Tall, with wide, darting eyes and graying hair grazing his broad shoulders, Matthias Regan strikes an imposing figure, standing alone in an unadorned exhibit space on a secluded street. He wears faded jeans and a loose-fitting T-shirt across which he has silk-screened the phrase, "Obedience doesn't relieve pain." Matthias Regan, 39, is not your typical curator. But then, with its piles of political pamphlets, sporadic hours of operation and disdain for traditional economic systems, Mess Hall isn't your typical gallery space, either.
Located on Glenwood Avenue in Chicago's Northside neighborhood of Rogers Park, Mess Hall, described by its founders as an "experimental cultural center," is bordered by block after block of empty store fronts. Mess Hall, however, has been thriving for nearly five years, even as a prolonged recession robs other galleries of a steady source of income. So what's Mess Hall's secret to success? Simple: It never had any income in the first place.
Mess Hall occupies a rent-free space offered to the collective by landlord Alan Goldberg, who says he initially saw Mess Hall as an opportunity to "prime the pump" for the arts district in Glenwood. Founded by the three-man artist collective Temporary Services, Mess Hall soon expanded to include five other keyholders, most with backgrounds in arts and visual media. "We all had the time, energy and inclination," founding keyholder Dan Wang explains of Mess Hall's singular origins. "Groups of people don't always have that sort of convergence."
Mess Hall facilitates a diverse array of exhibits and events, from sewing circles to poetry workshops to lectures on the history of underground punk movements.
At Mess Hall, economic freedom translates to cultural freedom. By keeping the space open to the public without any economic barriers, Mess Hall aims to serve as a place where culture is generated, explains keyholder Justin Goh, 33. "Non-social interaction like TV just reflects culture instead of generating new content - it's shooting culture back to you and saying, 'Be entertained.' A group of people, though, generates culture, which shapes and changes you in ways that watching TV and playing video games doesn't do" he said.
Mess Hall proclaims the avoidance of monetary transactions as one of its core tenets. "You're surfing on surplus, doing things for free," explains Regan, one of 10 "keyholders" in charge of keeping Mess Hall open and available to the Rogers Park community. The concept of an entirely free space strikes some as implausible. "People are so conditioned to paying," Regan explains. "Sometimes in the summer we'd hang things up on clothespins outside with a sign that said 'Free.' People would constantly come in and ask us, 'What do you mean by free?' "
Despite its strengths, one could plausibly walk by Mess Hall every day and never actually see it open to the public. Mess Hall's keyholders profess dedication to their cause, but most work conventional paying jobs to facilitate their involvement with Mess Hall. It's a sobering limitation of an institution that aims to perpetually "surf the surplus." "It's difficult to make time to do things here," explains Regan, who teaches poetry at the University of Chicago when he's not volunteering at Mess Hall. "I mean, we have the space. We have that part of the equation down. But now all we need is the time."
On a frigid Sunday night in early February, roughly two dozen tewntysomethings have found the time. They've packed into Mess Hall for the premiere of the Justseeds Portfolio Project: Voices from the Outside - Artists Against the Prison Industrial Complex, a collection of artwork advocating the reform of Tamms Supermax Prison in southern Illinois. Posters and petitions line the walls and dangle from the ceiling, filmed testimony from former prisoners is projected on the back wall, free beer flows and the crates of free goods usually filling Mess Hall have been temporarily relocated to the ice-slicked sidewalk (considering everything is free anyway, it doesn't seem to be a problem when objects spill out of Mess Hall, or in.) This is just one of many events hosted by Mess Hall, a space that seems to transform to suit the diverse needs of those who occupy it. "Mess Hall is super hard to define," explains artist Nicolas Lampert, a keyholder and co-sponsor of the JustSeeds Portfolio Project. "But that's what makes it so great. There's something different every night, there's no narrow agenda, and that's why so many people can claim it as their own."
This focus on making rather than reflecting culture has its limitations. Mike Wolf, 36, one of the first keyholders at Mess Hall, often saw events and exhibits fall flat in the early years. "Taking a cultural work and opening it up to a broader audience, a lot of times it was a failure. But you try it and see what happens. That's why I got into art in the first place."
Keyholder Goh agrees. "I think we're so accustomed to being afraid," he explains. "There's a tendency to ask, 'Tell me how to do it,' instead of just doing it. You're asking people, 'Teach me, tell me,' worrying about what they will do to stop you. Now, that attitude is wrong in the first place. You have to see the possibilities, not the pitfalls."
Mess Hall is located at 6932 N. Glenwood Ave.
Celebrate Mess Hall's fifth anniversary at a party at the center Sunday at 7 p.m.
Kate Albing is the Assistant Diversions Editor.
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