Someoddpilot and Andrew Rafacz have partnered to present Public Works, a rare late-summer exhibition of new and retrospective work that endeavors to map the ever-narrowing space between fine art and commercial design.

A reception for the artists will take place on Friday, July 31st, from 6 to 9 p.m. The exhibition continues through August 29th, 2009.

Public Works is a group show that features four artists who’ve spent years in Chicago working within the independent art and music communities: Cody Hudson of Struggle, Inc., Justin Fines of Demo, Andy Mueller from Ohio Girl / The Quiet Life, and Chris Eichenseer of Someoddpilot. Longtime friends, the four men have parlayed their streetlevel art styles into careers as internationally recognized graphic designers.

The new pieces presented in Public Works are wholly representative of the dual-influences of fine and commercial art in the artists’ lives, the gallery covered in an egalitarian display of screenprints, a digital pastiche of color blocks, Greco Roman statues, sardonic portrait photography and Dungeons and Dragons references. Accompanying the new work is a wall thick with retrospective rock posters, album covers and street images that bump and overlap, a physical manifestation of the artists’ intertwined pasts and common futures.

A speaker series, co-sponsored by AIGA Chicago will also accompany this show beginning on August 6.