Upcoming Exhibitions
 

The enduring and versatile voice of Bonnie Koloc has been heard in Chicago since 1968. For a decade, Bonnie was a pivotal act at the Earl of Old Town, drawing crowds that stood in lines around the block, hoping, at least, for a place to stand to catch the hottest act in town. In time her folk-oriented style merged with jazz and blues, and her versatility took her to Mr. Kelly’s, a long-time Chicago landmark. While continuing to play at the Earl, Orphans and Holstein’s, she began appearing at festivals.

Along the way she received a Governor’s Award in 1973 for Best Singer, recorded ten albums, two of them with Epic. In 1984 her career took another turn when she starred in the Public Theater’s production of The Human Comedy, first earning her the theatre World Bronze Award for Outstanding New Talent on Broadway and a Drama Critics Award nomination for Best Actress in a Musical.

In 1987, Bonnie returned to college to finish a B.A. in Art Education from the University of Northern Iowa. Since high school, Bonnie has shown a gift not only for acting but for fine art, and since 1987 she has been an active print maker, painter and ceramist. In the last eleven years she has had one-woman shows in the South and Midwest, including Chicago and Nashville. In 1999 she was distinguished by her inclusion in the National Exhibition of the Los Angeles Printmaking Society.

In 1996 Bonnie brought together her talents as a singer/songwriter and an artist in A Bestiary. A collection of linocuts, poetry, and music, A Bestiary captures thirteen beasts of the farm with a print, poem and song for each. This stunning work won Best in Show at the Iowa State Fair’s art salon in 1996. These art songs, written in the pentatonic scale, show Bonnie adding yet another dimension to her multi-faceted accomplishments. It is no coincidence that the Des Moines Register called her a “renaissance woman.” Copies of the limited edition set of A Bestiary have been acquired by individual collectors, the Iowa Arts Council, the Waterloo Art Center and Museum, and the special collections department of the Chicago Public Library.

In 1997 Bonnie created a one-woman musical commissioned by the College of Du Page in Glen Ellyn, Illinois. Set in the country of Trashmania, a land of artists and good dogs, the story centers around a woman’s attempts to fulfill her vocation a singer while regaling us with stories of her eccentric aunts, also artists, in the Royal Trashmanian Circus. For this musical Bonnie not only wrote music and lyrics for nineteen songs, but designed and built the set (which included her own paintings, prints, and drawings) and created all the costumes.

For the last decade Bonnie has also been an active book illustrator, creating covers and decorations for Free River Press. Her two most recent commissions have been for An American Mosaic: Prose and Poetry by Everyday Folk and Jump Start: How to Write from Everyday Life, both published by Oxford University Press. In 2003 Bonnie received a grant from the Iowa Arts Council to publish a trade edition of A Bestiary, which was released with a CD in 2004.  Also in 2004, ‘Timeless’  a double cd which captured the warmth and power of her performances from 1973 to 1990 (including The Earl of Old Town and The Amazing Grace) was released.  “Timeless was described as  “remarkable… an amazing piece of work…” , by Rick Kogan of WGN Radio.  

Bonnie’s latest recording  and 13^th overall “Here to Sing”, produced by longtime friend and collaborator Howard Levy is called “the best thing she has ever recorded,” according to Rich Warren of WFMT’s nationally syndicated radio program ‘The Midnight Special’.  

Inside Out
October 18, 2008-January 11, 2009

Inside Out is an exhibition exploring and exposing our ensconced perspective of sculpture and theme.  Inside Out can suggest something made topsy-turvy and presented to the viewer in a new way; the orderly arrangement of structure is made both chaotic and lyrical.  The show's title can also imply the act of seeing beyond the surface with the viewer encountering sculpture that creates an aesthetic impact where it does not exist. 

Inside Out will feature two important American sculptors, Chakaia Booker, who lives and works in New York and Bob Emser, from Illinois.  Their work will complement and confront, challenging the viewer to think of the artists' expression of their emotions, memories, and internal creativity – in a sense bringing their insides out. 

Chakaia Booker recreates sculpture from tough, black rubber tires that are cut up and rearranged in striking ways.  From works that are almost floral in their misleading softness to large, forceful abstract pieces, she uses the various parts of automotive tires, differently with each object, in surprising ways.

Her artistic career has enabled her to be part of the permanent collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Akron Museum of Art and exhibited in both group and solo exhibitions in such places as the Neuberger Museum of Art, and New York's Marlborough Gallery as well as the “Twentieth Century American Sculpture” exhibition at the White House in 1996 

Chakaia Booker, Midtown South , 2005
Rubber tires, wood 53x40x33in.
Courtesy Marlborough Gallery

Bob Emser, familiar to Elmhurst Art Museum audiences (he is the creator of Sistine Touch, the large outdoor sculpture installed by the South doors to the museum), brings new works to the galleries.  He continues to uncover the structural core of his works and present them, unobstructed, to the viewer.  His latest wall objects have a graceful quality and his use of hard materials like metal, wood, and fiberglass are unexpected because of the airy quality of his sculptures and the fact that shadows and reflections cast from the gallery lighting play an important role in completing the physical work and extending its complexity beyond the physical material. 

After being awarded a full time graduate assistantship in sculpture from Bradley University, Emser completed his M.F.A. in 1978 and was the youngest sculptor to have his work selected for the prestigious Illinois Arts Council's Sculpture Exhibition.  Emser has been exhibited across the United States and  internationally in Norway, Argentina, Australia, Italy, Paris, and Germany.

Bob Emser, A Breath Away, 2006
Stainless Steel, Polycarbonate
Courtesy of the artist.