Weatherproof: A Hidden Oasis of Art in Chicago

Author: The Auction Collective

Published: 18 Apr 2024

Interview with Weatherproof Directors Milo Christie and Sam Dybeck

The Auction Collective is excited to be hosting contemporary art gallery Weatherproof’s two year anniversary benefit auction, featuring works from more than thirty artists and community members. Works are currently on view at Weatherproof gallery and are available for auction until 13th May - bid here.

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Weatherproof Directors Milo Christie (Left) and Sam Dybeck (Right); Photography by Sam Dybeck

Founded in 2022, Weatherproof is a contemporary art gallery/curatorial umbrella, with an office space in Chicago's Albany Park neighbourhood, and a vitrine in Chicago's Logan Square neighbourhood. Started by Milo Christie, who now co-directs with Sam Dybeck, the gallery's program focuses on allowing artists opportunities to present ambitious and challenging work in a site-responsive and collaborative manner.

We sat down with Weatherproof’s two directors to find out more about this unique gallery space, their curatorial projects, and how they started off in the art world.

Tell me about the origins of Weatherproof

Weatherproof began as a curatorial project in May of 2022, in a strange hole on the exterior of a Chicago coach house building. In July of 2022 Weatherproof acquired an exhibition space within a building in Chicago’s Albany Park neighborhood. Sam and Milo have partnered to operate the project collaboratively since January of 2024 following working together at an existing artist-run exhibition space.

MC: Just speaking for myself, I had no idea what I was doing, and that was okay. Because of that, everyone should do this.

Image Credits: Photo is of the hole (vitrine), with work from Christopher Gambino installed. Photography Credit: Milo Christie

What are the gallery's curatorial inspirations?

The curatorial projects that we are inspired by include Prairie, Blade Study, M23, Bad Water, M. Leblanc, New Low, ASHES/ASHES, Gern en Regalia, Veronica, Espace Maurice, Mery Gates, Switch-Hook Projects, Chris Andrews, As it Stands, As Is, The Fulcrum, Timeshare, Sulk, Quarters Gallery, Fanta-MLN, 15 Orient, 52 Walker, SIMIAN, Emalin, (this list will never end), Apparatus Projects, Bodenrader, Silke Lindner, Nightclub, april april, CA53776V2.gallery, Final Hot Desert, to barely scratch the surface of the spaces whose program we follow and talk about and get excited about.

Our curatorial inspirations are our artists, because the point when we feel most excited about doing what we do is while talking to them about their practices and what the hell is going on everywhere.

Image Credit: Gallery Installation of 'a little, left over' by Garrett Lockhart and Jessica Zawadowicz. Photography Credit: Milo Christie

How did you get into curation?

MC: By an incredible desire for attention, I think, or maybe earlier something else. The back of ‘the hole’ is inaccessible and mostly wiring and ductwork. When I was in secondary school one of my professors told me about a very short but hidden set of tunnels underneath the art department building. It didn’t lead anywhere, but was a nice place nonetheless. A couple of months later, I organized a screening of Francis Ford Coppola’s Rumble Fish where viewers entered the room through the half-basement window down a fire escape; the main door to the space was locked from the outside. In this way, I have always been organizing dead-end projects.

Sam and I had the luck to work at LVL3 at the same time, with more agency than we both initially expected, and be able to try things under the veil of a more established and less precarious space.

SD: On accident. When I moved to Chicago in 2020 I didn’t have many connections and I wanted to be involved with Art organizing. I began volunteering at a gallery called LVL3 where I began working on exhibition programming. Somehow three years went by and it became increasingly apparent that presenting exhibitions was a fulfilling experience.

Photography Credits: Sam Dybeck

What is the biggest challenge facing the art world today?

MC: Rampant financial exploitation of painting as the trophy media. Canva.

SD: The MFA industrial complex.

Image Credits : Gallery installation of 'White Pill / Excellent Form' with Connor McNicholas, Talulah R.M., Brandon Bandy, Jon Lewis Fiona, and Nicole Ji Soo Kim. Photography Credit: Milo Christie.

Art related or not, where is your favourite place and what makes it so special?

In lieu of giving only one favourite place, we’d like to give recommendations for other things to do in the Albany Park neighbourhood of Chicago, where our main space is located:

Kabobi

Lawrence Fish Market

Village Discount on Lawrence

Village Discount on Kedzie

What upcoming projects or exhibitions are you most excited about this year?

This year we are happy to be participating in BARELY FAIR 2024 in Chicago, presenting work from Chicago-based artist Luca Klauba. In our less immediate future, we’ll be presenting work from Yan Wen Chang and Andrew Harding (both Toronto), and a group show curated by Andrew Rutherdale (Montréal), both of which will be incredible.

SD: Summer Blockbusters

MC: I hope so.