Cover art by Andre Guichard

By Jason Foumberg

A chronic criticism of Chicago’s art landscape is that, for a thriving urban center, its art venues and exhibitions spaces are too farflung across the city’s grid, and therefore largely inaccessible. A Chelsea-type stroll just isn’t possible in Chicago, and even if there are concentrated gallery districts in River North and the West Loop, they scarcely represent the full spectrum of the city’s visual art production. Our art scene has multiple centers with as many margins, and therefore many frontiers. Diane Grams’ new book, “Producing Local Color: Art Networks in Ethnic Chicago,” argues that Chicago’s island neighborhoods benefit from autonomous art production and consumption. The book offers three case studies—the Chicago neighborhoods of Bronzeville, Pilsen and Rogers Park—to describe how locally cultivated art scenes exist in relation to specific local issues, from real estate to crime, and to larger concerns of politics, civil rights and economic access.

A common tactic in Chicago, especially today, is the domestic gallery. In 1961, several people decided to start a “home-based museum” on the South Side and called it the Ebony Museum to represent black history in Chicago. Twelve years later they moved locations and changed the name to the DuSable Museum of African American History. This boldly innovative museum only became culturally legitimate and publicly influential, writes Grams, when the institution was relocated into the city’s parkland alongside other major cultural institutions. Read the rest of this entry »

Photo: Lauren Anderson

By Jason Foumberg

Out and about at the new gallery exhibitions this weekend, I noticed some nearly sold-out shows, with red dots signaling feverish sales, and collectors cheerily purchasing the hot commodities. As a critic I don’t usually pay attention to price lists or count the red dots, but it was hard not to notice that multi-thousand dollar artworks were being snapped up at every venue. Gallerists were glued to their phones, pumping handshakes and flashing weird smiles. There’s something exciting about all this but also something a little strange. Erik Wenzel called it “Halloween for a very specific segment of the population,” and it is indeed playfully grotesque. Read the rest of this entry »

Lowell Thompson

By Jason Foumberg

A panel discussion was assembled this past Thursday, March 26, to address a perception that artists on Chicago’s South Side are under-known and undervalued or, at worst, intentionally ignored. As a nod to Ralph Ellison’s 1952 novel “Invisible Man,” the multi-part event, which included the discussion, was titled “Invisible Artist: Creators from Chicago’s Southside,” underscoring a divide that is not merely geographic but also—and mostly—racial.

The “South Side problem” is a micro-argument of the “Chicago-problem,” or second city syndrome, an old topic recently dusted off once again at the University of Chicago for the roundtable “Chicago Artist? Is there such a thing anymore?” in January. In both cases there’s the acknowledgement of a healthy and active art scene followed by its perceived dismissal by a large and vaguely defined power-granting establishment. Unfortunately this can be distilled to the question, Why haven’t “They” made me famous yet? This is unfortunate because it assumes a passive, backseat role to one’s career, which has not been the enduring feeling of the many do-it-yourself art scenes on the South Side and in Chicago alike. In both cases artists have pushed through the various stereotypes (the South Side is violent; Chicago is provincial) to create their own artistic home.
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RECOMMENDED

Andre Guichard founded Bronzeville Gallery Guichard with hopes of inspiring the Southside community. The Third Annual Art Di Gras, a Mardi Gras-inspired celebration of art, hosts over forty artists in the three story gallery space. This year’s fête entitled “Art Gumbo” includes pieces from Guichard’s own Jazz series along with a diverse group of artists whose work largely centers on the pride of African heritage. Ade Oyelami creates bright tribal Batik on rice paper-mask prints. Karen Powell mixes old black-and-white photographs with fabric to create a balance between historic and modern. Brian Keith Thomas’ “Prelude to a Parting” is a striking oil depicting a female character whose face is the most memorable of the show. Abstract painter Jennifer Brideforth’s acrylic-on-canvas “Conflict, Interruptions” is a solid blue canvas with a thick red bar across the middle, signifying the internal struggle for peace and balance. Other standouts include Chicagoan Raymond A. Thomas, photographer Tony Smith and sibling artist collaboration Twin. (Rachel Turney)

Through September 26 at Gallery Guichard, 3521 S. King Drive, (773)373-8000.