Out of Easy Reach / BEVERLY FRESH: Really Somethin Else

Out of Easy Reach
Out of Easy Reach, co-organized by DePaul Art Museum, Gallery 400 at University of Illinois at Chicago, and the Rebuild Foundation, is guest-curated by Allison M. Glenn, Associate Curator of Contemporary Art, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. Conceived as one exhibition in three parts on view concurrently, this exhibition counters conventional accounts of art history that have often overlooked the artistic contributions of women of color. Out of Easy Reach presents the work of 24 American artists from the Black and Latina Diasporas with work made from 1980 to 2018. Out of Easy Reach proposes that there are myriad ways artists have employed abstraction as a tool to explore both personal and universal histories, with a focus on mapping, migration, archives, landscape, vernacular culture, language, and the body. A fully-illustrated exhibition catalog is available.

DePaul Art Museum: Candida Alvarez, Bethany Collins, Abigail DeVille, Maren Hassinger, Ariel Jackson, Steffani Jemison, Jennie C. Jones, Caroline Kent, Ayanah Moor, Kellie Romany, Xaviera Simmons, Edra Soto, Brenna Youngblood

Gallery 400 at University of Illinois at Chicgao: Lisa Alvarado, Torkwase Dyson, Leslie Hewitt, Juliana Huxtable, Yvette Mayorga, Howardena Pindell, Martine Syms, Zipporah Camille Thompson

Stony Island Arts Bank: Barbara Chase-Riboud, Sheree Hovsepian, Shinique Smith

Out of Easy Reach Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon: June 16, 2018, 12pm
DPAM will host a Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon for DePaul students and members of the general public to help create and improve Wikipedia entries for artists in “Out of Easy Reach,” using the catalogue and exhibition research materials. 

BEVERLY FRESH: Really Somethin Else
In his first solo museum exhibition in Chicago, artist, rapper, musician and world-record breaker BEVERLY FRESH takes on the incongruities, social rituals, and archetypes of the rural Midwest. Really Somethin Else is an exploration of rural Midwestern symbols, behaviors, and vernacular that also stems from the artist’s hometown of Port Huron, Michigan. Refuting the notion that middle America is void of culture, BEVERLY FRESH relishes in the absurd and finds common ground with other instigators who challenge cultural norms. The exhibition is anchored by the artist’s ongoing Outskirts videos of interventionist performances (2012-present) on view throughout the galleries and his archive of Midwestern ephemera. It offers a meandering experience of the artist’s interest in the role of performance in everyday life and how meaning is produced and shared in rural aesthetic forms. BEVERLY FRESH (a nickname for Zachary Ostrowski, American, b. 1980) is DePaul Professor of Art, Media and Design.

This exhibition is curated by DPAM Director and Chief Curator Julie Rodrigues Widholm.

Wild American Dogs Real Big Tent Revival: May 30, 2018, 5:30pm
Join performers BEVERLY FRESH, THE CROONER, AND PAYTON, for a one night only event! With songs, stories, jokes, cries, grunts, moans, squeals and hollers, this call-and-response show will let you air your lungs out real good.