DOUBLE DIP
New work by ERIN MCKENNA & SAMANTHA REHARK
March 24-April 8, 2013

Opening Reception: Sunday, March 24th, 5-9pm
Open Hours : Sundays & Mondays, 12-4pm

ACRE Projects
1913 W. 17th St.
Chicago, IL 60608

Erin McKenna and Samantha Rehark construct and control the elements of a social environment perpetrating a tease on the audience for the opening night of Double Dip. They present their work as a party, orchestrating experiences and creating objects for an audience to participate in and connect with, while giving over only as much control as will allow individuals to engage with the production of Double Dip further.

The centerpiece of this party is a hot tub, cut in half and reconfigured in the gallery. This gesture draws our attention to its form—a container—and its intended use—to lubricate social situations. While interrupting our ability to use the hot tub in its intended way they create a new object for use by the audience that maintains the original potential for that object as a container for social interaction, and provide other possibilities for personal contact as the lubricant. This creates a heightened awareness of the social structures that underpin a party atmosphere causing the participants to confront the contrivance of the event itself. By evoking the readymade, the duo transforms low culture objects to subvert their original function, and open up space for the contemplation of social experience as it happens in real time.

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ERIN MCKENNA lives and works in Columbus, OH. In 2012 she graduated from Columbus College of Art & Design. She has recently applied to graduate school to obtain an MFA in sculpture. This past summer she has managed NO PLACE, a large warehouse studio space for herself and 8 other fellow graduates.

More information about Erin McKenna can be found at erinalexandramckenna.com.

SAMANTHA REHARK’s recent projects explore a modern relationship to glamorized aesthetics in the social environment, as well as the transition of obsession and identity from the Information Age into the Next Age. Rehark has released her own independent zines and publications since 2011 under the name Let’s, and is also the co-founder of the Emerging Artist Series Yearbook (EASY), a series of monthly events and publications for emerging artists through ROYGBIV Gallery in Columbus, Ohio.

More information about Samantha Rehark can be found at www.samantharehark.com.

HOTT CHICKS HOTTER is the first in a series of one-night installation projects by McKenna and Rehark. Initiated in July of 2012, the travelling “glam-shots” duo debuted at ACRE Residency in Wisconsin and has since snapped pics at local bars and parties in New York, Chicago and Columbus.

More information about HOTT CHICKS HOTTER can be found at hottchickshotter.tumblr.com.

KATE BOWEN is an artist, educator and curator living in Chicago. She is a teaching artist with the high school outreach program Picture Me and an adjunct faculty member at the Illinois Institute of Art. She is the Video Programming Coordinator at the Museum of Contemporary Photography.

More information about Kate Bowen can be found at www.katembowen.com.

ACRE (Artists’ Cooperative Residency and Exhibitions) is a volunteer-run non-profit based in Chicago devoted to employing various systems of support foremerging artists and to creating a generative community of cultural producers. ACRE investigates and institutes models designed to help artists develop, present, and discuss their practices by providing forums for idea exchange, interdisciplinary collaboration, and experimental projects. ACRE enacts its mission primarily through an annual summer residency program in rural southwestern Wisconsin. Throughout the rest of the year, ACRE offers opportunities for exhibition to each of its residents.

More information about ACRE can be found at www.acreresidency.org.

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Tags: ACRE Projects, Erin McKenna, Hott Chicks Hotter, Kate Bowen, Pilsen, Samantha Rehark