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Public Performances

intimate performances in creating the impossible 

Thank you for a command performance.

- Kerry James Marshall

Selected Museum & Gallery Performances

 

2017, 2016, 2013 – Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Chicago, IL

2017, 2016 – Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, AL

2017 – International Museum of Surgical Science, Chicago, IL

2017 – MANA Contemporary Chicago, Chicago, IL

2017, 2010 – Mayslake Peabody Estate, Oak Brook, IL

2016 – Chicago Loop Alliance, Chicago, IL

2016, 2015 – Pleasant Home Museum, Oak Park, IL

2012 – Chicago History Museum, Chicago, IL

2010 – Elmhurst Historical Museum, Elmhurst, IL

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Selected Speaking Engagements, Conferences & Universities

 

– Chicago Ideas Week, Chicago, IL

– Cusp Conference, Chicago, IL

– Magic and Medicine Course - Northwestern University, Chicago, IL

– Theory & Art of Magic Conference, Muhlenberg College, Allentown, PA

– International Brotherhood of Magicians Convention, Louisville, KY

– College of DuPage, Glen Ellyn, IL– Women In Magic Conference, Las Vegas, NV

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Fellowships and Grants

 

2017 – The Institute for Art and Olfaction, Los Angeles, CA

2017, 2016 – The City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and 

           Special Events (DCASE) Individual Artist Grant

2016 – High Concept Labs - Sponsored Artist, Chicago, IL

2015 – Awesome Chicago Foundation - Chicago Chapter

2014 – Escape to Create Artist-in-Residence Fellowship, Seaside, FL

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Selected Performer-in-Residence Positions

 

2017, 2016, 2015, 2014 – Seaside Repertory Theater, Seaside, FL

2015 – The City of Seaside, Seaside, FL

2012 – Chicago History Museum, Chicago, IL

2012, 2010 – Flight 112/Glitch Gallery, Elmhurst, IL

Roses

Invisible Roses

A site-specific work for the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago’s 50th Anniversary

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Your performance was full-blown and memorable

- Lynne Warren

  Curator, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago 

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Jeanette's graceful sleight of hand is equal parts mystifying and alarming. How something so slippery and illusory can happen within arms reach of your watchful eye is truly remarkable.

- Jason Pickleman

  Owner/Curator, Lawrence & Clark Gallery, Chicago 

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Handed a map to the performance, museum patrons unfold the paper, noting it is blank other than a simple instruction to “locate roses.” They begin a sort of scavenger hunt in the museum, with fresh sod squishing underfoot welcoming them to a display of a thousand roses…. those rose petals unlock the real, previously invisible map to the performance. During the cousre of the work, sensory illusionist and magician Jeanette Andrews leads the audience in a series of illusions, magic, experiments. The scent of wet dirt imbues audience members with magical powers, and viewers use a single piece of fabric to create the impossible… For this work, Andrews returned to the Museum of Contemporary Art with a site-specific performance exploring concepts of certainty and being hidden in plain sight. Responding to Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s fabric wrapping of the MCA’s building in 1969, Andrews’ series of mysterious installations and interactive performances serve as a celebration of the museum’s future. ©

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Photos: Michael Sullivan (On the Real Film) with additional images from Catherine Miller

Video: Justin Leyba (The Control Room)

Special Thanks to: Caryn & Mike Andrews, Ann Meisinger, January Parkos Arnall, Abraham Ritchie, Amanda Abernathy, Aubrey Ainsworth, Benjamin Barnes, Eric Andrews, Ethan Schleeter, Heather Miller, Kristen Kaniewski, Jeffrey O’Malley, Joshua Adam Rupp & Ashley Ann Rupp, Lorenzo Conte, Luciano Ristori, Molly Steere, Rick Ekelof, Will Rogers, and Central Sod Farms, Inc.

In Memory of Eugene Burger & Jason McNinch

Thresholds

Thresholds

Unlocking Illusions for the Five Senses and Beyond

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Experience one of the most unique performances ever created with interactive illusions for each of the five senses in five distinct spacial environments.

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Jeanette is killing it, empowers the audience, and uses science and art to make her mark.
PBS – WTTW Chicago, Chicago Tonight, Chloe Riley

 

Using a combination of research in philosophy, psychology, and art, Andrews drew in the crowd with her personality, but kept them there with her mind, and most importantly—by blowing their minds.
- Amanda Elliott – Windy City Cosmo

 

The show was amazing! Really fantastic and I loved how you incorporated history of perception within the story you told with the magic.
- Kristen Kaniewski, Visitor Services Manager – Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago

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The Experience

Shattering the mold of the traditional magic performance, an unforgettable evening of impossible visions, scents, tastes, feelings, and sounds awaits you.  Immersive and highly interactive, the audience embarks on a physical journey experiencing elegant magic designed for each of the five senses in five distinct environments throughout a venue. Andrews serves as a magical guide through landscapes specifically designed to awaken the mind and the senses to a state that inspires revelation and wonder.

 

One of the brightest, innovative young artists in magic/illusion today, Andrews uses philosophy, psychology and art to give audiences an unforgettable evening beyond the normal. Playing against the inherent stereotype of magic shows, the entire audience collaborates to create the performance by making crucial decisions and possessing seemingly impossible knowledge. These mass participations include such things as the audience being able to find a chosen card using the sense of touch, or making an image on their program vanish and then reappear at will. Andrews delivers a fresh and elegant performance totally unlike anything ever done in magic before.

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Andrews is the only magician in the world known to have been named to an artist-in-residence position, with the genesis of Thresholds being created during her residency. The work debuted in April 2015 to a sold-out, extended run, and this critically acclaimed show is currently touring the United States to sold-out performances. Having received national and international press including the Chicago Tribune and Magic Magazine, Thresholds uses the unique components of life to create an unforgettable evening that leaves you enthralled and enchanted.  Watch as an audience member’s thought-of scent becomes a reality, a member of the audience is able to surmise Jeanette’s thoughts, and walnuts carry an unexpected surprise, as the performance progresses to a conclusion that will leave you speechless.

Bring one of the most unique, interactive performances ever created to your venue.  (Can be adapted to various venues and spaces, including a stationary version.)


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Impossible Gardens

Impossible Gardens

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Plant a garden via mysterious means...

 

It is created as each person uses seed paper cards to perform a magic illusion in their own hands without knowing how they accomplish this impossible feat.

 

In a guided interaction, the group performs a magic illusion in their own hands, using the seed paper cards (instead of traditional playing cards). At the onset, each person chooses a seed card that is unique to them. Following a set of verbal instructions, the group then shuffles the cards together and makes decisions to eliminate some, tossing them into the air one by one, seed cards fluttering down to the ground. In a final moment of magic, from the remaining cards, each person is able to magically find their originally chosen seed paper card without knowing how they accomplished this incredible feat...! Each person takes their unique, chosen seed paper home as a remembrance of the experience, and also receives a small pot of soil in which to plant these seeds. The participants also plant fallen seed papers in the community plot, and This Impossible Garden can now begin to take root. Participants join together to care for this evolving communal garden, with the amazing nature of seeds as the focus, a beautiful reminder of how seeds connect us. An impossible garden, made possible…

Projects

Projects

Images from:

Chicago Ideas Week

Institute for Art and Olfaction 

Birmingham Museum of Art (two sets of site-specific works) 

High Concept Laboratories

Seaside REP Theater

Chicago Loop Alliance 

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