Chicago, Illinois - Woman Made Gallery is pleased to announce the opening of a new group exhibition, "12th International Open," collaborative works by Tracy Featherstone and Krista Connerly, and a solo exhibition by Marjorie Woodruff. The Artisan Gallery continues to present "Whimsicality," constructions rooted in concepts of irony, naiveté, and fantasy with fine craft work by 11 women.

Please join us at the artist reception on Friday, March 6, from 6 to 9 p.m., at 685 N. Milwaukee Avenue in Chicago. Works will be on display until April 16, 2009.

In addition to group and solo exhibitions, Woman Made Gallery presents a poetry readings hosted by Nina Corwin on Sunday, March 15, from 2 to 4 p.m.

Regular Gallery hours are Wednesday, Thursday and Friday from 12 to 7 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from 12 to 4 p.m.

Yolanda M. López is an American muralist, painter, printmaker, educator, and film producer. Her work focuses on the experience of Mexican American women and often challenges ethnic stereotypes associated with them. López obtained international celebrity for her "Virgen de Guadalupe" paintings.

Gloria Adams, Golnar Adili, Theresa A. Anderson, Nancy Angermeyer, Joanne Tomi Aono, Cousandra Armstrong, Donna Ascher, Lisa Marie Barber, Sylvia Broubalow, Audrey L. Brown, Angela Cazeljahn, Jinkyung Chong, Crisanta Deguzman, Jean Donegan, Susan Grace, Judithe Hernandez, I-Hua Lee, Anna Liljas, Jeanette Martone, Molly McCarty, Janet McKenzie, Valerie Mendoza, Kendall Mingey, Erin Mullenex, Su Yeon Na, Carol Ng-He, Kristine O'Reilly, Patricia Peña, Mary H. Phelan, Jessica Plattner, Erika Pochybova-Johnson, Gosia Podosek, Rosemary Porter, Marianne Reim, Kristin Lindseth Rivera, Sally Ruddy, Caren Helene Rudman, Michelle Sierra, Olaina Silva, Priscilla Smith, Sabrina Squires, Allison Svoboda, Gwendolyn Zabicki, Ling Yan Zhang.

The Artist Reception is on March 6 from 6 to 9 p.m. and works will be up through April 16, 2009.

Images: (top to bottom) Artworks by Anna Liljas and Judithe Hernandez

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Featuring Connerly and Featherstone's Envirotouchers, a series of prototypes for a more connected world, "Dig In, Float Up" seeks to replace rationality with sensuality and isolation with relationship.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS:
Tracy Featherstone:
Featherstone's work has been featured nationally and internationally. She has shown at the Wexner Center in Ohio, at the Contemporary Art Center in Cincinnati, at the Corcoran Museum of Art in Washington as well as at the Fringe Festival in Scotland among many others. Featherstone lives and has a working studio in Hamilton, OH. She earned a BFA from the University of Cincinnati and a MFA from the University of Arizona. She is currently an associate professor in Art at Miami University, Ohio.

Krista Connerly:
Connerly's work has been exhibited nationally and internationally in places such as Los Angeles, Portland, Chicago, Memphis, Basel, Cairo, Dublin, and Melbourne. Some of these venues include: The Urban Institute for Contemporary Art in Michigan, The Next Wave Festival in Melbourne, Australia, WOW, Women's International Film Festival in Sydney Australia, The Los Angeles Center for Digital Art, Banff Centre for the Arts in Canada, and at the Egyptian Ministry of Culture in Cairo. Connerly lives and works in Portland, Oregon. She earned her MFA from Carnegie Mellon University and was responsible for developing the Digital Media program at Anderson Ranch Art Center. Currently she teaches at Oregon State University.

Exhibition Dates: March 6 - April 16, 2009

Image: "Dig In, Float Up" - photograph by Tracy Featherstone and Krista Connerly

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A dedicated teacher, Marjorie Woodruff holds MA and MFA degrees in ceramics from Northern Illinois University. She is the recipient of an Illinois Arts Council grant, the Regional Artists' Project Program Grant and the Community Arts Assistance Program Grant among other awards, which permit her to conduct community ceramic workshops for adults and children in and around Chicago. She has worked with the Museum of Contemporary Art, The Art Institute of Chicago, the Harold Washington City College, Gallery 37, Lillstreet Art Center, and others.

Exhibition Dates: March 6 - April 16, 2009

Image: "Hearts and Mines" - ceramic sculpture by Marjorie Woodruff

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Hosted by Nina Corwin, this special reading will feature a select group of writers who have had a collection of work published in the past year.

These include Alice George, This Must Be the Place (Mayapple Press), Parneshia Jones, co- editor of Women. Period. (Spinster Ink Books) w/Julia Watts, Jo Ruby and Elizabeth Slade, Jesse Lee Kercheval, Cinema Muto (Southern Illinois University Press, 2009) Kristy Odelius, Strange Trades (Shearsman Books), Elise Paschen, Bestiary (Red Hen Press), Kathleen Rooney, Live Nude Girl: My Life as an Object (Arkansas, 2009) and Oneiromance (an epithalamion) (Switchback Books, 2008).

The reading takes place on March 15, 2009 from 2 to 4 p.m at Woman Made Gallery, 685 N. Milwaukee Ave., Chicago, IL 60642. The event is free to the public, and refreshments will be served.

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About Woman Made Gallery

Woman Made Gallery is a tax-exempt, not-for-profit organization founded in 1992. Its goal is to support women in the arts by providing opportunities, awareness, and advocacy. It specifically accomplishes this through monthly thematic exhibitions which raise public awareness and recognition of women's cultural contributions.

Woman Made Gallery is supported in part by grants from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency; a CityArts Program II grant from the City of Chicago, Department of Cultural Affairs; the Arts Work Fund for Organizational Development, a donor-advised fund of the Chicago Community Foundation; the Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Foundation; Foundation; the Efroymson Fund, a CICF Fund; a major anonymous donor; and the generosity of its members and contributors.