month. During promotional events at the SMALL Showroom the creators of these local products will be able to demonstrate or present them to the public. If you are interested in being a big part of SMALL please email ed@smallma.org. We are currently focused on identifying manufacturers and producers to create a directory of Made in Chicago products. We will then contact interested parties to join us for the launch of the event at the SMALL Showroom that opens May 1, 2012 at the Co-Prosperity Sphere in Chicago. Product categories featured in SMALL's Directory include: Auto & Bike Apparel Body Products Children & Maternity Contract Manufacturers Food & Beverage Furniture Hospitality/Entertainment Products Home & Garden Jewelry/Accessories Pet Products Print & Media Production Other artisan made and hand crafted items. SMALL is being incubated by Public Media Institute (PMI). PMI is a non-profit 501(c) 3, community based, arts & culture organization located in Chicago, Illinois. Our mission is to create and incubate innovative arts programming and cultural infrastructures to transform people - socially and intellectually – through the production of festivals, art spaces, events, exhibitions, community projects, artifacts and media. Public Media Institute is committed to the region's cultural ecology and is evident through our series of programs, spaces and projects. http://www.publicmediainstitute.com

What happens when you invite cultural workers,community developers, urban entrepreneurs, artists, designers, foodies, public space hackers, urban planners, cultural geographers, and dreamers to swarm a neighborhood and transform it for one month? Version 12: Bridgeport The Community of the Future. This May 2012, we're inviting you to come visit us in Bridgeport, a Chicago neighborhood, and join in on our month-long urban experiment. During the Eleventh Annual Version Festival, we will be opening and remixing twelve temporary spaces, businesses, enterprises and projects, all to celebrate the neighborhood we love and call home. And then we're going to use these places as home bases, networks, and maps, all to energize our local environs for long-term change - but we need your help to make it happen. Version 12 seeks collaborators and partners to help us re-imagine the tactical urbanization of our hood. We will supply the spaces for your project and help coordinate the activities and ideas that you would like to share with our communities. Right now our plans include opening up the following: a used bookstore, a nightly performance space in a church, a home brewing club kitchen, a department store/gallery showcasing all locally manufactured small batch and artisanal products, nomadic collaborative restaurants and community kitchens, parking lot flea markets, a neighborhood tourism bureau, and a rotating exhibition space for artists and designers. And we're still looking! We need groups and individuals to open or manage temporary stores, co-working spaces... any choose-your-own pop-up space endeavor you can imagine. Of course, there are other ways to participate too. You could also create or install public art in the hood, volunteer at a space, bring your food cart or truck to the neighborhood, conduct a public space hack, farm in a local urban garden, perform at one of our venues, or just stop by and dive in. Everyone is welcome! The festival is co-produced by Public Media Institute (PMI) and dozens of our neighbors, friends, and business owners here in Bridgeport. PMI is a non-profit 501(c) 3, community based, arts & culture organization located in Chicago, Illinois. Our mission is to create and incubate innovative arts programming and cultural infrastructures to transform people - socially and intellectually – through the production of festivals, art spaces, events, exhibitions, community projects, artifacts and media. Public Media Institute is committed to the region's cultural ecology and is evident through our series of programs, spaces and projects. http://www.publicmediainstitute.com WANT IN? LET US KNOW HOW YOU'D LIKE TO GET INVOLVED. PLEASE RESPOND BY MARCH 1, 2012 AND EMAIL YOUR RESPONSE TO --> versionfest12@gmail.com PLEASE CHOOSE ONE (OR MORE!) OF THE FOLLOWING OPTIONS: [ ] opening up a space [ ] performing [ ] making or installing public art [ ] providing a service to the neighborhood [ ] having your product featured in our department store [ ] volunteering [ ] other YOUR NAME: EMAIL: TELEPHONE: WEBSITE (it's OK if you don't have one though): ONE PARAGRAPH PROPOSAL - let us know what you want to do!: PLEASE INCLUDE 3-6 images up to 1,000 pixels wide