ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the specific accomplishments and limitations of Mess Hall (MH), an experimental cultural center I co-founded with seven others in a Chicago storefront in 2003. MH is a globally networked, locally rooted space sustained by an economy of generosity and conviviality. occupying a rent-free 680-foot storefront in the far north-side neighborhood of Rogers Park, MH functions as a non-economic space for exchanging ideas and skills, eating with others, developing projects, and celebrating interests with strangers. It offers a free way to socialize in a dense urban setting without being a consumer, an opportunity to build social relations that are at once rare and socially vital. In an urban development and neoliberal policy paradigm that fails to foster communal exchange or engagement that is not pay-to-play, MH makes a particularly poignant incision as a de-commodified storefront in a commoditized landscape. As a possibility space fostering creative engagement with the world in which we live and act, I will argue that the MH example stands to expand the discourse on creativity and the city.
