A Case for Feeling Insecure

The Institute for Infinitely Small Things

The Institute for Infinitely Small Things, a performance research collaborative based in Cambridge, MA, will produce “Unmarked Package: A Case for Feeling Insecure” at locations in Chicago characterized by excessive security. Having observed that the Unmarked Package appears frequently in the literature on security and emergency preparedness and in actual reported events that evoke fear and insecurity around the nation, the Institute seeks to use “Unmarked Packages” to test for insecurity in Chicago's public places.

Radical Grandmothers

Bonnie Fortune, with illustrations by Becca Taylor

A new “Free Walking” zine, combining research from two projects, “Free Walking” and the Library of Radiant Optimism. The Library involves researching and collecting books which express an optimistic spirit of self-education and freedom. The Free Walking project (freewalking.org) is an ongoing series of peripatetic investigations and accompanying zine that contain writing about walks, walking, or time spent outside. Radical Grandmothers will feature the stories of, and walks with, Kirsten Dufour and Margit Czenki, both of whom were involved in optimistic self-education and self-publishing movements of the 1960s and 1970s. The zine will also contain interviews with various members of the Raging Grannies: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raging_Grannies.

The New Yorkers’ Guide to Military Recruitment in the 5 Boroughs

The Friends of William Blake

As a counter argument to the grinding machine of military recruitment during the Iraq War, fighting in Afghanistan, and elsewhere, The Friends of William Blake, a small collective of artists, writers, and activists, has created “The New Yorkers’ Guide to Military Recruitment in the 5 Boroughs” – a pocket-sized, sixty-page, comprehensive guide to local military recruitment and resources for counter recruitment in NYC. Made in the spirit of The People's Guide to the RNC which they published in 2004, this book is a small part in the worldwide effort for peace & justice. It seeks to inspire hope while provoking conversation, informing potential recruits, and giving activists a new wrench in their toolbox. http://www.counterrecruitmentguide.org

Theodoreau

Andrew Dodds

Part of an ongoing series of works exploring the links between Henry 'Walden' Thoreau and Theodore 'Unabomber' Kaczynski, two 'historical' figures who loom large over America's understanding of itself. Their lifestyle choices in remote, cabin home is mirrored in the political acts that both expounded, though for very contrasting reasons. For Pathogeographies a 'discursive', relational space is to be created in which group participation will be encouraged.

www.andrewdodds.com/artwork/lifeinthewoods.html

Ritual Guerilla Mummification

Kali

The Guerilla Mummification Kit is a variation on our Home Mummification Kit.
While the latter features everything needed for a traditional approach, the former provides only wrapping materials such that it is better suited to extemporaneous freeform mummifications. The wrapping materials are quite varied: aluminum foil, string, tapes of various kinds, festive wrapping papers and ribbon, cellophane, etc. We will seek out subjects for mummification such as fried chicken, gas pumps, and furniture. The process will be recorded by a before and after photo, as well as by brief musings in a diary/sketchbook.

please see: http://www.kaliartifacts.com

CrossPollinNation

Andi Sutton

In CrossPollinNation, I will conduct two city walks, from 6 - 10 miles, one in Boston and one in Chicago, both reflecting the race and class changes of the city neighborhoods that the routes pass through. I will carry 2 suitcases filled with heirloom squash seeds and planting materials (squash are notorious for their cross-pollinating tendencies.) When someone on the street offers to help me carry the suitcases, I will plant a squash seed for her/him to cultivate. The suitcases will lighten as more people offer to help. Both walks end when I reach a cultivation site where people I encounter along the way will be able to plant and tend to their seeds together for the rest of the growing season.

Boston dates: Sunday, May 20th, starting at 11AM in Harvard Sq., Cambridge and ending whenever I reach the end of the bus route in Dudley Square, Roxbury.

Chicago dates: ca. June 21-25

URL: http://www.bittermelon.org
(The National Bitter Melon Council)

In Search of Lost Memory

Kristoffer Ardena
In Search of Lost Memory

This public intervention consists of found photos (mainly dating around the civil war till the fall of the Franco dictatorship - the time of Spanish Diaspora) that I found in dumpsites, flea markets in Madrid, Spain. At the time these photos were made Spain had a considerable emigrant population, as a recent immigrant to Spain I wanted to somehow link the experience of displacement by searching for clues as to the whereabouts of the people and places in each photo. The project consists of making flyers in the typical Lost-and-Found style to search for people in the photos or anyone that have any relationship to it.

With Love, Dad

Katina Papson

"...the general condition of archives involves the subordination of use to the logic of exchange." - Allan Sekula

A collection of letters I have received from my father will be sent to the gallery for analytical, emotional and psychological "unpacking." Chicago is the mediating state between New York City (where my father lives) and San Francisco (where I live.) By inviting multiple voices to the interaction, there is a distribution and distillation of power in the search for truth, neutrality and love.