Visual Arts

Now Showing in the Harris Gallery

Eric Futran: Opening Reception at Open House Friday
featuring live music by the Independence Park Marauders
Friday, May 4th, 2012, 7:00 - 9:00 PM
Harris Gallery, 4544 N. Lincoln Ave.; Exhibit runs April 7th - July 5th, 2012; For 76 years, the Galax, Virginia Lodge No. 733 of the Loyal Order of Moose has sponsored what has become the world's oldest and largest fiddlers' convention.; Fiddlers, mandolin pickers, banjo players, singers, guitarists, autoharpists, dulcimer strummers, and flatfoot dancers from around the Appalachians (and around the world) gather for a week in August in a friendly competition and a never-ending series of jam sessions. Unlike many summer music festivals, great and small, this is an amateur undertaking. Participants pay a fee (which is refunded after their performances) and they give it their best shot. The first place fiddler wins $185; the winning bluegrass band gets 775 bucks to split.; This undertaking is all about the love of the music and the effort to keep the art form vibrant. Jam sessions routinely include both pre-teens and octogenarians. Imagine the sessions routinely found in the nooks and crannies of the Old Town School but multiplied to a spectacular scale. The fellows at the Moose Lodge estimated the accumulated attendance in 2011 to be in the vicinity of 30,000.; I've attended two of these events and my first inclination has always been to pick up an instrument and participate. But as an already active picker, I instead tried to use my role as a photographer to visually interpret the internal flow of the music, and how it transforms the people who are experiencing it.; The landscape of western Virginia is spectacular in its quiet, rolling beauty. The cascading notes of the five-string banjo and the modal moan of a well-bowed fiddle bend around it and fit like a comfortable glove. I recommend the experience highly.; Eric Futran is a life-long Chicago resident. He has been self -employed as a photographer since 1974. Although he is well known for his culinary and food shooting, he has taken pictures of just about anything, at one time or another. Since resuming music lessons at the Old Town School of Folk Music about five years ago, he has predictably begun turning his lens on musical subjects. His work is published regularly in The Reader, and he has completed several stories for the very fancy publication, Fretboard Journal. His previous show at the Old Town School was Melodies From the Heart, photos of Mexican musicians and luthiers.; He may, in fact, be the best part-time left-handed blues bouzouki player in the 32nd ward of Chicago.; Eric Futran Online

Gallery Information

The Old Town School's Lincoln Avenue location features rotating exhibits of visual art in the Harris Gallery, which is in the main hall of the second floor.

The Harris Gallery is available for viewing during open school hours: Monday - Thursday 9:00 AM - 10:00 PM and Friday - Sunday 9:00 AM - 5:00 PM