River North Galleries: Catherine Edelman & Stephen Daiter

This week, my Photography in Chicago class visited two great galleries in the River North District: the Catherine Edelman Gallery and the Stephen Daiter Gallery. We made our first stop at Catherine Edelman's to talk to the gallery's Assistant Director, Juli Lowe. After wandering through the semi-subterranean, white space and absorbing the type of photography and mixed media that Edelman features in her gallery, we asked Juli some questions about the operation of the gallery and the pieces that we saw. The front half of the gallery was dedicated to a series of photos called Double Life that were taken by Kelli Connell, a Chicagoan photographer. She told us that their gallery aspires to feature as many local artists and students as they can. This was also evident in the eastern half of the gallery, where many of the featured artists were from Chicago. But the gallery also features artists from all over the world, such as Roger Ballen who currently resides in Johannesburg, South Africa. Juli informed us that a crucial way for her and the other staff at the gallery to find new artists is by perusing blogs. This method is so important, in fact, that a section of their gallery is dedicated to artists they have found online. She went onto explain that much of how they run their business is by looking through blogs and viral marketing. The Catherine Edelman gallery has their own website, a Twitter, a Facebook, a blog, and email subscription lists. I also found it interesting that the gallery now has an online store, so all the the art in the gallery is available for sale to people who may have not even seen it in person. Below is on of the photos on display now at the Catherine Edelman gallery. It's by Roger Ballen and is titled Dirkie.

Our second stop of the day was across the street at the Stephen Daiter Gallery. As opposed to the Catherine Edelman space, the Stephen Daiter Gallery was on the fourth floor in a space that would not be found by someone unless they knew exactly where they were going. The gallery was also very different from the Catherine Edelman Gallery because the space was darker (filled with blacks and shades of gray, rich woods, and less natural light) and only featured one artist: Alex Webb. The contemporary photographer's work popped in the dim gallery, since his photos were highly reliant on the natural, vivid colors he captures. Although Alex Webb is a contemporary artist, the Stephen Daiter Gallery is also known for their collection of vintage 20th century photos, which was not on display during our visit. But during our time there, we were lucky enough to go behind the scenes a bit and see some of the amazing black and white prints from the 1930s and 40s in their possession. Below are two photos currently being featured as part of the Alex Webb collection at the Stephen Daiter Gallery that I loved.