• Someone has forgotten a birthday until this very moment — and they were supposed to be at the celebration 30 minutes ago.
• A couple believes they have commissioned a piece of artwork for the dining room, they think it will be ready before Thanksgiving dinner, but neither of them spoke with the artist.
• There is an art opening planned and publicized, but no art arrives to open.

I am happy to report that at this point in my career these are not typically my emergencies, rather I have advanced to become the solution to said emergencies. So I might not have “solve blindness” on my to-do list like my friend Christina (who, btw, should get a huge whopping bonus if she gets to mark that one off!), but I am quite capable and equipped to render art related triage.

The result of the latest triage is a show I would be happy to have hanging anywhere (even with more than 12 hours notice), but especially since it will be in my own Columbus Park neighborhood. If you haven’t seen my previous body of work, “Collective Memories”, or you would like to revisit it, please swing by this Friday, May 18th to Columbus Park’s hottest new dinner spot, Pandolfi’s Deli.

Collective Memories

by Chris Dahlquist

Pandolfi’s

538 Campbell

Kansas City, MO 64106

Have an art emergency or want to learn more about the Collective Memories show please contact me.

Have you had a art emergency? Oh, and have you read Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern? I finished it yesterday and it makes me want to revisit these images and treat them in a different way! The first line of the description seems to fit with my week quiet well:

“The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not.”

MIle Marker 230, 23″ x 35″

To add this or another piece to your collection please contact me.

Something like this:

Preparing for shows

or this:

loads of artwork

And you can probably imagine what the days after a typical show look like.

lots of miles

But one of the glorious things about doing a hometown show is that the days immediately following (which we call the “show hangover”) look something like this:

Great meals

a clean desk

a good book and a comfy hammock

and the muses

But as of today I am back in the studio, the desk will be messy soon enough, and the muses will have to tough it out on their own. So if you need me you know where I will be.

Mile Marker 280, 35″ x 51″

To check the availability of this or similar pieces please contact me.

I have never been prouder to live in Kansas City, our city is filled with creativity and those that support it!

From the painter that creates in their dining room on Sunday afternoons to the new Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts, Kansas City supports the arts and it is becoming not only local but national news. But for artists that participate in art festivals this comes as no surprise. Kansas City is host to two of the highest ranked juried art festivals in the country (based on sales and attendance), the Brookside Art Annual and the Plaza Art Fair. And I am thrilled to be participating in both of these spectacular shows. Thank goodness I’m not superstitious — it will be my 13th year in each!

So while the art community continues to grow, and get press in the New York Times, and the New York Post, Frommer’s names Kansas City one of top destinations for 2012 (the only US city to make the list). Even our “rival cities” along I-70, Saint Louis and Denver declare, “Score one for Kansas City,” and “Kansas City is a cultured place.”.

Remember the smallest of the creative businesses–

The individual artists that have long been bringing great art to the streets of Kansas City and come visit us at the Brookside Art Annual.

Brookside Art Annual

May 4–6 2012

Art Fair Hours:
Friday, May 4, 5pm-9pm
Saturday, May 5, 10am-9pm
Sunday, May 6, 11am-5pm

While in Brookside visiting the art festival be sure to visit the other small locally owned shops that make up the wonderful neighborhood. Brookside in the KC Star

Not in Kansas City? Visit my schedule to see when I will be in a town near you. Or come visit us in Kansas City for the Plaza Art Fair and see all the great things that the “Paris of the Plains” has to offer.

“The wideness of the horizon has to be inside us, cannot be anywhere but inside us, otherwise what we speak about is geographic distances.” Ella Maillart

MIle Marker 237, 23″ x 35″

Shipping department.

Ever wonder who takes care of the “shipping department” while we are away?

We have had many house sitters over our years of travel. In fact, our house sitting roster includes some of the most talented performers in Kansas City. Many have been in transition or recently back to Kansas City after a time of performances away. At times, our sitters spend almost as much time living in our house as we do — they are our invisible roommates. They are an essential part of our team. You get to see us and my work in Florida, Texas, Oregon etc. because they allow us to travel without concern for the furry assistants (aka shipping department) that reside with us.

Cory Imig (photo from Ink magazine)

But none have approached it in the way our current sitter does, for Cory it is a life style and an art project.

Cory Imig has foregone traditional living and an abundance of material possessions to live as a minimalist. By sharing other people’s homes with them while they are away, she gets to experience different ways of interacting with a space and different parts of the city. Her job as an artist is to question the status quo and for now that is living arrangements. And while this life-style choice certainly wouldn’t suit all, it is the perfect fit for this well organized, responsible young artist that likes to shake things up.

And in addition to being the best house sitter ever, her project is getting local attention (good thing we book our year of travel in advance!).

Read what Ink Magazine has to say about Cory here.

Follow her ongoing adventures on her blog: At Home Without a Home.

Thanks Cory! We couldn’t do it without you!

MIle Marker 266, 11″ x 14″

To add this or another piece to your collection please contact me.

It’s a lie about the driving.

Kyle and I crossed the Red River into my home state Tuesday night on our way to the Main Street Fort Worth Arts Festival. And though I haven’t lived here since I was a small child, and I often hear, “You don’t seem like a Texan” I was definitely raised as one — complete with the Texas flag flying in front of our house on holidays…in Missouri. So while I know instantly when I have crossed into the “Holy Land”, as my grandfather called Texas from the pulpit, for others it might not be so clear.

Some Signs:

• You can hear a horse whinny from your hotel room…at the Hyatt.
• There are images of barbed wire along with your room number outside your door.
• The two pair of cowboy boots tucked away in your suitcase seem inadequate.
• The glasses of iced tea are bigger than your head.
• The state flag is everywhere you look.
• You hear the words “boot” and “scootin’” used together in a sentence.
• The stars at night are big and bright.

*signs may vary — there might be a few others

Some Visual Signs:

MIle Marker 258, 16″ x 22″

If you would like to add this piece or another to your collection please contact me.