2nd Floor Rear 2015
February 7-8, 2015
The curatorial premise for 2nd Floor Rear 2015 is part feeling, part idea; it’s Chicagoans’ annual substitution of “stay warm” for “see you later”. It’s also the hypnotic quiet at winter’s core that makes the season’s deep melancholy savorable. In the midst of another winter, we sought forms of art that might warm us, draw us in, and make us stay.
In 2015, we hoped to bring audiences anti-spectacular wonder and radical tenderness. We wanted Chicagoans feel present and connected even in their winter fugue states. We wanted to carve out a safe place to be vulnerable and wildish. We wanted things to resonate–to find us all again days later while we wated in line at the Walgreens checkout counter. This year, we offered utopic gestures, cathartic documents, collaborative making, rituals, immersion, hangouts, fem(me)inisms, forms of encounter, virtual hypnosis, and one freewheeling, sweaty dance party featuring grooves by Tess of (Slo ‘Mo) and Audio Jack.
2015 featured artists, collectives, and curators included Society of Smallness, Elena Tejada-Herrera, Tegan Brace, Betsy Zacsek, Juneer Kibria, Alfredo Salazar-Caro, Cooper Collier, Marya Spont-Lemus, Dao Nguyen, Jane Jerardi, Hideous Beast, JVG/WAR, HI typ/O, Grace Needlman, Will Bishop, Matthew Coleman, Brian T. Leahy, Sarah Bastress, Bryant Worely, J. Thomas Pallas, Katie Vota, Jessica Speer, Hannah Tarr, Third Object, Traci Fowler, Inside the Artist’s Kitchen, Kiam Marcelo Junio, Ann Kreitman, Shaina Schrooten, Jeremiah Jones, Liz Ensz, Ali Aschman, Christina Doelling, Chelsea Coon and the Queen of Luxuria (Carron Little).
Featured exhibition spaces included the I am Logan Square Gallery, Hume Gallery, Dreamland D, Kitchen Space, Corner, the Whistler Storefront Gallery, Tritriangle, and Autotelic Studios. Special thanks to our community partners: I am Logan Square, Crown Liquors, Uncharted Books, the Whistler, the Church of the Advent, and Slo ‘Mo.
Learn more about 2nd Floor Rear 2015.
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