Ratko Ikic

On Saturday morning I had breakfast with Nick and Nadine of Sonnenzimmer. Afterward, on the way South to CAKE we were distracted by a row of huge, colorful paintings leaning up against a wrought iron fence on Ashland avenue. We immediately pulled over for a better look and ended up talking to the artist, Ratko Ikic. He didn't have much English and none of us speak... Bosnian? So very little was really communicated (he has a book of English Castles that he references... and that's about all I got). These are a few of the paintings. They are kind of stunning.

Clearly he's self taught, I'm guessing he came to painting late in life. But they really had a pretty amazing, idiosyncratic sense of mood and light and color. And the guy is ambitious. They were big. And there were a lot of them. It was pretty amazing in about six different ways at once.

That's him in the cowboy hat. He's got a gallery/studio at 4036 N Ashland. Go knock on his door if you're curious. He might actually try to give you one.

Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

Below are images of some of the finished paintings from my recent collaboration with Sonnenzimmer. In general the process involved the folks at Sonnenzimmer starting the paintings, then handing them off to me to draw on and finish. for the last image in this list, though, the order was reversed. To see an earlier stage of the first one (immediately below) look here. The show is up through July 2.

Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

Over the last several weeks I have been busily drawing on top of a number of half finished paintings given me by Nick Butcher and Nadine Nakanishi of Sonnenzimmer. The opening reception for the resulting show is being held at Fill In The Blank Gallery this Friday, the 20th of May, from 7-11. above is an unfinished painting, below are details of several more. You can read more about what the hell we were thinking here. The process has been, by turns, a delight, an ordeal, an education... It has turned out to be a vigorous conversation–and at times a vicious internal argument–between abstraction and representation, between painting and drawing, and between playfulness and planning. Come listen in. 5038 N Lincoln Avenue in Chicago.

ten by ten

Nick Butcher and Nadine Nakanishi (AKA Sonnenzimmer--I've done posts about them here and here) just did a series of ten posters for Insound's 10x10 series. They are @#$%&x* brilliant. They are up now in Logan Square at Longman & Eagle (best ceiling in the city) and should be available at the Sonnenzimmer and Insound sites if they haven't sold them all already. Eighties Trapper Keeper art made smart, sharp and sublime. I also recommend the Sonnenzimmer blog.

Nick Butcher and Nadine Nakanishi

The current show at Lula, Nick Butcher and Nadine Nakanishi's paintings and constructions, is on its way down. The work in the bar came out two days ago and the rest of the work comes down next Tuesday. Because you are, after all, reading the blog of someone who makes books, it seemed appropriate to post some of the stuff, much of it book based, that they had in the cases in the bar (for those of you who have never been, the bar at Lula is made from old humidors salvaged from the cigar store that used to occupy the space...so the bar is hollow and covered in glass–we show art there, as well as on the walls). The first two pieces are children's books that Nadine painted in to alter/interact with. As is often the case, the physicality of these is pretty well lost in just zeros and ones, but they're awesome. Here are two of my favorite spreads:


The next three are Nick's, from a blank book in which he did a series of small paintings.



Lastly is a handmade book of what I'll call improvisational screen printing. Nick made a number of small screens with various geometric shapes and used them to create different compositions, ultimately binding them together in the book. Again...physicality, uselessness of computer screens, subtlety, awesomeness, etc etc ad naseum. Following these last book pieces are two more drawing/painting collage type things. Did I mention their posters?

Other People's Pictures

For about the last six years or so my friend Marianne and I have curated the artwork at a restaurant here in Chicago called Lula. We both used to work there, me flipping eggs, she serving them once flipped, when the original curator fell by the wayside. Marianne and I, imagining that our experience with drawing birds and sewing pieces of toast made us art experts, took over. Shows of varying quality have come and gone. People seem to have liked them, mostly. Because we both have our own work and the art at Lula has been neither her nor my primary vocation we've done a rather dismal job of documenting our work there. I think I might have photos of three shows out of roughly 20 we've hung. As of today's entry, I'm turning over a new leaf.



The pieces above are from the current show. The two above are Residue and Two Neighborhoods 2 by Nick Butcher. The two below are Green Bar Suprematism and The Spines of Rothko by Nadine Nakanishi. You can find more info and pictures from both at sonnenzimmer.com. Both artists are printmakers and graphic design types. Nick makes music, too. They make beautiful, beautiful stuff. Really. The show should be up til mid May.

I'm intending to do posts about a few other recent shows at Lula over the next few weeks.