PRESS RELEASE
April 8, 2013
For Immediate Release
Media Contact: Shari Schlachter
Phone: 312-502-7264
Email: shari@hairpinartscenter.org
Contemporary Arts Council Sponsors the Exhibition
‘The Presence of Absence’ at Hairpin Arts Center
May 6-June 2, 2013
Dave Tolchinsky and Debra Tolchinsky have curated the Contemporary Arts Council 13th annual
exhibition, The Presence of Absence at the Hairpin Arts Center in Logan Square. The exhibition runs
from May 6 to June 2, 2013. Opening reception is Friday, May 10, from 5-7pm. Curators and Artists Talk,
Saturday, May 18, 2-3pm. All events are open to the public.
The Presence of Absence presents visual and aural work in a range of media that grapples with that
which should be there, but isn’t, and that which shouldn’t be there, but is still felt, seen or heard.
As excerpted from the curator’s statement, “Awakening from a deep sleep and the dream begins to
fade. Trying to hang onto a particular image, an evaporating face. A face that belonged to a person
whom the dreamer loved. The person has passed. What remains? Dust and bone and something even
less tangible…absence.”
“The initial concept for our exhibition came about from such a dream and the ensuing awareness that an
absence of anything—a person, an action, an idea—often affects us more acutely than that which may
be concretely present. Gathering work for the show, we found ourselves attracted to artists who explore
the tension between that which is and that which is not in a variety of media and from a multitude of
perspectives,” Dave and Deb Tolchinsky.
Participating Artists are: Christopher Baker, Melika Bass, Paola Cabal, Robert Chase Heishman and
Brendan Meara, Inigo Manglano-Ovall, Laurie Palmer and Katarina Weslien. Accompanying catalog is
designed by Ken Pagni. Gallery hours are Wed. 12-3pm, Fri. 5-9:30pm, Sat. 2-9:30pm, and Sun. 2-5pm.
The Tolchinsky’s are professors in the Radio-TV-Film Department at Northwestern University. They
previously curated The Neighbor Next Door: Shimon Attie at the Mary and Leigh Block Museum in
Evanston, IL and The Horror Show at the Chicago City Arts Gallery which then traveled to Dorsky Gallery
Curatorial Programs in New York City. Debra Tolchinsky also previously co-curated Crossing Wires;
Technology and Play at the Evanston Art Center.
The Hairpin Arts Center was established by the Logan Square Chamber of Arts. The space acts as a place
for cross-disciplinary exchange. By offering a variety of traditional and experimental programming, the
Hairpin brings together local, national, and international artists and arts groups connecting them to the
local community.
###
Hairpin Arts Center, 2800 N. Milwaukee Ave., 2nd Floor, Chicago, IL, 60618, www.hairpinartscenter.org