Chicago Writers House and Curbside Splendor Publishing present:

A Pop Up Book Fair!

Sunday, April 14, 2013
at The Empty Bottle
1035 N. Western Ave., Chicago, Illinois 60622
2:00 pm

$5 or Free with RSVP

Chicago’s finest independent publishers will be on hand displaying their goods. Quimby’s Bookstore will also stock a table with a selection of books/zines penned by Chicagoans. Enjoy cocktails and listen to live music all afternoon as you pan through your new Spring reading materials.

Check here for an upcoming list of participating publishers and musicians.

21+ unless minors are accompanied by a parent or legal guardian.

Karaoke Idol

Beauty Bar on Thursday, March 14th, at 8PM!
@ 1444 W Chicago Ave

Featuring Megan Klawitter

The March installment of Chicago’s favorite live karaoke battle KARAOKE IDOL hits the stage at Beauty Bar on Thursday, March 14th, at 8PM! One singer from each the following cool Chicago-based companies and organizations will battle it out to determine who will wear the crown of KARAOKE IDOL!

SPUDNIK PRESS COOPERATIVE
BEST FRIENDS GALLERY
READ/WRITE LIBRARY
826CHICAGO
& RETURNING CHAMPS
CHICAGO WOMEN’S HEALTH CENTER

Megan Klawitter, one of Spudnik’s board members and teaching artists, will be competing on behalf of Spudnik Press to raise money for our new Vandercook Press.

YOU DECIDE THE WINNER!

Ultimately CHICAGO DECIDES who wins based upon audience applause so come ready to cheer for your favorite performer! All sales will be rewarded to the contestants and their sponsors. In addition, one extra contestant will be chosen from the crowd to compete for prize $$$, fame, a stack of PBRs, and a crown.

Be sure to stick around afterward for OPEN KARAOKE w/ “Shameles Karaoke”! Come early and stay late so you can sign up & belt out your favorite songs!

KARAOKE IDOL is brought to you by Curbside Splendor Publishing, Another Chicago Magazine, & Quimby’s Bookstore.

21+
$5 cover

It’s Time For A Spring Clean!

Spring cleaning can be overwhelming, but not with a Spudnik Volunteer Task Force! We are clean-sweeping the Printshop as well as the Annex and could really use your help! Many of the jobs are small ones and will go by quickly, but we will be so glad to take care of them. We can do it with many hands and a motivating playlist. Our list includes, and is not limited to:

– Organizing Screens
– Painting
– Securing Shelves/Replacing Hardware
– Cleaning Floors/Table Tops
– Scrubbing Sink/Wash-Out Room
– Emptying Trash and Recycling
– General Studio Wash/Maintenance

*Heads up to members and studio users:
Anything that has not been name/dated/touched in a very very very long time will go in a re-sale pile. These items might include old prints, abandoned items, scraps, ect.

Please email info@spudnikpress.com to sign up/submit ideas.
Include your name + friends’ names, time you plan to join, specific task (if any) you want to tackle.

And….THANK YOU! We ask our members to volunteer 4 hours a year. The spring cleaning day is a great opportunity to get involved in Spudnik as well as to remind you that we are here for your printing convenience 🙂 Happy Printing!

From February 15 to March 8, anyone participating in Zine Fest can use Open Studio at a reduced rate – just $5 per session!

Spudnik Press is pleased to be a sponsor of this year’s Zine Fest. The goals of our new studio space, The Annex, align perfectly with Zine Fest’s mission to create an outlet for small press and independent publishers to showcase their work, swap skills, sell books, and build a wholesome community.

The Annex has been accruing tools and resources to help artists and small publishers since last fall. We’ve got a photocopier, long-range staplers, sewing machine, stamps, craft supplies, and more. We even have a hot foil press and a typewriter that types in cursive!

More details:
The $12 Base Fee for Open Studio will be reduced to $5 for all Zine Fest Participants.
Artists new to Spudnik should first come to Orientation (Mondays at 6pm; Fridays at 12pm).
Annex Open Studio Hours are Mondays 6:30-11pm and Fridays 12:30-5pm.
Anyone who also wants to use The Printshop (for screenprinting, letterpress, etc.) can do so. There is a $10 material fee for use of presses and printmaking materials.
Don’t want to use plain old copy paper? We have Paper Resale stocked with a variety of weights, colors, and sizes, plus a large selection of swatch books.
B&W Photocopies are $0.05; Color Copies are $0.50.
Much more information about utilizing our studio can be found at here!

Wednesday, February 20, 2013
6:30 – 7:30pm
at Spudnik Press

Calling all Spudnik Press members (& people who are thinking about joining)! Join us for our first member meeting of 2013! We will be testing and tasting the Hashbrown signature cocktail, finishing up final preparations for the chili cook-off and of course, talking about member things and what’s happening in 2013! It will be fun and informative…the best of both worlds!

*Get a sneak peak at the 2013 Member Swag, partially pictured above!

Friday March 1 and Saturday March 2
10:00 am – 4:00 pm

Chicago Cultural Center
78 E. Washington Street
Chicago, IL 60602
Admission Free!

The Creative Chicago Expo connects Chicago’s creative community with resources they need to thrive. Through Keynotes, Workshops, Vendors and more, get professional development expertise from top local and national providers.
Spudnik Press will have a table to share what we offer to the local print community, so stop by and say hello!

Artists, Mickey Zacchilli & Lauren Pakradooni
Saturday, February 9, 2013
3:00 – 5:00pm
at The Annex at Spudnik Press

Spudnik Press welcomes two fantastic printmakers to Chicago — Mickey Zacchilli (Providence, RI) and Lauren Pakradooni (Spartanburg, SC) — for an artist talk on Saturday, February 9!

Mickey Zacchilli was born in 1983 and is know for her popular mini-comics series Rav (available at Quimby’s) as well as her wild silkscreened rock show posters. She has a monthly comic strip in Mothers News, has been published in anthologies like Thickness and Monster, and contributed illustrations to the New York Times.

Lauren Pakradooni’s interdisciplinary work incorporates drawing, printmaking, painting, sculpture, installation, performance, and sound. She gravitates towards exploring space, making use of the graphic qualities of print, enveloping character of sound, and the literal space of sculpture and performance. Lauren spent 2011 teaching printmaking in Doha, Qatar, and this year will be an artist in residence at the Wassaic Project, in Wassaic, NY.

We’ll have a presentation from each artist, and they’ll have prints with them that you can check out!

Stay tuned for more artist talks held at Spudnik Press in 2013!

The best way to start off your Friday is by having friends from The Arts of Life stop by to screenprint with you!

This morning, we worked together to create three exquisite corpse drawings and turned them into screenprints. The pro-printers (seriously, they can screenprint circles around you) made three editions of 10, all rainbow-rolled, and all amazing. Take a look at the images (taken by Liz) and check out our fun collaborations. More importantly, check out The Arts of Life organization!

The Hashbrown 2013

A cut-throat Chili Cook-Off featuring the best of Chicago’s Print Community

Saturday, February 23, 2013
at Spudnik Press Cooperative
1821 W Hubbard, Suite 302
6 pm – 10 pm

Cook-off winners announced at 9:30 pm or when chili runs dry

Purchase Tickets in Advance

Tickets also available at the door.

$10 for 5 tickets / $20 for VIP Package*
Redeem tickets for chili and tamales
*VIP guests receive 5 larger chili portions throughout the night, a golden spoon and a complimentary signature cocktail.

The tradition continues: On February 23rd, The Hashbrown will bring together twelve of Chicago’s finest organizations devoted to printmaking and self-publishing. Each contender in this annual competition provides a pot of chili in support of Spudnik’s mission to keep printing and publishing approachable and affordable.

The 2013 chili cook-off roster includes last year’s winners, Chicago Printmakers Collaborative and The Printstitute, as well as new chefs: Homeroom, Center for Book and Paper Arts, Read/Write Library, and Chicago Alternative Comics Expo. The lineup is rounded out by Fugscreens Studios, SAIC Student Printshop, Dan Grezca, One Horse Press, SP Members and Spudnik Press will contribute a special House Chili and homemade sweet and savory tamales. “Golden Squeegee” Awards will be given for vegetarian and meat categories, determined by popular vote.

In addition to warm food and comforting drinks, Spudnik’s newest acquisition, a Vandercook Letterpress, will be up and running. Spudnik’s Annex Gallery will feature a solo show of artist books by Daniel Mellis. The 2013 Collector’s Print by Kristina Paabus will be released, and the 2013 membership swag will be revealed.

In less than six years, Spudnik Press Cooperative has enabled over 800 artists to create their own prints, and it has worked with as many young students through field trips and in-school youth programs. This fall, The Annex was added to better serve Chicago’s writing, comics, and zine communities. Spudnik Press Cooperative continues to increase the support they provide to Chicago’s creative community. Help Spudnik continue their mission by attending The Hashbrown, Chicago’s premier event for chili-based philanthropy.

Beer Sponsored by Artisanal Imports

Homeroom presents: Visual Music 101

With Guest Speaker David Metcalfe

Sunday, February 17th 4pm
The Annex at Spudnik Press
1821 W. Hubbard, Suite 302
Free

On Sunday, February 17th at 3pm at The Annex at Spudnik Press, Homeroom Chicago, Spudnik Press, and Access Contemporary Music present a public seminar exploring the relationship between color and sound.

As music became the inspiration for the movement towards abstraction in early 20th century European painting, artists searched for ever more meaningful ways to incorporate the language and gestures of music into their work. Similarly, the use of the color spectrum to illustrate musical tonality and timbre became common, not only among synaesthetic composers like Scriabin and Messiaen but also in the forms of light displays, color organs, and abstract animation. As we delve deeper into the mixed media possibilities of the digital age: how do color and light inform our experience of sound textures and vice versa?

Writer David Metcalfe will present his research about various theories and practices regarding the relationship between color and sound ranging from Pythagoras to David Lynch, providing specific audio and visual examples as well as methods useful for active artists and musicians.

The event will also serve to kick off Homeroom and Spudnik’s third iteration of Ten x Ten, a collaborative project between Chicago musicians and printmakers.

The event is free to the public. Snacks and drinks will be made available.

Happy Holidays, everyone!

Spudnik Press will be closed on Monday, December 24th, Tuesday, December 25th and Wednesday, December 26th and there will be NO Open Studio on Monday 12/24.

Open Studio sessions will go on like normal during the days in between (Thursday, Friday & Saturday, 12/27-29).

We will also be closed on Monday, December 31st and Tuesday, January 1st.

There will be NO Open Studio on Monday, 12/31.

APPLICATION DEADLINE: JANUARY 4, 2013
Spudnik Press’ Residency Program provides the resources, equipment, and space for one artist per season to develop a body of print-based work. We hope to encourage and enable the production of high quality prints, and to contribute to the development of an emerging Chicago artist.

For more information and to download the application, take a look at our Residency page!