Chicago, Illinois - Woman Made Gallery is pleased to announce the opening of "Interactive," a group show juried by Karen Hanmer, and solo shows by Sage Dawson and Kong Xin Shi (SLim.) The Artisan Gallery continues "Physicality: Body, Shape and Form" with fine craft work by nine women.

Please join us at the artist reception on Friday, June 19, from 6 to 9 p.m., at 685 N. Milwaukee Avenue in Chicago. Works will be on display until July 23, 2009.

In addition to group and solo exhibitions, Woman Made presents a poetry readings hosted by Nina Corwin on Sunday, July 12, 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.

Karen Hanmer is a Chicago book and installation artist whose intimate, playful works fragment and layer text and image to intertwine memory, cultural history, and the history of science. Her work weds the ancient act of book binding with the high-tech use of the computer to aid her process.

The exhibition includes work by Alex Appella, Alli Berman, Zawi Borsa, Lucy Childs, Margaret Coleman, Jenny Craig, Paula Curran, Jennifer Drinkwater, Wendy Fernstrum, Susan Finsen and Jane Bortnick Griffith, Dianna Huxhold, Peggy Johnston, Laurie LeBreton, Jacqueline May, Amanda Meeks, Rachel Melis, Rachel Merrill, Cathryn Miller, Elena Neidig, Catherine Blackwell Pena, Alyson Provax, I. Carmen Quintana, Gabriela Salazar, Barbara Schneider, Catherine Schwalbe-Bouzide, June Sekiguchi, Shawn Simmons, Leslie Haines and Britt Stadig, Jen Thomas, Nikki Thompson, Kathy Weaver, Ashlee Weitlauf, and Jessica Witte.

The Artist Reception is on June 19 from 6 to 9 p.m., and works will be up through July 23, 2009.

Images: (top to bottom) Artworks by Paula Curran and and Catherine Blackwell Pena

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Exhibition Dates: June 19 - July 23, 2009

Image: Artwork by Sage Dawson

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Kong Xin Shi's sculptures and paintings portray organic forms to convey qualities that all beings share. "All organic forms are beings, and all organic forms contain beings. Leaves become noses and noses become figures prostrating in prayer. Leaves breathe. Noses breathe. And in prayer we all breathe the same air, walk the same earth, and drink the same water. All beings have consciousness. All beings have an equal opportunity to interact within themselves and find self-realization. In this way all beings are interrelated."

"I wanted to become a physician but instead became a "patient" in a Buddhist monastery and a student at Malaysian Buddhist Institute, Penang, Malaysia for over a decade. After ordaining as a Buddhist nun, I came to Chicago in 2000 and have been serving and teaching from birth to death in several Asian and American Buddhist organizations and the community at large while earning a B.A. degree in art and psychology at Northeastern Illinois University."

Exhibition Dates: June 19 - July 23, 2009

Installation by Kong Xin Shi (SLim)

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The Artisan Gallery exhibition "Physicality" was curated by Margaret Denny, a Ph.D. Candidate at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She teaches at both Columbia College and the University of Illinois at Chicago. Denny is a former Terra Foundation fellow and has worked at the Art Institute of Chicago and the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum.

Linda Brant, Sue Canizares, Annie Duffy, Rhonda Gushee, Laura C. Hewitt, Deborah Kruger, Carmen M. Perez, Roberta Polfus, Kelly Rush.

Exhibition Dates: May 1 - July 23, 2009

Image: Artwork by Roberta Polfus

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Join curator Nina Corwin and a group of fabulous writers for this special reading during the "Interactive" group exhibition, on display from June 19 to July 23, 2009.

For this event, writers work and/or performance will involve interaction with other writers, performers, art forms, media, maybe even with the audience. Participants in the event include Simone Muench and Philip Jenks, collaboratively written poetry; Mars Gamba-Adisa Caulton (working with her own music); Performance poetry duo Marty McConnell and Andi Strickland just back from their Wandering Uterus tour; Jen Karmin of Red Rover with a multi- voiced sound performance; and curator Nina Corwin in collaboration with Janice Misurell-Mitchell, internationally known improvisational flautist. As a SPECIAL FEATURE (time allowing), Jen Karmin will lead a Tag Team reading (such as the one she presented at Links Hall during AWP) in which audience members will be invited to participate with their own poetry.

The reading takes place on July 12, 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.