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Theaster Gates has a new project: ’’Bing’’
United States Architecture News - Feb 01, 2016 - 23:44 5936 views
Theaster Gates with employees and artists in his pottery studio, inside a converted beer warehouse in Chicago. image by Stephen Wilkes for The New York Times.
Theaster Gates has a new project: Bing. The high-powered local artist and developer will open Chicago’s first arts-focused bookstore as the newest addition to his vision for an “arts block” on the stretch of Garfield Boulevard directly west of Washington Park. Bing—the name comes from a broken bingo sign Gates found—is due to open within the next few weeks. As with last year’s opening of its next-door neighbor, Currency Exchange Café, details and specifics have not been disclosed to anyone beyond Gates’s inner circle, and no concrete opening date has been announced.
Gates attributes the inspiration for Bing to his realization that apart from museum-affiliated stores there are no bookstores in Chicago with a specialty in art books. The store is the result of a partnership between Gates and Hamza Walker, the director of education and associate curator at the Renaissance Society. Walker is leading the curatorial side of the project, locating and acquiring the art and books to be sold at the store. “The one part of this project that feels like art is this really deep collaboration with Hamza,” says Gates.....Continue Reading
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