RECOMMENDED Various, often alternative, notions of conflict are lugged together in Hyde Park’s newest installation, forming a complex geometry of social commentary. Wandering from the real—sometimes even close enough to approach being reparative—to the erotically bizarre, the works examine the greater product of violence at a base level. In her Jacquard-woven series of video stills, “Maquiladora,” artist Christine LoFaso binds the arresting facial expressions of several Guatemalan sweatshop workers to canvas with seemingly oxidized gold metallic yarn. Judith Brotman’s emphatically primal textile sculptures, “Objects for Perfect Strangers,” address schema collision more generally. Still much of the finite viewer attention in this overall exhibition is ruthlessly seized by New York curator Joshua David Riegel’s challenge to root out a unique perspective on the sparring nature of social identities. Admittedly, picking up this logical gauntlet is somewhat fun, in a LSAT practice exam, hyper-challenging video game sort of way. Yet, after passing the final level, your reward awaits at a social vantage point where self-importance compresses into something like ozone and a hearty guffaw can be heard for miles. Sorry, Mario, the princess is in another castle. (Patrick Klemz) Through January 6 at HYDE PARK ART CENTER
Lives Lost: A Site of Struggle Presents the Complexity and Complicity of Anti-Black Violence The works on view serve to memorialize the many lives lost, allowing space and resources to mourn those individuals, and to process both the dark histories of the United States as well as the bold acts of resistance. Hopefully the exhibition moves visitors beyond rage or grief or empathy into action.
The Craft of Reparations: DePaul Art Museum Connects Local and International State Violence “Remaking the Exceptional: Tea, Torture, and Reparations | Chicago to Guantánamo” at the DePaul Art Museum examines the question of reparations by tackling two cases: the well-documented tragedy of Chicago police torture and the ongoing international scandal of Guantánamo Bay.
For Us: A Review of "Something from Something" at Engage Projects Kushala Vora and Adia Sykes’ collaboration "Something from Something" tells us as viewers that knowledge, art, creation, inspiration, love—really anything you can think of—has a place of origin.
Women Behind the Lens: A Review of "From Her to Eternity" Courtney Love curates on the street. Just west of Wabash on the corner of Eighth Street, there is a wall of stellar rock star images that includes a special collection made by women photographers over the years.
