Holly Holmes and Tom Burtonwood‘s domestic gallery space project, What It Is, provides a nice and homey retreat for contemporary art in Oak Park. Their last show featured the work of Michelle Welzen Collazo Anderson, a Chicago native and painter who presented bright textile pattern work inspired by a pair of Blum Jerro shoes, and Bernard Williams, who displayed a monstrous hammer in the home’s back yard and smaller sculptures indoors built from the hammer’s scraps and discards. These reassessed accidents, monochrome, heavily material and chaotic, opposed and balanced the feminine and colorful references of Collazo Anderson’s paintings, full of purpose and design. A very nice pairing of artists and a good space to check out in the future.

Bernard Williams, Sharkhammer

Michelle Welzen Collazo Anderson and Bernard Williams

Michelle Welzen Collazo Anderson and Bernard Williams

Michelle Welzen Collazo Anderson, Blum Jerro Series 2

Michelle Welzen Collazo Anderson & Bernard Williams opened Saturday, December 5th and ran through December 20th @ What It Is, 1155 Lyman Ave. in Oak Park.