Readings, Rated
Printers’ Ball rocks the MCA 8/22
The party of the season for Chicago literary types and those who love (or read) them, The Printer’s Ball wants to take you for a whirl this Friday, Aug. 22. Over 100 literary and arts organizations will converge for Poetry’s huge arts-and-lit party at the Museum of Contemporary Art. From 5:30-10 p.m., ballgoers can talk, listen, dance, sip, and browse an astounding array of free magazines, journals, books, weeklies, and posters.
But don’t get your heart set on curling up under the Jeff Koons bunny sculpture with a nice poem…creative crosspollination is the main order of business at the Ball. Printer’s Ball pan-literary performances include, Killing Him: A Radio Play by Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai; a return of the surprise-rife Dollar Store Reading, this time with Usama Alshaibi, Quraysh Ali Lansana, Jonathan Messinger, and Julie Shapiro; and a screen-printing demonstration by poster wiz Mat Daly. Also, don’t miss the Librarians’ Boudoir, a viewing library of limited run publications, nor the Gnoetry poetry machine (writer’s block, begone!).
Music by Pure Magical Love and Stagecoach (members from Mahjongg…no waltz, surely?), will be presented by Proximity Magazine. Sets by DJs Logan Bay, Dustin Drase, and Greg Gaffud are enabled by CHIRP, Lumpen, and Venus Zine.
The Printers’ Ball is an annual celebration of print literature in Chicago, hosted by Poetry Magazine, the Museum of Contemporary Art, and Newcity. Admission is free and reserved for those 21 and over. Find the Museum of Contemporary Art at 220 E. Chicago Ave., just east of Michigan Ave. For performance times and a list of participating organizations, visit www.printersball.org.