Quodlibetica

An Absence

Written By: Staff Constellation 15 8.1.11

Quodlibetica and writer Emily Atchison regret to inform that the interview scheduled to appear in this spot was withdrawn by the Chinese artist involved who feared possible recriminations.

Art for Artists

Written By: Staff Constellation 09 7.31.10

“When I got out of graduate school, I didn’t want to talk to collectors and gallerists; I wanted to work with artists,” says David Petersen, the Artistic Director of Art Of This (AOT). It comes as no surprise, then, that AOT was conceived as a space run by artists for artists. [...]

“A very social business”

Written By: Staff Constellation 09 7.31.10

“I don’t want people to think of SooVAC as Suzy’s gallery—it’s really about the community, about all of us,” says Suzy Greenberg, Executive Director of Soo Visual Art Center. SooVAC’s long-standing commitment to serve as a hub for local and emerging artists and to engage art lovers and the community [...]

“We’re not stodgy old wankers over here”

Written By: Staff Constellation 09 7.31.10

“From the very beginning, we wanted to make a statement that this was not going to be another standard artist-run gallery,” says Howard Oransky, one of Form + Content’s twelve founding members, when Camille Gage, he, and I sit down to talk about the past, present, and future of the [...]

Smart Art at Midway

Written By: Staff Constellation 09 7.31.10

While some art enthusiasts appear bundles of energy, gushing forth ideas and artists and concepts without rest, the art enthusiasts at Midway Contemporary Art appear a different breed: Reflective, deliberate, contemplative.
In contrast to some of the Twin Cities other “alternative” art scenes—the word “alternative” seems inappropriate and pejorative, [...]

Art Space at Soap Factory

Written By: Staff Constellation 09 7.31.10

The Soap Factory’s building—a formidable if weathered 48,000 square foot wood-and-brick cut of a structure—appears out of place amid the renovated warehouses and splashy redesigned grain mills that line the north side of the Mississippi in downtown Minneapolis. The views: Spectacular. The foot and bike traffic: Heavy. The area: Increasingly [...]

Achieved Simplicity

Written By: Staff Constellation 09 7.31.10

Umber Studios is a space whose simplicity belies an intensity of purpose, and the clarity of co-director Jessica Umber’s vision comes through in the absence, in the silence that surrounds the work.

Like the gallery itself, Umber is bright but modest, and her quiet demeanor partly masks a great intelligence. [...]

Here They Are

Written By: Staff Constellation 09 7.31.10

They seem, frankly, a little bemused – a little surprised that we have chosen them, as wary of us as we are wary of misrepresenting their space, their mission, their marginality and their youth.

They are Emily Atchison, Jennifer Hedrich, Kelsey Olson, Lauren Allshouse [...]

Vision, Experience, and the Museum

Written By: Staff Constellation 06 2.1.10

By Thomas O. Haakenson
Despite widespread belief, Walter Benjamin did not usher in the end of the museum with the various versions of his essay, “The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technical Reproducibility,” published in the early 20th century. Rather, it is Miguel Helft, and others like him, our colleagues in the contemporary [...]

Wilderness in the Cinema

Written By: Staff Constellation 04 9.23.09

We asked several cinephiles – historians of film, artists, film makers, and other aficionados–to send us their picks for films that engage with the idea of wilderness and the wild. Films criticisms are linked to other related articles throughout the magazine. Use the comments section to add more films that you think should be on [...]