What is MdW?
MdW (pronounced “Midway”) is an evolving regional coalition of artist-run projects, platforms, and spaces spanning across the Midwest. MdW is an expanding initiative that takes shape as “Convenings” which connect and strengthen communities within the cultural landscape, the “Atlas” which serves as an alternative publishing platform, and “Drifts” which explore and document regional hubs of creative energy. Artist-centered in its approach, MdW is a growing ecosystem of hyperlocal art scenes from across the Midwest working together to build lasting coalitions of purposeful, artist-led action.
Convenings
The MdW Convenings are a two-part initiative that provide alternative opportunities for artist-run projects, platforms, and spaces to gather in the Midwest. Rotating on a bi-annual basis, the Assembly and Summit connect artists and audiences across geographic boundaries to generate a regional dialogue about the Midwest cultural landscape. The Convenings are a coalition-building initiative where artists and culture bearers are invited to collectively reimagine alternative models for connecting, sharing, and making outside of the “art world’s” restrictive limits. MdW’s DIY ethos is rooted in the desire to connect hyperlocal art scenes from across the Midwest to build lasting coalitions of purposeful, artist-led action.
Atlas
The MdW Atlas is an ongoing online and print publication that archives the region’s cultural landscape, featuring a wide breadth of artistic practice, creation, and community-centered initiatives in the Midwest. In addition to essays and interviews, the Atlas presents itself through photo essays, radio transmissions, poetic texts, and other media that capture the material history and day-to-day lives of artists and cultural workers. As a document, the Atlas is ever expanding, comprising of multiple editors, writers, curators, and artists spanning across geographic boundaries.
Drifts
MdW Drifts are gently curated road trips across the Midwest cultural landscape, surveying regional hubs of creative energy. Drifts offer moments of wonder, creative resistance, and mutual aid. In addition to Drifts taking place at specific dates and times, MdW has created an open-source Interactive Map for self-guided exploration. Users are invited to add their own points of interests to this living document of cultural sites, artist-run businesses, natural areas, and more.
Fellowship
Starting in 2024, the MdW Fellowship is an opportunity for artist organizers to connect their practices and programming across artist-run ecologies of the midwest. Fellows are invited to participate in Drifts, contribute to the Atlas, and join the MdW community of organizing partners. Each fellow has been invited by one of the seven MdW regional partner organizations in recognition of the valuable work they are doing in the field of artist-run culture in their regions.
To see a list of 2024 MdW fellows, click here.
History
MdW was an artist-run art fair that took place three times between 2010-2012. A partnership between threewalls, Public Media Institute, Roots & Culture, and Document, the fair hosted galleries based in Chicago and the Midwest in an alternative art fair setting. Though sometimes criticized for its avoidance of commercial art fair norms by art world critics, the fair was usually praised by Chicago’s artist community and was of vital importance to Chicago’s artist-run culture and the network of Midwestern spaces.
At the 2012 iteration of MdW, a conference took place called Hand in Glove, versions of which were later hosted in many other cities and eventually became Common Field, a national organization that convenes and supports artist-run spaces.