Tabriz, Iran, 2012. (Image courtesy of ICY and SOT.) When they’re not crashing at a Brooklyn warehouse among a collective of creatives they’re tearing across America in a van and trailer with a punk band (why don’t more visual artists do this?). Street art duo ICY and SOT, two young brothers from Iran, have been taking the underground art world by storm. In an onslaught of paint and paste and... 

“Part reptile, part human, maybe they are angels,” Goons mused. He was reflecting on his creatures, also called goons, who he obsessively paints and draws in different settings, guises, outfits, and identities. The goons, marked by their iconic giant open mouths with thick lips, are electric, psychedelic, and whimsical creatures. Opening on October 5th, Welcome to Goonswood presented a prospective... 

Vernissage. Expo Chicago 2012. (Image courtesy of Carol Fox and Associates Public Relations.) Last month, about a week before Expo Chicago: The International Exposition of Modern/Contemporary Art & Design opened, I sat down with Tony Karman, Expo’s President and Director, for a preview of the inaugural fair. It might have been easy for some to dismiss those early superlatives as simply hype,... 

I initially came across the work of James Jankowiak when it was being displayed in The Post Family booth at Art Chicago/Next in spring of 2011. In December of 2011, I got to work with James at What’s Your Art? and I finally had the chance to ask him the following five questions. Here are his five really insightful answers about his life-long passion as a creative and maker of art. If you had to... 

Originality, “gestapo graffiti blasters” in Chicago, the legacy of the Imagists, and writing your contact info on the backs of other people’s business cards when you’re a typical artist and therefore don’t have your own… What follows is the second half of my opening night interviews with those behind Text, Drugs, and Rock & Roll, Maxwell Colette Gallery’s latest show, curated by Billy... 

Artist Jolanta Izabela Pawlak is seen at the Patron “Simply Perfect” Art Project Holiday Windows event on Wednesday, Nov. 23, 2011 in Chicago. (Peter Barreras/AP Images for Patron) This holiday season window shopping will be taking a different approach as vacant store fronts transform into working art studios and galleries for local artists. Titled the “Simply Perfect” Art Project,... 

Text? Check. Drugs? Debatable. Rock and roll? Art stars aplenty. At least, one of the show’s artists walked around cradling a handmade Jack Daniels plushie (probably the world’s most comforting security blanket, to be quite honest). Featuring an international group of over 40 artists working across different media, Text, Drugs, and Rock & Roll opened last Friday at Maxwell Colette Gallery with... 

Martin Bernstein's studio. Entry to "the paint room." November 2011. (Image courtesy of Andrew Roddewig.) Martin Bernstein’s studio is probably one of the best artist studios you will ever visit in your entire life. At least, any artist studio that elicits the seemingly universal reaction of “Whoa. It’s like Pirates of the Caribbean in here…” deserves accolades. To describe... 

Art Depth’s 2nd Annual Art Party & 1st Annual Draw-a-thon. Featured artist Laura Mae Noble. October 2011. (Image courtesy of Jenny Lam.)   A welcome and well-timed reprieve from a temperamental September (a strange string of 90º weather to a seemingly unending bout of torrential rain? not cool, fall), the clear skies and ample sun on Saturday provided the perfect backdrop for the first... 

Honestly, people don’t like to read in general. Art, specifically? From Jenny Holzer’s aphorisms projected throughout New York City to Kay Rosen’s recent Go Do Good installations in Chicago’s Loop, text-based art tends to grab viewers’ attention due to its relatively brazen nature. Contemporary art that is purely image-based is often met with objections of “I don’t get it,” or “Well,...