The festival season kicks off with Versionfest 2010 tonight and this weekend, an eleven day continuum of art and music which will have many more events and sub-events than I can feature here. I’d check out the itinerary at their website (the calendar at the top of the page) for the details, and show up at the opening party on Friday too. To plug myself: If you’re down on Sunday for the NFO XPO @ Benton House, I’ll be taking part in a round-table discussion about art criticism and art writing with a number of other artists/art-writers/bloggers, etc.

Anyway, here are my picks for this week. Check out more here and here.

Claire Pentecost @ threewalls

Photography professor and ambitious project artist Claire Pentecost hooks up with threewalls to present VictoryLand (you, I shall answer your letter), an exhibition of many-media work about good and evil and life and death. Opens this Friday, April 23rd from 6-9PM @ threewalls, 119 N Peoria St, 2D.

Stacie Johnson & Alexis Mackenzie @ ebersmoore

This month Chicago brings Stacie Johnson left from New York and Alexis Mackenzie right from LA, the pair meeting in between for a double solo show at ebersmoore. Mackenzie’s collages and Johnson’s painted still lifes should look pretty great together, but find out for yourself at the opening on Friday, April 23rd from 6-10PM @ ebersmoore, 213 N Morgan St.

Earthworks @ Museum of Contemporary Art

Earthy artworks make for good museum shows and coffee table books. Earthworks at the Museum of Contemporary Art promises both, with installations and recreations from Robert Smithson, Mary Brogger, and Sam Durant opening on the third floor and the books in the gift shop. The exhibition kicks off this Saturday, April 24th @ the Museum of Contemporary Art, 220 E Chicago Ave.

Transitions and Translations @ Concertina Gallery

Curator Joe Iverson brings together the visual accompaniments from seven Visual Critical Studies grad students’ written theses in Transitions and Translations at Concertina Gallery. This might take the heady cake for this weekend, but I’m certainly interested in seeing what this show looks like. Artists include Amanda Brinkman, Maureen A. Burns, Joel Kuennen, Susan Morelock, Benjamin Pearson, Brian Wallace, and Jorge Mujica, and the opening is this Saturday, April 24th from 7-10PM @ Concertina Gallery, 2351 N Milwaukee Ave, 2nd floor.

Bitches Ain’t Shit @ Johalla Projects

Bitches Ain’t Shit is an exhibition of nine undergrad female students’ work curated by Jes Ashley Santrock. Billed as not a feminist show, Santrock is more interested in the female subtleties and creative processes of young women photographers. Artists involved include: Kate Brock, Kimberly Kim, Megan Noe, Sarah Q., Laurie Reese, Jess Sikon, Krystal Thompson and Maria Ulric. Opens Saturday, April 24th from 7-11PM @ Johalla Projects, 1561 N Milwaukee.

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