Starving artists

STOREFRONT REBELLION Roving art series Kunsthalle Chicago kicks off in a former discount retail space.

As our country slumps into a recession, art markets get hit hard, too. With these tough economic times in mind, SAIC graduate student Jean Kang organized Kunsthalle Chicago, an exhibition that looks at both the aesthetics of arte povera —dubbed “poor” art and made from mostly found objects—and more traditional artwork (photographs, oil paintings) that costs more to produce.

Kang is invoking the concept of kunsthalle, a German word loosely meaning a space for temporary art exhibitions, as a jumping-off point to host a series of shows in unlikely locations—spaces that fly in the face of the traditional white-cube gallery setting. Future venues for Kunsthalle Chicago, though not scheduled, could include a medical-supply store, apartments and even an Indian art show on the sidewalks of Devon Avenue. In this first show, Kang says the location—an old dollar store storefront—plays a key role, amplifying the “poor art” end of the spectrum. “If you walk into a dollar store, they’re selling paintings, shower curtains—everything,” Kang says. “But, at the same time, [the plethora of dollar stores are] a symptom of hard economic times.”

As Kang curated this first Kunsthalle, she found that the widening gap between rich and poor in the U.S. and the impact on artists influenced the type of work she chose to display. One featured artist, Esteban Schimpf, presents work utilizing found objects—one of his pieces covers a three-foot-tall, towerlike block of chipped Styrofoam with grey spray paint and globs of red and gold paint. Also embracing the idea of re-use, Martha Gross goes for a thrift-store aesthetic in “family history,” a patchwork quilt with black letters over multicolored squares that spell out a lie the artist found while exploring her family’s past.

Kang isn’t immune to exasperation over dwindling funds and rising prices. “We are in a recession, our economy is very bad and the dollar is really low. What do artists have to work with?” Kang says. “If you have to paint a painting, it costs a lot; if you have to print a photo, that’s $200 for a large format. So a lot of the work I have in this show is just kinda poor.” But if this show is proof of anything, it’s that artists can accomplish a lot with few resources.

Kunsthalle Chicago runs through April 30.