Corbett vs. Dempsey

Ed Flood, "Constructions: Boxes & Works on Paper, 1967 - 1973"

By Lauren Viera. Published September 18, 2009

Once upon a time, amid Vietnam protests, Andy Warhol's Factory and post-modern Art For Art's Sake, there lived a group of talented, creative folks who sought out Hyde Park -- not Chelsea -- as their exhibition space of choice. They were known as the Chicago Imagists, and among them were two very different Eds: Paschke, who painted, and Flood, who crafted.

"Constructions" includes more than a dozen of Flood's signature wood-and-plexiglass boxes. They are simple enough in construction -- sheets of plexi are illustrated with acrylic paint, sealed into wooden frames and, on occasion, embellished with marbles or plastic figurines -- and the bright colors and cartoonlike imagery of their subject matter is eerily cheery, not unlike Paschke's fluorescent oil paintings of the same era.

Trouble is, when seen en masse like this, Flood's boxes become victims of their own craftsmanship. But is that so bad? Should we force ourselves to stop admiring the joints and think about what's trapped inside?

If you can get over how perfectly the works in this show would illustrate a paradise-themed pinball game, tongue-in-cheek subtleties begin to surface. Evidence (1968) puts the Chicago Police Department's crime detection laboratory on a hot case: a box of marbles. The Flaming Comet Zulu Dart Board (1968) is all blue skies, palm trees and bursts of cartoon flames, until you spy the row of toy soldiers defending on lookout near the top of the box. The later works, especially, are more abstract: less palms, more squiggles.

The show is rounded out with pre-construction sketches and prints from the same era.

Also on view is fellow Chicago Imagist Red Grooms' Tappy Toes short from 1968, for which Flood did the camera work and Paschke, Lori Gunn and others are featured.