Chicago (art magazine)

Chicago, Times, Plotter, Helvetica, DIN, Techno, Löhfelm, RR_02, Univers, Tiffany, Circuit and Memphis are the 12 issues of the Chicago magazine founded in 2002 in Vienna by a group of Austrian, German and Swiss artists: Christian Egger, Manuel Gorkiewicz, Christian Mayer, Yves Mettler, Magda Tothova, Ruth Weismann, Alexander Wolff.

With 2 to 3 issues a year, the members of the team publish their magazine around their personal encounters and interests.

Each issue presents around fifteen contributions, in both texts and images. Artists, writers, scientists and specialists in all kind of fields are invited to contribute and intervene within the framework of a dicreet and pragmatical layout, which has already been acknowledged by the London Design Museum in its exhibition Best European Design 2005.

The focus of the redactional activity is in the organisation and assembling of the contributions, including their own material like interviews, found footages or critiques, in order to create for each issue a strong and original unity. This is especially stressed by the use of a different font for each issue which gives it its title. The 300 black and white prints are completed with a color centerfold poster by an internationally recognized artist (Elke Krystufek, Daniel Pflumm, Ayse Erkmen, Amelie von Wulffen, Renée Green, etc...).

Apart from the publishing work, the team organizes for most issues release parties in diverse and curious locations such as panoramic bars, wax museum, art project spaces, other magazine's redactional spaces etc... sometimes in combination with an artists performance or exhibition, e.g. Gregor Hildebrandt exhibition/ Künstlerhaus Passagengalerie Wien; Sven Åke Johansson performance/ Büro Friedrich, Berlin; Max Krefeld concert/ Basso Berlin.

Broadening its network, the magazine gets invited to show in art spaces to which the team responds contextually: multiple author wallpainting for a magazine fair, a show about Performance at Flaca in London, curated groupshow/concert event in Circuit, Lausanne, brunch lectures in galleries, etc...