OUR MISSION
Invisible Republic is a national nonprofit arts organization dedicated to strengthening arts education and visual literacy through book publications and exhibitions, using a mix of print and digital media to help bring underrepresented voices to the fore.
WHAT’S IN A NAME?
Greil Marcus’s first major work was originally called Invisible Republic, a metaphor he used to describe Bob Dylan after his Don’t Look Back tour, when he left Greenwich Village and moved to Woodstock, New York, to get away from the pop star hoopla and “voice of a generation” banter he was saddled with. He ended up collaborating with The Band in his basement on the now-legendary “Basement Tapes.” One of the first serious studies of Dylan as an artist, the book was eventually reissued with the current, more apt title, The Old Weird America: The World of Bob Dylan's Basement Tapes but Invisible Republic lives on in our new nonprofit arts organization.
STAFF
FOUNDER & CREATIVE DIRECTOR
J.C. Gabel began his career in publishing at the age of 19. In the mid-’90s, he handmade the first issue of Stop Smiling,“The Magazine for High-Minded Lowlifes” and developed it into a full-color glossy featuring timeless themes, original stories, and interviews you couldn’t read anywhere else. It grew for 15 years before transitioning into books.
In 2012, Gabel moved from Chicago to Los Angeles to work on two large book projects for Chronicle and Taschen. A couple of years later, Pitchfork commissioned him to create The Pitchfork Review, a print quarterly. The following year, he founded Hat & Beard Press with the intention of finding a more artist-friendly way of producing and selling books in the 21st Century.
Previously, Gabel was a contributor to the Wall Street Journal, Playboy, Bookforum, The Paris Review, LA Times, New York Times, and Wallpaper.
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Michael Guarrine has been singing in avant-rock bands since the age of 17 and has been playing stages and releasing records all over the world ever since. He has been the front person for Assembly Line People Program, Watchers, and for his current band. Guarrine has toured with Blur and James Chance (The Contortions) to name a couple. Michael has garnered press from The FADER, XLR8R, Pitchfork, and the Chicago Reader.
Not just passionate for the stage, Michael simultaneously blazed a trail in social service. He began his career in 1999 working with underserved communities throughout the Chicagoland area in the arena of child care. In 2013, he received his Masters in Community Leadership Development from DePaul University, and built a nationally recognized preventive health program for Latinx families at Erie Neighborhood House. Most recently he found himself at a much larger CBO, Chicago Commons, working with primarily black and brown communities leading a team assisting parents to receive affordable child care in the Back of the Yards, Pilsen, and West Humboldt Park neighborhoods of Chicago.
FOUNDING BOARD OF DIRECTORS
LOS ANGELES
Hamza Walker
Director of nonprofit arts organization LAXART, former curator at The Renaissance Society, professor at SAIC, curator and art historian.
Liza Dodson
Twenty-five years Film & Television Production experience at Warner Bros Studios.
Operations Manager for Warner Media Film Group. Southern Culture Documentarian.
Visual artist, composer, bassist (Dengue Fever, The Ecstasy of Gold, Radar Bros.), author, poet.
CHICAGO
Damon Locks
Fine artist, musician, band leader, graphic novelist, poet.
Fred Sasaki
Art Director at Poetry Magazine, writer, editor, curator.
NEW YORK
Lawrence Lui
Electronic musician, music executive, founder of Bampire Music, Recording Academy Governor, former Sr. Marketing Director at Island & Capitol Records.