This Saturday, the South Union Arts Center, the music and arts venue hidden within the rugged shells of an old Missionary Baptist church in the South Loop, welcomes the work of thirty artists for “Il Stato un Regalo Gradito,” which translates to “Welcome Back Gifts,” a reference to the space’s near-closing this past winter. “[South Union Arts Center] is very challenging—the walls are not nice and they’re not easy to fix,” says curator Anna Cerniglia, who’s fighting to keep the 200-year-old building open. “You have to work around a lot of things, but there are things about smaller spaces that can be as interesting as museums—they all have their own aesthetics.” Cerniglia adds that the point of this show was to bring a large group of artists and a diverse mix of media, featuring graffiti, structural art, installations and paintings, as way to announce to the community that the arts center is far from closing its doors for good. “I’m just really excited to have the people that we have,” she says. “In a way it’s like ‘Welcome back—these are the people that surround you in Chicago.’” Visit southunionarts.com for more info.
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