Local artist-slash-troublemaker Vincent Dermody was showing off his new manicure in the hallway outside Wendy Cooper Gallery last Friday night. Former Vice magazine photo editor Tim Barber, who has work up in the gallery, and I were snickering, and Dermody warned Barber not to fuck with him. “I have a black belt in the ancient martial art of hapkido,” he warned for about the zillionth time that night, only slightly kidding.
We were taking a breather from “The Promised Land,” a show of mostly photos designed to “convey aspects of human striving and failure,” according to the gallery’s press release. “Loosely conceived as a landscape show,” it goes on, “the work carries much greater weight as social commentary in an age of alienation from the environment and from our very purpose on earth.”
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
In one of Barber’s pictures, Staten Island Ferry, a rockabilly couple smooch sluttily in a corner. Next to them another couple embrace as if they’ve narrowly escaped some tragedy. Barber said he shot it while on a date on the ferry, “a grimy-ass boat.” He says he, too, had gone to that corner for some action and took pictures behind his date’s back while they were going at it.
The Reeders, who founded a gallery/boutique/hangout space in Milwaukee called General Store, curate shows together at fancy-pants galleries in New York and Miami. I’m a fan of their irreverence–their shows are the art-world equivalent of a crayon drawing on a mansion wall. Other people seem to like them too: last year the Village Voice called the first “Drunk vs. Stoned” “one of the most diverting group shows of the year,” and this summer the New York Times gave “Drunk vs. Stoned 2” a mostly positive review, calling it “ambitious if understandably discombobulated.”
Back inside, Barber introduced me to Wendy Cooper’s director, John McKinnon, and I had another flashback to “The Four Color Pen Show.” After I wrote about that exhibition, mentioning that Van Harrison was about to move to New York, McKinnon wrote a letter to the Reader asking why I would even bother comparing that city and this one. “You wrote a mean letter about me!” I screeched at him. “Nice to meet you!” McKinnon took it all in stride, and we laughed about it like old pals.
