29.02.2025
Elena Ailes
Hope is a thing
with feathers,
again (2025)
By bye Avondale 2025, Installation view ILG Factory,
60641 Chicago, Photo: Jonas Müller-Ahlheim,
Artists: (Foreground) Elena Ailes, (Background) Shir Ende
by bye is a collaborative and opportunistic art practice that repurposes soon-to-be-gone spaces in Chicago into temporary sites for artistic explorations.
1.) The project views itself as a new form of artistic labor; it is a production project. It aims to present artistic work, help realize ideas, and enable artistic manifestations. Opening up spaces.
Unlike other major capital cities in the U.S., Chicago presents unique artistic and spatial opportunities to eschew the conventional gallery model. Comparable to initiatives such as The Kitchen in New York or the HKW in Berlin, which emerged during periods of spatial availability, the city of Chicago finds itself in a transitional moment—between the forces of gentrification, the remnants of a vanished industrial era, and a vibrant, local art scene.
2.)The architectural space which the project temporarily occupies is a meeting place for people.
Through these prototypical interventions and exhibitions, by bye critically engages with the spatial and social conditions of these environments as well as the entanglement of art and architecture.
3.)The project is dependent on hints from the public for future locations: contact@bybye.net
ILG Factory: by bye Avondale PDF Download
by bye avondale opens up the vanished, industrial spaces of the historic ilg factory on pulaski rd during their transition from artist spaces to life storage units.
Originally designed by chicago architect alfred alschuler in 1906, the former ventilation factory faces extensive remodeling after housing artists for the past decade. "Wary of tales that naturalize displacement, this moment invites the question: how do intervals of artistic reprieve and labor prelude, not only intervene in, storage unit monoculture?"
Artists:
Noelle Africa
Tauba Auerbach
Kaya & Blank
Camille Casemier
Matthew Girson
Philipp Groth
Gordon Hall
Gary LaPointe
Makayla Lindsay
Matthew Metzger
Jonas Müller-Ahlheim
Steph Patsula
Josue Pillot
Richard Rezac
Cameron Spratley
Aleksandra Walaszek
Ruby Que
Xu Yue
Elena Ailes
Janine Antoni
Gin Bahc
Elizabeth Cote
Pia Dobrowitz
Lindsey Dorr-Niro
Shir Ende
Max Guy
Anas Kahal
Michael Madrigali
Neiva Mulhern
Jeff Prokash
David Sprecher
Fondation Tschuess
Kezia Waters
Olivier
By bye Avondale 2025, Photo: Jonas Müller-Ahlheim, Artist/Artwork: Elena Ailes/hope is a thing with feathers, again
Cermak Center: by bye Pilsen PDF Download
by bye Pilsen marks the farewell of Chicago’s Cermak Center, a former Ford plant pre-dating the modern assembly-line of Detroit and Chicago area factories. Having served as an artist space for the last 20 years, the warehouse in the Pilsen neighborhood is now slated for remodeling, allowing for a careful repurposing of its broached industrial floors.
By bye Pilsen 2024, Detail view of Two works for by bye Pilsen by Matthew Metzger, Photo: Jonas Müller-Ahlheim
By bye Pilsen 2024, Installation view Cermak Center,
60616 Chicago, Photo: Jonas Müller-Ahlheim,
Artists: (Foreground) Matthew Metzger, (Background) Cameron Spratley