Posts By: Nate Beaty

Fall 2011 Artist in Residence

Current Artist-in-Residence: Nicole Kita

Nicole Kita’s work takes on a clinical aesthetic of the instructional diagram, through acrylic paintings, graphite drawings, silkscreen prints, and di-cut vinyl installations. By utilizing conventional signifier of self-preservation, survival, fear, mortality, and loss, including life jackets, inflatable rescue boats, water wings, and surgical masks for public health protection, Kita investigates the belief in these objects in contrast to the shortcomings of the actual, physical object. Kita writes, “Despite the fallibility of the objects in the event of true crisis, there is tremendous comfort in knowing that one is taking incremental measures against disaster; the life jacket under your plane seat actually is reassuring.” Kita is currently investigating the mimetic qualities, transactional symbols, and legitimizing practices of ritual, or symbolic healing.

During her residency at Spudnik Press, Kita plans to create a series of editioned screen prints in response to her investigations of Chicago’s: antiquated pharmacies, apothecaries, hospitals, medical centers, and botanicas. She intends to integrate the printed material into the public sphere through site -specific installations.

Kita was born in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada and received her MFA from The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Kita has been both a screen printing instructor and printmaking technician at an interdisciplinary institution. She now lives and works in Chicago. A portfolio of her work is available at: www.nicolekita.com


Fresh Prints: Artists from Hyde Park Art Center and Spudnik Press

A new exhibit at West Town’s Star Lounge Coffee Bar brings together some of the city’s foremost print artists exploring various styles and media of printmaking. “Fresh Prints” features intaglio printing made with metal sheets, silk screening and woodcut prints.

Featuring work by Elke Claus, Angee Lennard, Antonio Martinez, Barlow J. Nelson, Michelle Nordmeyer and Liz Born, the show represents artists who create on the city’s South Side at the Hyde Park Art Center, as well as in Ukrainian Village at Spudnik Press Cooperative.

Elke Claus, a teacher of printing at Hyde Park Art Center and Spudnik Press, curated the exhibit. In an increasingly digital age, printmaking is an art that provides satisfaction in handiwork and a tangible art form, Claus says. The exhibit is “a textbook example of all the different forms of printmaking.”

Opening night will be Sept. 2, 2011, from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Star Lounge Coffee Bar. The exhibit continues through Dec. 1, 2011.

ABOUT (SOME OF) THE ARTISTS

Liz Born is a Chicago-based painter and printmaker. A graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, she currently prints at Spudnik Press, a co-operative print-shop in Ukrainian Village. Versed in media from watercolor to screen-printing, her heart belongs only
to the Reduction Woodcut, sometimes called the “suicide woodcut,” a process in which one woodblock is carved and printed progressively to create multiple layers of color from the same matrix. Because the woodblock is destroyed in the process of making the print, each
edition is limited, and can never be reprinted. Born draws on evolutionary biology and science fiction in her prints, exploring hybridization, inter-species allegory and the possibility of reverse evolution. Her most recent series, “Dimorphisms,” addresses gender-based mutations in the animal kingdom.

Elke Claus holds a B.F.A. from Rutgers the State University of New Jersey and an M.F.A. from
the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Both degrees have a concentration in printmaking.
She has extended her research abroad in Germany at printshops in Berlin (Kunstlerhaus
Bethanien) and Trier (Academie der Bildene Kunst). Her artwork has been shown in juried
exhibits and solo shows in the Chicago area. Her experience includes teaching college/adult
courses at Columbia College, The School of the Art Institute, Lill Street Art Center, and the
Hyde Park Art Center. Her artwork can be seen at Morpho Gallery in Chicago or online at
www.elkeworks.com.

Angee Lennard is the founder and executive director of Spudnik Press Cooperative.
Established in 2007, Lennard built the press from the ground up, initially utilizing her apartment
to create a live/work space. The following year, the press moved to a dedicated studio
space, and programming expanded to include a residency program, keyholder memberships,
consignment printing and collaborative projects. She has participated in group shows at Green
Lantern, Heaven Gallery, Butcher Show, Beverly Art Center and Chicago Urban Art Space. She
has been an Artist in Residence at AS220 in Providence, RI. She currently teaches at Marwen,
CAPE, and Spudnik Press, and has previously taught at Rumble Arts and Paper Source. She is a
member of the Chicago Printers Guild and Southern Graphics Council. She received her BFA
with an emphasis is Print Media from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2005.

ABOUT ART AT STAR LOUNGE COFFEE BAR

Since opening in 2007, the Star Lounge has featured art by some of Chicago’s freshest talents.
Every quarter, a changing collection of artwork brings new perspectives to the West Town
neighborhood. For more information about the Star Lounge or Dark Matter Coffee Co., visit
www.starloungecoffee.com.

Renegade Craft Fair

It’s time for Renegade again! Come and visit Spudnik’s booth and grab some crafty prints!

Members, we are inviting you to share our booth with us! Each active member can submit up to 15 items. We will display between 1 and 3 prints from each participating artist at all times, at our discretion. For example, artists can submit 3 images, 5 copies of each or 15 monoprints. Please keep in mind that this is a craft fair. Keep price points under $50 and imagery catchy! Each member that has work represented is asked to volunteer a 4 hour shift during Renegade. (See below for shifts)

Members are responsible for creating clear professional labels. All work must be labelled with a title and the name of the artist, and price so that we can document what sales are made. It is your responsibility to keep an inventory list.

Work should be delivered in plastic sleeves with a rigid backing for easy display and handling. We have some bags available for resale at 25 cents each.

Spudnik Press kindly asks for 25% of the proceeds from sales made at Renegade to be donated to the studio. This will help cover the fee for the booth (which was $400!)

Confirm Participation by August 31. Include top three choices of shifts you would like to volunteer (Send to angee@spudnikpress.com)

Drop off artwork by September 7.

Pick up unsold artwork by September 30, or the artwork will be considered a donation to the press!

Volunteer Shifts:
Saturday, Sep. 10
8-1pm
12:30-4:30pm
4-8pm (will need a car)

Sunday, Sep. 11
10-2pm
1:30-5:30pm
5-9pm

Comics in Cambodia!

In Collaboration with Arts Network Asia (ANA) and Anne Elizabeth Moore, Sara Drake will be traveling to Phnom Phen, Cambodia to teach an introductory comics and self-publishing class to young women. Help her provide a space in which young women can feel comfortable sharing their own ideas within a culture that has historically given women little access to do so! Click here for more info.

Visit Spudnik at BUILT Festival

Friday, August 12th 5:00-10:30pm &
Saturday, August 13 12:00 – 10:30pm

Location:
1767 N Milwaukee Ave,
Chicago IL 60647

Artists render a major new art initiative; BUILT festival is a city being created out of shipping containers this summer in Chicago’s Wicker Park neighborhood. The shipping containers will be given over to Chicago’s contemporary artists and curators to transform into alternative or ‘guerrilla’ venues.

Over a hundred independent artists, projects, exhibitions and performances, which expand on the festival’s themes of urban culture, will open inside and out of our shipping container venues.

$10 tickets available online.

Spudnik Press Turns One: Celebration and Fundraiser

Saturday, June 7, 2008 7pm-2am
Gallery opening: “3-Dimensional Prints”
Air Hockey Tournament & Dance Party

Spudnik Press hosted a night of festivities on Saturday, June 7th to celebrate our first year as Chicago’s alternative, cooperative printmaking studio. 3-Dimensional Prints was a group show featuring 23 artists from Chicago and beyond using a variety of printmaking methods atop a blue and red 3-D grid. When these prints are viewed through snazzy Magic Viewing Glasses, the images vibrate and pop off the page.

The Spudnik Press Air Hockey Tournament helped raise funds to allow Spudnik to have a residency program. Applications for residencies will be available July 1st. Players took home prizes ranging from silkscreened posters to journals to votives, etc etc… Jeremy Tinder won the raffle for a free month of open studios at Spudnik Press.

At 10pm, we kicked off the dance party. Good times were had to celebrate the first year of printiness here at Spudnik.

Spudnik Press Print Bazaar

Dec. 1, 2007, Spudnik Press hosted its first print bazaar. It was a cold night; icy and fridgid. But plenty of people braved the weather to see what Spudnik Press is all about. More than 20 printmakers showcased their artistic skills to help support the printshop as well as themselves. Hand-printed items included T-shirts and band posters in addition to traditional prints on paper. Prints were also available for 25 cents from a vending machine. The Cimena Periscope, created by Tim Weidelman, featured the work of Alexander Stewart and Lilli Carré (work will be on display through the end of 2007). The etching press was set up to print monoprints. About 40 prints were pulled through out the night. Laura Williams provided vegan treats like carrot cake, brownies, and bean dip.

Spudnik Press Grand Opening

One of One: Prints Like No Other

On June 8th, Spudnik Press celebrated its official opening with an exhibition of prints displaying ways that artists have used the medium of printmaking to make one of a kind images, much like painters and printmakers. "One of one: Prints Like No Other" challenged viewers to questions the misconception that prints are made to make multiples. The artwork ranged drastically in type of process, style, scale, and presentation, but all were one of kind work, and utilized printmaking as a tool to create a unique end product not achievable by any other process.