Nathaniel Mary Quinn. “Pool Hall,” 2017. Oil paint, paint stick, oil pastel, gouache, acrylic gold paint on canvas. 36 x 36 inches./ Courtesy Rhona Hoffman Gallery
EXPO Chicago 2018 More than ever, Chicago’s annual commercial art fair on Navy Pier shows the world what to expect from the Midwest’s artistic powerhouse. Browse over a hundred established galleries coming from as close as Detroit and as far as Johannesburg, or focus on the thirty or so extra spots reserved for emerging galleries and artists to see the freshest work. Walk along the outer walls to see what Chicago’s independent and alternative spaces like the Renaissance Society, the Chicago Artists Coalition, the Hyde Park Art Center and 6018|North have to offer. Performances, book releases, artist and scholar talks and site-specific installations keep the rigor high and the space alive.
South Side Stories For those who paid little attention to the South Side before Theaster Gates showed up, this pair of exhibitions will open eyes to the long history of collectivity and creativity alive and well in the neighborhood since before the sixties. At the University of Chicago’s Smart Museum, “The Time Is Now!” maps the networked communities of South Side cultural production, focusing on the Black Arts Movement and its affiliates. At the DuSable Museum for African American History, “The Art and Influence of Dr. Margaret T. Burroughs” considers the broad influence of the artist, writer and educator who co-founded the DuSable and helped establish the South Side Community Art Center.
Hairy Who Ever heard of ’em? Fall brings multiple tributes to the seminal artists and the larger Chicago Imagist canon. The Art Institute will focus on the original gang of six and their late-sixties exhibitions, while Elmhurst Art Museum will show figurative works curated by original member Suellen Rocca. Even the Smart’s show, noted above, will integrate the group into its tale of the South Side’s artistic community. Northwestern’s Block Museum will open an exhibition focusing on Ed Paschke’s art and teaching, fitting for the school where Paschke taught for decades. Later this season, the Museum of Contemporary Art’s “West by Midwest” exhibition will include works by Imagists who influenced West Coast styles.
Elliot Josephine Leila Reichert is a curator, critic and editor. She is the inaugural Curator of Contemporary Art at the Eskenazi Museum of Art, Indiana University. She was formerly Curatorial Fellow at the Chicago Artists Coalition, Art Editor of Newcity and Assistant Curator at the Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University.
Trust Fall: A Review of Deeper & Deeper at Roots & Culture It is in this interplay between disciplines, between science and art, between truth and fiction, psychology and neuroscience, that Balara and Gonzales suggest the mutual capacity of art to transform all those involved in receiving it.
