One day a few years ago police officer Daniel Godsel was browsing at a bookstore while his partner looked for a Christmas present. “While she was off shopping,” Godsel says, “I picked up a book on an artist. There was this guy in a suit next to me, and he’s staring at me and I’m ignoring him. I’m reading this book and he says, “Oh, are you interested in art?’ I said, “Yeah.’ And he said, “Well, that’s a refreshing thing to see, a cop reading.’ I was very offended by that–to think that because I’m a cop I’m illiterate. Not only was I reading a book but reading a book on art, of all things.”
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When the 26-year-old officer, who’s been with the Chicago Police Department for about four years, isn’t working as a member of a tactical gang team on the west side, he’s busy painting and working on his BFA at the School of the Art Institute. He and 12 other Chicago police officers will be showing their work during March in the Fine Arts Building Gallery exhibit “Off Beat: Art From the Heart”–many, like Godsel, for the first time publicly. The exhibit was the idea of painter Chris Basick, who saw an officer shopping for art supplies last year and asked, “Are there more of you? Are there more police officers who make art?” Says Basick, “That’s not an image I would expect–seeing a police officer looking at brushes.”
At the School of the Art Institute Godsel usually doesn’t tell the other art students what he does for a living. “I’m sort of guarded,” he says, “because sometimes there’s a stigma. But that might be a preconception of mine.” When it does come out that he’s a police officer, he says, “some of them are very interested and others leave it at “Oh.”‘ It’s a different story when his fellow officers find out he’s a painter. “At first they’re shocked. But some of them are fascinated and ask a million questions. They’re very open-minded about it, from my bosses right down to my partner.”
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/Nathan Mandell.
