RAREEARTH A SPEAKEASY OF SOUND AND IMAGESSEPTEMBER 22 – NOVEMBER 17, 2017Rare Earth invites the viewer to experience chancearrangements and discover new correlations between builtenvironments from around the world. Mined from RebuildFoundation’s archives, architectural and design images,film, and live performances combine into a score thatoffers a poetic imagining of the speculative city.Weekly performances Arts Incubator GalleryThursdays 301 E Garfield Blvd • Chicago, IL6:30–7:30pm arts.uchicago.edu/aplLIVE THE WRITING LIFE YOU IMAGINE Sign up for open-to-all, non-credit courses that will inspire and challenge you at the University of Chicago Writer’s Studio downtown. From Basic Creative Writing and the Art of the Pitch to Storytelling for Business, find the class that is right for you. Join our community at our lively and inspiring open mics and write-ins. NEW CLASSES START SOON Learn more at writersstudio.uchicago.edu.
15 / OMAR KHOLEIF 17 / DANIEL SCHULMANTo celebrate its centennial in 2015, giver of unrestricted grants to artists 18 SEPTEMBER 2017 NewcityØvstebø oversaw the space shedding nationwide, into its second decade, Paul Gray and Valerie Carberryits iconic grid scaffolding, but the space Deana Haggag runs a compact Partners, Richard Gray Galleryremains an architectural challenge to organization with a major footprint, giving Since their merger-acquisition in 2015,artists. Øvstebø has embraced the Ren’s out up to two-and-a-half million dollars Gray and Carberry have de factolongstanding reputation for encouraging directly to artists each year. See dominated Chicago’s art market forartists to take risks with new work that Newcity’s interview with this Art Leader European and American modernis unencumbered by constraints of a of the Moment for a conversation on the masters. At the same time, the new Graycapricious commercial art market. evolving territory of arts philanthropy. Gallery manages to show some ofUpcoming solo exhibitions include Chicago’s best—Theaster Gates hasJennifer Packer, Alejandro Cesarco 17 shown with Gray, and Rashid Johnsonand Richard Rezac. Daniel Schulman and Bethany Collins are both represented Director of Visual Art, Chicago by the gallery. In all, the Gray roster and15 Department of Cultural Affairs and stable is an eclectic, impressive bunchOmar Kholeif Special Events united by formal excellence. Their newSenior Curator and Director of The Chicago CulturalGlobal Initiatives, Museum of Center has been alive 18 / VALERIE CARBERRYContemporary Art Chicago with contemporary artOnly two years into the job, Omar Kholeif for as long as Daniel 53has already landed a major survey of Schulman has had hisEgyptian artist Basim Magdy and a way there. After yearscollection show, “Eternal Youth,” on the at the Art Institute andpeaks and pitfalls of being and wanting elsewhere, Schulmanto be young. This fall, he will open the found a home at thefirst survey of work by Michael Rakowitz, city’s flagship culturalan Iraqi-American and long-time institution, focusing theChicagoan with a major international efforts of the multi-profile. With a survey of Nigeria’s gallery space on a mix ofOtobong Nkanga on the books and a emerging Chicago artistsglobal survey of the art and revolution and historically importantof the Middle East and South Asia in work. Major triumphsplanning stages, it’s no wonder Kholeif include landing thewas recently named director of global 2015 Archibald Motleyinitiatives, a position he will maintain retrospective, whichalongside his hefty curatorial role. toured to the Whitney Museum in New York, as16 well as exhibiting EugeneDeana Haggag Eda’s painted doors forPresident and CEO, United States Artists the now-demolishedLeading United States Artists, a major Malcolm X College.
LEFT TO RIGHT 48 / JANET DEES 19 / NAOMI BECKWITH 50 / NEYSA PAGE-LIEBERMAN space, a massive post-industrial diversification and 21 / LISA YUN LEE warehouse on Chicago’s West Side, is expansion of the society. She helped convene “Field Trip / Field Notes / Field Guide,” a consortium a far cry from their high-rise Hancock artistic canon, of fellows from UIC, the University of Chicago and the School of the Art suites, but if anything it shows that Jacqueline Terrassa Institute of Chicago, which intends to make Chicago an attractive city for Gray and Carberry will stop at nothing takes charge of a creative young people. Lee has said that the consortium, now in its second year, to stay on top. department in great aims to “incentivize artists and people in the creative economy to stay in Chicago need of change. instead of going to Los Angeles or New York.” Lee also helped curate this year’s 19 Coming most recently Open Engagement conference in Chicago, which brought together artists Naomi Beckwith from the Metropolitan and cultural workers to discuss social practice in art. Curator, Museum of Contemporary Museum in New York, Art Chicago Terrassa nonetheless Here we have a homegrown star. has deep Chicago Beckwith has been back in Chicago for a roots, with years of minute, but it seems like she never left us. experience at the Since returning home in 2011, she’s Museum of curated significant shows at the MCA, Contemporary Art, including “The Freedom Principle” of the Smart Museum 2015 and last year’s solo show of The and the Hyde Park Art Center. The Propeller Group, an American and endowed position at the Art Institute Vietnamese artist collaborative. Beckwith will afford her a wide capacity to was awarded VIA Art Fund’s inaugural redevelop the education program at a curatorial fellowship grant this year and moment when the winds of changeNewcity SEPTEMBER 2017 will serve as the chair of New York’s could thrust her work to the forefront Armory Show’s inaugural curatorial of an evolving field. summit in 2018. 21 20 Lisa Yun Lee Jacqueline Terrassa Director, School of Art & Art History, Chair of Museum Education, University of Illinois at Chicago Art Institute of Chicago Since becoming Director of UIC’s School As museums everywhere reconsider of Art and Art History in 2012, Lee has their educational missions in light of the continued her mission of cultivating54 rapid advance of technologies and the artistic practices that aim to transform
Roman Ondak: Man Walking toward a WHAT IS GENIUS?Fata Morgana12 September - 9 December 2017Roman Ondak, Escape Circuit, 2014 (detail). Found and modified metal and wood cages.Overall dimensions 77 x 510 x 295 cm. Courtesy the artist and kurimanzutto, Mexico City.Photo©Diego Perez201 East Ontario Street www.artsclubchicago.org DISCOVER MORE. TAKE OUR UNITY TEMPLE TOUR.Chicago, Illinois 60611 [email protected] F LW R I G H T. O R G | 3 1 2 . 9 9 4 . 4 0 0 0312.787.3997 @artsclubchicago EXAMINE BELIEFS. RADICALLY RETHINK THEM. SCHOOL OF THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGOMelanie Teresa Bohrer (MFA 2016), Untitled (Memorial), 2016 SAIC encourages interdisciplinary, Graduate SAIC Day collaborative, and experimental investigation. In addition to our SUNDAY, OCTOBER 1 renowned Master of Fine Arts 10:00 A.M.– 2:00 P.M. program, SAIC offers a number of SAIC MACLEAN BALLROOM Master of Arts programs, a Master 112 S. MICHIGAN AVE. of Architecture, Master of Design, CHICAGO, IL 60603 and a Master of Science. Graduate Portfolio Day SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 4 10:00 A.M.– 2:00 P.M. 280 S. COLUMBUS DR. CHICAGO, IL 60603 Apply Now saic.edu SAIC GRADUATE ADMISSIONS | 312.629.6100 | saic.edu/gr | [email protected]
At an institution that increasingly emphasizes its modern and contemporary program over medium- or geographic-specific collections, photography might seem a passé pursuit. Witkovsky has proved otherwise, securing a significant first-floor gallery in the newish Modern Wing in addition to the drab, carpet-walled basement galleries where the rest of the department’s exhibitions hang. Last year’s blockbuster Moholy-Nagy retrospective, co-curated by Witkovsky, traveled to the Guggenheim and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Less spectacular but certainly more experimental, the department’s recent exhibitions of the Japanese photography magazine “Provoke” and their recreation of Takuma Nakahira’s seventh Paris Biennial installation deserve commendation. LEFT TO RIGHT Bergman, Cauleen Smith and Joyce 25 23 / JIM DEMPSEY AND JOHN CORBETT Pensato have little in common besides Carlos Tortolero brilliance. At the same time, the pair has President and Founder, 22 kept alive an important earlier generation National Museum of Mexican Art Mary Jane Jacob of Chicago’s greats, representing Barbara The National Museum of Mexican Art Executive Director, Exhibitions and Rossi, Christina Ramberg and Karl found its permanent home in Pilsen Exhibition Studies, Director, Institute Wirsum too. thirty years ago. To celebrate the three for Curatorial Research and Practice, decades and 220 exhibitions, Tortolero School of the Art Institute of Chicago 24 and the museum put on “Memoria Defining the avant-garde of curatorial Matthew Witkovsky Presente: An Artistic Journey” a show practice for an entire generation, Mary Curator and Chair, Department of of thirty artists working in and around Jane Jacob’s profound impact on the field Photography, The Art Institute of Chicago Chicago. The roster included long may never be fully appreciated. Since her established artists like Dan Ramirez earlier successes with Places With a Past alongside younger generations like (1991) and Culture in Action (1993), Jacob Maria Gaspar and Yvette Mayorga. has moved into the institution to instruct The museum continues to honor new generations of curators at the tradition while investing in new School of the Art Institute of Chicago, generations of artists of the Mexican where she directs the exhibitions diaspora and beyond. programs and exhibitions studies. Last year, Jane Jacob established the Institute 25 / CARLOS TORTOLERO for Curatorial Research and Practice at the school, broadening the scope of her work to collaborate with curators from around the world to produce new research and methods on the craft. 23Newcity SEPTEMBER 2017 John Corbett and Jim Dempsey Founders, Corbett vs. Dempsey Thirteen years is a long time to keep a gallery going in Chicago. It helps that both John Corbett and Jim Dempsey had been deeply steeped in the city’s music, film and art scenes for decades before opening their eponymous space above the Dusty Groove record shop. Their roster of artists speaks to the eclectic56 expertise of the dueling duo—Margot
26 / JULIE RODRIGUES WIDHOLM mandate at the museum has been through performance. In January of next to expand the museum’s role in year, the museum will present the first26 championing Chicago artists. To kick solo museum exhibition by BarbaraJulie Rodrigues Widholm off the fall season, the museum will Jones-Hogu, a Chicago-based artist andDirector and Chief Curator, feature work and documentary core figure of the historic Black ArtsDePaul Art Museum photography from Chicago-born artist Movement and AfriCOBRA.Julie Rodrigues Widholm spent more Senga Nengudi, including her “R.S.V.P.”than fifteen years helping to shape sculptures that mimic the female form 27Chicago’s contemporary art scene as but are stretched, pulled and twisted out Kate Lorenzcurator at the Museum of Contemporary of proportion and activated by the artist Executive Director, Hyde Park Art CenterArt before her appointment as director From her days as an intern to her currentof the DePaul Art Museum. Part of her role at the top, Kate Lorenz has seen the Hyde Park Art Center from just about every angle through the most ambitious of its decades of growth. As a former director of development, she led their multi-million dollar campaign to renovate HPAC’s current space, and then in 2014 secured funding to convert underutilized storage space in the same building into a suite of studios for resident artists during the center’s seventy-fifth anniversary year. Programming at HPAC has expanded to include national and international partnerships while still maintaining a focus on Chicago’s artists and arts education for the city’s youth. 28 Shane Campbell Owner, Shane Campbell Gallery Since moving its primary space from West Town to the South Loop’s Motor Row, Shane Campbell’s eponymousLEFT TO RIGHT45 / SCOTT HUNTER27 / KATE LORENZ SEPTEMBER 2017 Newcity 57
29 / NATASHA EGAN Traubert, she has poured countless dollars from her Hyatt Hotels inheritance into the arts and other worthy causes, youth education and health top amongst them. Traubert was formerly the chairman of Marwen, a major force in youth arts education in Chicago, and served on the board of The Renaissance Society. Pritzker is a life trustee at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago. The details of their collection are largely unknown, but one can assume that it befits their daunting fortune. 31 Caroline Older Executive Director, Chicago Artists Coalition Since 2014, Older has been guiding the Chicago Artists Coalition into a bastion for artistic development. Coinciding with EXPO Chicago 2017, she will host the third edition of “The Annual,” an art auction to support CAC’s programs gallery seems poised for continued 31 / CAROLINE OLDER growth. Campbell’s roster mixes Chicago’s most promising rising and and the work of Chicago-based artists recently risen—Tony Lewis, William J. and curators. Through fundraising and O’Brien, David Leggett, Chris Bradley, corporate sponsorships, Older has etc.—with prominent Los Angeles- and increased the number and amount New York-based artists, several of whom of the CAC’s Maker Grants, which passed through Chicago for a degree at provide unrestricted cash awards to the School of the Art Institute, where artists. This year she rebranded CAC’s Campbell occasionally teaches. While the annual benefit as “Work in Progress” massive former car dealership that now to reflect the work of Chicago’s up-and- stores and exhibits Campbell’s artists is coming artists and curators. CAC added an impressive sight, the high ceilings and a six-month residency called FIELD/ polished-concrete expanse tend to WORK and a pilot residency for arts diminish anything that hangs inside it, no administrators is on the way. CAC’s matter how large the scale of the work. long-anticipated move from the West His Lincoln Park apartment gallery offers Loop will happen in 2018, with its new a more intimate experience with art. location to be unveiled soon. 29Newcity SEPTEMBER 2017 official and unofficial views of life Natasha Egan under the North Korean regime. Other Executive Director, Museum of exhibitions have repeatedly emphasized Contemporary Photography at the disastrous effects of pollution and Columbia College Chicago climate change. Outside of Chicago, Natasha Egan has been at home at the Egan co-curated the inaugural Dubai Museum of Contemporary Photography Photo Exhibition in 2016. for two decades and since 2011 has headed up the museum. Beyond simply 30 promoting the artistic significance of Penny Pritzker and Bryan Traubert photography in our post-studio, post- Collectors & Co-founders, Pritzker medium moment, Egan has doubled Traubert Family Foundation down on the political dimensions of While no longer the United States photography as an agent of witnessing. Secretary of Commerce, Penny Pritzker Her background in Asian and Eastern is no less influential than she was this European history has brought shows time last year. With her husband Bryan from these seemingly far-flung regions to Chicago, including recent shows of Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei and a58 group show of photography contrasting
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32 33 / LORELEI STEWART Lisa Corrin Director, Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art The past two years have seen an astonishing widening of the Block Museum’s focus, with more exhibitions drawing from artists outside the mainstream of the United States and Western Europe. While recent solo show artists Kader Attia and Tseng Kwong Chi have French and American connections, respectively, artists in the recent “If You Remember, I’ll Remember” group exhibition come from backgrounds historically marginalized within the States. The Block’s comprehensive 32 / LISA CORRIN project that seeks to make the effects of chaotic storms of disruption, Sixty Inches survey of the artist Charlotte Moorman, climate change tangible for Chicagoans. from Center remains anchored to its co-curated by Corrin and the Block’s mission to cover all aspects of Chicago’s Corinne Granof, permanently revised 34 cultural geographies with an emphasis the status of the American musician and Daniel Berger on the work and voices of people of performer from mere muse to central Collector & Medical Director and color, women, LGBTQIA persons, the node of the American avant-garde Founder, Northstar Medical Center differently abled and others consistently movement of the 1960s and beyond. When he’s not battling the scourge of marginalized by the mainstream. Hazel HIV with the latest in treatment and founded Sixty seven years ago, when 33 clinical research, Berger is pouring his conversations about race and equity Lorelei Stewart energies into collecting and exhibiting were not as visible as they are today. Director, Gallery 400, University of Illinois work by top caliber artists from Chicago Her work has undoubtedly advanced at Chicago and beyond. At his backyard gallery that conversation by miles in Chicago. In her seventeen years at the University Iceberg Projects, Berger has curated A recent residency with the Department of Illinois Chicago’s Gallery 400, Stewart and invited guests to organize myriad of Cultural Affairs and Special Events has continually staged timely and striking shows spanning the gamut from political launched Sixty’s Chicago Archives exhibitions for the college community activism—”Militant Eroticism: The ART+ project, which aims to expand the and the city at large. Stewart says the Positive Archives”—to pure, beautiful capacity of individuals and communities gallery prioritizes showing work by weirdness—”George Kuchar: Bocko.” to take stock of their cultural histories to women and artists of color, while seeking Works from his collection, which he rarely build a broader understanding of what “to demonstrate how art is relevant to exhibits at home, have been loaned to we make together.Newcity SEPTEMBER 2017 everyday people’s lives and to show major institutions like the Museum of that the way we live today is relevant Contemporary Art Chicago. Berger 36 in art.” The coming year’s programming serves on the Board of Governors at the Caroline Picard is no less impressive. An upcoming School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Executive Director, The Green Lantern collaboration with the DePaul Art Press; Co-Director, Sector 2337 Museum and Rebuild Foundation will 35 On and off since 2005, Caroline Picard’s feature twenty-four female-identifying Tempestt Hazel Green Lantern Press has published artists from the black and Latina Director and Founding Editor, dozens of artfully designed experimental diasporas. “Garden for a Changing Sixty Inches from Center tomes by artists, critics, poets, Climate,” planned for summer 2018, At a moment when art criticism in writers and other thinkers outside the60 is a large-scale participatory public art Chicago and nationwide weathers the mainstream. Since 2014, the Press has
35 / TEMPESTT HAZEL 37 / EMILY GREEN 38 has spent more than twenty-five years Cesáreo Moreno building the artistic reputation of the Director of Visual institution that continues to showcase Arts and Chief the depth and breadth of Mexican Curator, National creativity from both sides of the border. Museum of This year’s thirtieth anniversary of Mexican Art the museum’s permanent home in Leading the Pilsen brought Moreno together with a curatorial team team of curators to exhibit the work of of the nation’s thirty artists currently working in and most prominent around Chicago. Moreno’s recent museum reinstallation of the NMMA’s permanent dedicated to galleries, titled “Nuestras Historias,” Mexican art and sets ancient Mesoamerican artifacts culture, Moreno alongside contemporary works by artists 38 / CESÁREO MORENObeen headquartered in Sector 2337, SEPTEMBER 2017 Newcitya hybrid bookstore-gallery-bar thatsupports the Press’ efforts to remain 61financially independent and pairsexhibitions with books that extend thethemes on display. As she continues topush the boundaries between literatureand visual art, Picard’s criticism, fictionand comics have been widely published.37Emily GreenExecutive Director, ACREIt’s been seven years since ACREestablished itself as a DIY artist spaceand residency in Chicago’s Pilsenneighborhood, a popular area for youngartists to find apartments and studios.Since then, hundreds of artists havestreamed through its summer programin Southern Wisconsin, where studiospaces provide equipment and spacefor painting, drawing, ceramics, weaving,screen printing and woodworking.Green’s leadership has seen ACREthrough finding a new permanent spacein a former funeral home, also in Pilsen,with ample space for exhibitions,workshops and events.
LEFT TO RIGHT 39 / JULIA FISCHBACH AND EMANUEL AGUILAR of Mexican heritage, tracing the highest-ranking art schools, Arnold Kemp painting and printmaking for three years, continuities and variables in an ongoing has made a face and a name for himself Kemp hasn’t given up his studio practice cultural discourse. among students and faculty alike. upon landing the big job, having recently Coming from Virginia Commonwealth shown at Daniel Berger’s Iceberg 39 University, where he served as chair of Projects in Rogers Park. Under the newly Julia Fischbach and Emanuel Aguilar Founders and Directors, Patron Gallery 40 / ARNOLD KEMP “The last two years have been quite aNewcity SEPTEMBER 2017 ride,” Emanuel Aguilar says of the journey that took he and Julia Fischbach from co-directing Kavi Gupta to running their own gallery. Patron represents ten artists, including locals Alex Chitty, Samuel Levi Jones and Mika Horibuchi, and has exhibited others. Opening the space in Chicago was “the best idea ever,” Aguilar says. “Not only because we love this city and think that there is so much talent and potential here, but also because being in a place like Chicago has allowed us to grow so much stronger and faster than if we were elsewhere.” Patron is gearing up for EXPO Chicago, where they’ll show Lucas Simões, and will soon launch a limited edition artist book series with Candor Arts. 40 Arnold Kemp Dean of Graduate Studies, School of the Art Institute of Chicago Only a year into his tenure leading graduate studies at one of America’s62
Nathaniel Mary QuinnNothing’s FunnySEPTEMBER 8–OCTOBER 13, 2017 THE RENAISSANCE SOCIETY SEP 9–NOV 5, 2017 at the University of Chicago118 NORTH PEORIA STREET 5811 South Ellis Avenue JENNIFER PACKERCHICAGO ILLINOIS 60607 Cobb Hall, 4th Floor TENDERHEADEDW WW.RHOFFMANGALLERY.CO M Chicago, Illinois 60637 renaissancesociety.org PAMELA BANNOS ALEX CHITTY HENRY DARGER’S ORPHANS AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF RACE JOSHUA CITARELLA JEANNE DUNNING Through January 7, 2018 MIN KIM PARK LETHA WILSON HYOUNSANG YOOOBJECTIFYING THE PHOTOGRAPH CURATED BY JESSICA LABATTE AND MIKE REA Reflections Intimate Portraits of Iconic African Americans by Terrence A. Reese August 29 – October 20, 2017Northern Illinois University Henry Darger (1892-1973), untitled (“In Times Like These…”) (detail), Chicago, n.d., page of coloring book, newspaper clippings,Art Museum and other paper clippings on advertising cardboard, 14 x 20 in., collection American Folk Art Museum, New York, 102.5. © 2017DeKalb, Illinois Kiyoko Lerner / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo by Gavin Ashworth, © American Folk Art Museum/Art Resource, NYAltgeld Hall, First Floor, West End 756 N. Milwaukee Ave. www.art.orgniu.edu/artmuseum
LEFT TO RIGHT 41 / ZACHARY CAHILL 43 / ARON GENT appointed president Tenney and with a for Arts and Inquiry, he is launching “1971: A Year in the Life of Color” with major capital campaign just underway, a number of initiatives, including the University of Chicago Press, and a Kemp might find himself with less time “Sidebar,” an ongoing series of monthly new monograph, “To Describe a Life: to paint this year. conversations on arts and ideas. Essays at the Intersection of Art and Race Terror,” will be published by Yale 41 42 University Press in 2018. Zachary Cahill Darby English Curator, Richard and Mary L. Gray Professor of Art History, 43 Center for Arts and Inquiry University of Chicago Aron Gent Zachary Cahill’s politically and historically Since 2003, Chicago art has benefited Director and Founder, Document charged practice transcends boundaries from Darby English’s thoughtful approach Alongside his founding of the gallery and between roles as artist, critic, curator, to art history and criticism. Alongside artist printshop Document in 2011, Aron writer and educator. Recently, Cahill was his return to the University of Chicago Gent co-created MDW, an ambitious, if chosen as a “Future Great” by ArtReview after two years as Starr Director of the short-lived, art fair in partnership withNewcity SEPTEMBER 2017 and had a solo exhibition at Regina Rex Research and Academic Program at the Bridgeport’s Public Media Institute, in New York City. Cahill has his hands Clark Art Institute in Massachusetts, Roots & Culture and Threewalls. A large full this fall with a solo exhibition, “USSA English maintains an appointment as part of what EXPO Chicago claims as Sanctuary,” at Anastasia Tinari Projects adjunct curator in the Department of its debt to the strength of Chicago’s and co-curating an exhibition at the Painting and Sculpture at the Museum alternative art scene can be attributed Smart Museum titled “Revolution Every of Modern Art, New York. Although to Gent’s and MDW’s earlier effort to Day.” In addition, you can catch Cahill his specialty is African-American art, cultivate and coalesce the independent, leading a séance at DePaul University as English works to resist the traditional artist-run experiments across the city. part of their one-hundredth anniversary trappings of interpretation like Gent continues to support the artist of the Russian Revolution. As curator at disciplinary boundaries and broad community in Chicago with his gallery’s the University of Chicago’s Gray Center generalizations. In 2016, he published press, which mints a great deal of fine-art64
prints, posters and other printed matter focused practices of video and ago, the program has expanded underfor Chicago’s artists and galleries. Gent performance. Moreover, his roster the leadership of Megha Ralapati intoalso serves on the board of directors for includes younger, less established artists national and international partnerships,the ACRE residency program. whose careers have been boosted by including with Project Row Houses in Godard’s support—Alejandro Figueredo Houston, the Centre régional de la44 Díaz-Perera, Orr Menirom, and Rashayla photographie Nord Pas-de-CalaisGregg Bordowitz Marie Brown among them. The last and ARTPORT in Tel Aviv. JackmanProgram Director, Low-Residency MFA, holdout of the former gallery lofts at was also instrumental in securing theSchool of the Art Institute of Chicago 119 North Peoria, Godard promises an funding to move HPAC into its currentGregg Bordowitz is perhaps best known imminent move from the neighborhood facility in 2006.for his early and sustained involvement where nearly every gallery has alreadywith the early AIDS awareness move- been priced out. 48ment, which has not ceased. These days, Janet Deeshe also directs the School of the Art 47 Curator of Modern andInstitute of Chicago’s highly competitive Deone Jackman Contemporary Art, Block MuseumLow-Residency MFA program, a three- Philanthropist and former Chair of the Since arriving at the Block Museumsummer sequence of coursework and Board of Directors, Hyde Park Art Center two years ago, curator Janet Dees hasstudio time that brings career artists Visitors to the Hyde Park Art Center had an outsized impact at the institution.together for shorter stints toward an will recognize the Jackman name from Her first exhibition, “If You Remember,advanced degree. Among the program’s the Jackman Goldwasser Residency, I’ll Remember,” sensitively explored loveperks is a visiting artist series that brings which brings five international, national and loss and the ways we connect,major names to speak in Chicago. Moyra and local artists to the Art Center remember and share historic traumas,Davey, Wafaa Bilal, Wu Tsang and Trevor each year for intensive studio work and with work by seven contemporary artists.Paglen were among the many who spoke exhibitions. Since its creation five years As an affirmation of her work andthis summer. Bordowitz is alsofaculty at the Whitney Museum 46 / JEFFERSON GODARDIndependent Study Program inNew York City.45 SEPTEMBER 2017 NewcityScott HunterCollector and Directorof Neuropsychology,University of ChicagoHunter is an adventurous andmultidisciplinary collector whoinvests in new and local artand also teaches pediatricneuropsychology at the Universityof Chicago. A fixture at artopenings, there’s a good chanceyou’ve already met him. Currently,he is curating an exhibition for theUkrainian Institute of Modern Artthis fall, titled “A is for Artist.”Hunter selected artists from localorganizations such as EsperanzaCommunity Services, The Arts ofLife, Thresholds and also from aNavajo program in Arizona calledFlying Colors at the St. MichaelsAssociation for Special Education.He also serves on the board atChicago’s longtime alternativespace Roots & Culture and is apatron and co-collaborator at thenewer space South of the Tracks.46 65Jefferson GodardFounder and Director,Aspect Ratio ProjectsGodard continues to defyexpectations of what kind of workcommercial galleries can promote,focusing on the less materially
scholarship as well as the Block’s 47 / DEONE JACKMAN ongoing efforts to emphasize its contemporary art program, Dees’ 49 / SEBASTIAN CAMPOS position was recently endowed andNewcity SEPTEMBER 2017she will curate three exhibitions this season. Two will highlight gifts to the museum, including an early edition of Carrie Mae Weems’ first installation, featuring photographs printed on hanging scrims, and Sam Gilliam’s rarely shown 1970 drape painting “One.” She is also a curator mentor for the 2017-18 Chicago Artists Coalition HATCH Projects. 49 Sebastian Campos Principal, The Mission Relative to other gallerists and dealers in the city, Sebastian Campos keeps a low profile, but his spaces in Chicago and Houston speak for themselves. With a focus on exchange between the United States and Latin America, Campos has brought a much-needed angle to a cultural dynamic at risk of occlusion in the current political climate. This year, Campos showed painting and sculpture by the Chilean artist Rodrigo Zamora and paintings by Peruvian artist Michelle Magot, among other local and international names. The Sub- Mission, a basement space beneath the gallery, focuses on Chicago artists and operates on a proposal- based curatorial program, offering an in for aspiring curators and artists in the city. 50 Neysa Page-Lieberman Executive Director, Department of Exhibitions and Performance Spaces at Columbia College Columbia College Chicago boasts a bunch of exhibition spaces beside the well-known Museum of Contemporary Photography, and Neysa Page-Lieberman directs several of them. At the Glass Curtain Gallery, Page-Lieberman has recently focused on social justice and identity politics with exhibitions like “The Longest Revolution: Feminist Social Practice” and “Vacancy: Urban Interruption and (Re)generation.” Her most visible curatorial efforts are on the walls of the Wabash Arts Corridor, where she organized Tatyana Fazlalizadeh’s mural “Stop Telling Women to Smile” (2015) and will curate the Corridor’s second annual exhibition this fall.66
Take Care September 15, 2017 – January 13, 2018 Opening Reception: Friday, September 15, 5 – 8 PM Take Care is organized in partnership with the Metropolitan Chicago Breast Cancer Task Force and aims to shed light on systemic barriers to quality healthcare through the lens of breast cancer. Featuring work by Indira Allegra, Laura Berger, Joan Giroux, and The Think Tank that has yet to be named.Image: Carrie Mae Weems, “Ritual and Revolution” (1998), installation view at UC Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive,. Courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery. Logan Center Gallery • Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts • 915 E 60th St Chicago IL 60637 Weinberg/Newton Gallery September 8 300 W Superior Street, Suite 203 MONGERSON GALLERY Chicago, IL 60654 312 529 5090 weinbergnewtongallery.com Hours Mon – Sat 10 AM – 5 PM Cinthia Marcelle and Tiago Mata Machado — DIVINE arts.uchicago.edu/logan/gallery 19th & 20th Century American Art VIOLENCE October 29312.943.2354 | info@mongersongaller y.com mongersongaller y.com
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Swim in Opposite: Fuchsia wool SEPTEMBER 2017 NewcityTakashi Murakami’s blend top, ElenaColor Ocean Bobysheva, $246; Wool asymmetrical mini- By Isa Giallorenzo skirt, Elena Bobysheva, $443 (both We had the daunting task of finding on sale); Hot pink with designs that wouldn’t fade in front of faux-mink poufs cocktail Takashi Murakami’s magnificent large- hat, Angela Morano, scale works, on display at the Museum of $255; Nene Contemporary Art Chicago until sneakers, City Soles, $89 September 24. That is why we picked Below: Icon Dress Nº Elena Bobysheva’s carefully constructed 009, Elena pieces, with strategic cutouts and strong Bobysheva, $1,275; black- colors—she creates clothes that are both and-white big bow, elegant and impactful. The same could Angela Morano, $250; be said about Angela Morano’s millinery, Nene sneakers, City hand sewn by the designer in a process Soles, $89 that combines fashion and sculpture with quality as her strongest value. 69 How did you start your career in fashion design? What made you want to pursue it? I went to design school where I received an interdisciplinary bachelor’s in business and fashion design. I launched my ready-to-wear line in 2013 using grants from numerous design and business competitions. The label was founded with my own deeply held values at its core—a commitment to sustainability, quality and authenticity. I wanted to create a label that reflected a slower pace and process: where things are made with care and detail, where tradition is more important than trend, where there is a purpose to every piece, and things are made to last. What fuels your creativity? What makes you want to create a garment? It starts from a passion for quality. When I start designing a piece the first thing that comes to mind is the fabrication and a silhouette, an idea. Then I do some rough sketches to get the idea onto paper so I can develop the proportions, color palette, design details, and so on. I have technical training in garment
Newcity SEPTEMBER 2017construction and pattern making and through that process the garment is developed even more. What are the underlying themes of your collections? I like story telling. When I design a collection, I think of a character and the character is the same from last season, but more grown up and evolved through her experiences. Each collection is a continuation and a new chapter within the one story. I then think: where would she wear this piece and why? Does this piece have a purpose in our modern world? Who is your dream customer? I am inspired by women who are strong and passionate; women who are very intelligent and use their intelligence in service of others and bettering the world. The EB woman loves quality and understands fabrication and fit. She wants statement investment pieces in her wardrobe. I’ve yet to meet a woman that doesn’t relate to my line. What is it like designing luxury ready-to- wear in Chicago? How do you produce, sell and promote your creations? Almost all of our products are produced in-house on a cut-to-order basis by professional tailors and are currently sold exclusively via our own e-commerce store on our website. We do not have a PR or marketing budget. The label has grown through word-of-mouth, social media and press coverage. How do you overcome the limitations of manufacturing in a city that’s not particularly known for its fashion scene? I think that fashion is a global industry but there are different capitals for different things. I think Chicago is still in its infancy stage of establishing a fashion identity and infrastructure but it won’t grow to be like New York, London or Paris. Every capital has its particular strength but talent can come from anywhere. It’s not defined to a specific geographical location. Plus with today’s technology, I can design a dress in Chicago and the next day a woman in Belgium could wear it to dinner. What is the price range of your line? I positioned my label in the designer price point. The clothes are not meant to be bought in bulk. The focus is on investment pieces. Full-marked products can range between $700-$1,500.70
Crepe silk organza Where do you see your brand going intop, Elena the future? What are your short- andBobysheva, $250 long-term plans?(on sale); I think to get a wider audience toIcon Skirt Nº appreciate the product, you need to001, Elena touch it and feel it so I want to startBobysheva, $1,170; approaching potential retail partners nextCutout year for wholesale accounts. I think itvisor, Angela would be wonderful if I could partnerMorano, $285 with a Chicago-based specialty boutique like Ikram or VMR. I think their customer would appreciate my product—the aesthetic, fabrication and fit. You are very conscious about the environment. How do you take it into consideration while producing your designs? I am devoted to minimizing waste. I want to do luxury in a smart and transparent way. Our factories and our vendors for our materials are usually Italian, French and Polish. They are family businesses, multigenerational that have dedicated their lives to their craft. We currently do not develop our own fabrics. Ninety percent of our textiles are high-end spare stock that already exists in the market but have not sold elsewhere. The remaining ten percent we wholesale from fabric mills. My Icon Collection, for example, features spare stock French Guipure lace and Italian wool-crepe. Having a finite supply of material makes the ready-to- wear collection more exclusive. Certain pieces are limited-edition. We also produce on a cut-to-order basis, meaning we make only what is ordered so to not contribute to dead inventory ending up in landfills.Crepe silk organza top, Elena Credits: SEPTEMBER 2017 NewcityBobysheva, $250 (on sale); Photography by Matthew Sperzel:Icon Skirt Nº 001, Elena matthewsperzel.photography / @sperzphotoBobysheva, $1,170; Cutoutvisor, Angela Morano, $285 Clothes by Elena Bobysheva: elenabobysheva.com / @elenabobysheva Hats by Angela Morano: angelamorano.com / @angelamoranodotcom Shoes provided by City Soles: citysoles.com / @citysoles Make-up and hair by Leanna Ernest Model Monica Machado Make-up artist and model represented by Factor Chosen Chicago: factorchosenchicago.com / @factorchosen_chi Location: Museum of Contemporary Art at the Takashi Murakami exhibit (through September 24): mcachicago.org / @mcachicago Special thanks to Factor Chosen Chicago’s Jessie Sardina and Lily Pike, and MCA’s Abraham Ritchie and Katy O’Malley. 71
The Lyric Opera and Joffrey Ballet team up for the first time ever. Culturerts &\"Orphée et Eurydice\" costume design by John Neumeier./PHOTO: Andrew Cioffi
FALL ATLOGANLOGAN FIVE YEAR BASHIn honor of the fifth anniversary of the Reva and DavidLogan Center for the Arts, join us in celebrating ourcommunity partners, artists, neighbors, students, faculty,scholars, and staff.Saturday. October 7, 11:30am–11:30pmFor more information, full schedule of events,and tickets, visit arts.uchicago.edu/loganfiveyear#LoganTurns5LOGAN CENTER BLUESFESTThe Logan Center continues its tradition of celebratingand promoting the rich cultural landscape of Chicago’sSouth Side with a three day festival of concerts,workshops, film, food, and conversation.October 13–15, 2017For more information, full lineup, and tickets, visitloganbluesfest.uchicago.edu#LoganBluesfest 915 East 60th Street 773.702.ARTS
Rashid Johnson Art Spreading Wings And Taking Flight Rashid Johnson Soars at the Milwaukee Art Museum By Kerry Cardoza In “Song of Solomon,” Toni Morrison’s 1977 novel, the characters exhibition space. Johnson, like Morrison, is known for using signifiers SEPTEMBER 2017 Newcity are obsessed with flight. The book starts with a spectacle: a mild-man- of black culture in his work, such as Public Enemy’s logo or Frederick nered insurance agent has climbed onto his roof, wearing wings made Douglass’ portrait. In this cohesive show, the thirty-nine-year-old of blue silk. He’s convinced he can fly from his Michigan home clear artist continues to use these signifiers to explore questions around over Lake Superior. “If you surrendered to the air, you could ride it,” the identity, race, appropriation and anxiety. protagonist, Milkman, comes to learn. It refers to an ancestor believed Originally from Evanston and now based in New York, Johnson first to have flown back to Africa, but also to the acceptance of his own life. made waves back in 2001 when he participated in “Freestyle,” a It’s about ceding control, letting the wind guide your journey. group show at the Studio Museum in Harlem. The exhibition made headlines both for the promising work of the twenty-eight emergingThe book, like Morrison’s other works, is steeped in blackness. The artists and for curator Thelma Golden’s now infamous remark that characters are black, of course, as is the author creating the vivid the work on view was “post-black.” Golden later said the term was world they inhabit. Their blackness informs how they decide on the meant to free artists from the burden of working within the confines right way to live: black respectability versus the unabashedly real, of so-called black art. “We were now willing to exist as a place where keeping a low profile versus avenging the killing of black lives. They we could talk about the complexity of black creation and the politics search for their histories, the ones kept purposely hidden. Their lives behind it through multiple voices and multiple strands,” Golden said are multiplicitous and complex, even though they live in the same of the Studio Museum. Seen through this lens, the term fits world, face the same problems, breathe the same air. They share a Johnson’s work through its refusal to be pigeon-holed or to provide a history and a kind of magical thinking where escape is possible, single meaning. transcendence real. The show opens with “Antoine’s Organ,” a gorgeous architectural It was Morrison’s story that came back to me at Rashid Johnson’s installation stacked with potted plants, books, televisions and shea“Hail We Now Sing Joy,” on view at the Milwaukee Art Museum. Vast butter, that fills the first gallery. At the Kemper Museum of Contempo- paintings and sculptures occupy the entirety of the first-floor rary Art, where this exhibit was first staged, the plants on the top row 75
ART TOP 5 Rashid Johnson, \"Untitled Escape Collage,\" 2016Newcity SEPTEMBER 2017 1 EXPO Chicago. Navy brushed the ceiling. Mostly hidden from “All art is personal,” Andera says. “Johnson, Pier. EXPO Chicago along view inside the grid sits a piano, which local to me, his personal experience is so much with EXPO Art Week bring musicians play at scheduled times for the a part of what these works are, but he also more than 135 galleries from all duration of the show. The piece is named then leaves room for your experience.” The over the world to Chicago for a for Antoine Baldwin, a pianist and producer artist speaks frequently about growing up in weekend of talks, screenings also known as Audio BLK. an Afro-centric household. A 1977 and public installations in and photograph of his father in a Taekwondo around the art fair. “When you come upon the sculpture and it’s uniform features frequently in Johnson’s not being activated, it certainly is something work. Here, it shows up as one element of 2 Michael Rakowitz. to consider,” Margaret Andera, interim chief the “Untitled Escape Collage” series, Museum of curator and curator of contemporary art at paintings made of vinyl, tile, spray paint, Contemporary Art. Sculptures, the museum, tells me. “But then there’s this black soap and wax that evoke a tropical elaborate reproductions of added element when the music is being getaway. looted artifacts, and a food played too… It makes you kind of stop and truck serving Iraqi dishes tell think about the fact that a work of art, a But it was another series, “Falling Man,” the tales of America and the single work of art, can exist in more than that struck me the most. The title brings to Middle East in war and peace. one way.” mind Don DeLillo’s novel of the same name, which is centered around the life of a 9/11 3 Lilli Carré. Western The sculpture is layered in every sense of survivor. It took me a moment to see the Exhibitions. This Newcity the word. Over three-hundred plants, most falling men. The wall-mounted pieces are Breakout alum shows in ceramic pots made by the artist, line the part-painting, part-sculpture, and they use ceramics, prints and a virtual black steel shelves. Grow lights illuminate many of the artist's signature elements: body that glitches the various sections. Stacks of books serve as burnt red oak, black soap, shea butter, discomfort we all feel inside. both cultural signifiers and visual markers: mirrored tiles, books, plants. Taking up “Sellout: The Politics of Racial Betrayal” by most of each piece is a blocky outline of a 4 William Blake and the Randall Kennedy, “The Souls of Black Folk” man, head down, feet in the air. The wall Age of Aquarius. by W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Concept of text likens the men to superheroes or chalk Block Museum of Art. Fifty Anxiety” by Søren Kierkegaard, “The End of outlines. To me they are everyday people years after the summer of love, Blackness” by Debra J. Dickerson, and the weighed down by the world and looking for this show explores the Alcoholics Anonymous “Big Book” are just a escape. “I don’t see them as trapped— influences of the quintessential few examples. Though the piece is more like they’ve accepted their fate,” the English artist and poet on the monumental in size, the objects it contains— artist has said of the series. While the men psychedelic counterculture of books, Persian rugs, potted plants, etc.— “seem to be falling, they could also be seen 1960s America. are familiar, domestic. The grid itself almost as flying.” In a world that continually makes seems like something you could piece us heavy with grief, the falling men conjure 5 Leslie Baum. together after several trips to IKEA. It is a a feeling of weightlessness. As Morrison Cleve Carney Art Gallery. great example of the openness that writes, “You wanna fly, you got to give up Simple, colorful forms shift characterizes Johnson’s work, an accessi- the shit that weighs you down.” between painting, sculpture bility that serves as a key to his early and installation. success. As the MAM website prominently Rashid Johnson’s “Hail We Now Sing Joy,” notes, Forbes recently named Johnson shows through September 17 at the 76 “one of the four or five most important Milwaukee Art Museum, 700 North Art contemporary American artists.” Museum Drive, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED Eugene Von Bruenchenhein, untitled (fowl bone chairs), John Michael Kohler Arts Center Collection. Photo: Rich Maciejewski. Chicken bones...an ordinary thing made extraordinary Featuring works by Emery Blagdon, Loy Bowlin, David Butler, Mary Nohl, Eugene Von Bruenchenhein, and Stella Waitzkin. FREE ADMISSIONThis exhibition is supported in part by a grant from the Wisconsin Arts Board with funds from the State of Wisconsin, the Wisconsin Department of Tourism, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Funding was also provided by the Institute of Museum and Library Services, Kohler Trust for the Arts and Education, Kohler Foundation, Inc., Herzfeld Foundation, and Sargento Foods Inc. L to R: by Beverly Mayeri, by John Cederquist, by Kim Cridler, Racine Art MuseumVisit America’s Largest Contemporary Craft CollectionLearn more about Racine Art Museum exhibitions and events at ramart.orgSeptember 17 – December 30 75 at 75: Significant Works from RAM’s Collection Paul Smith: Masters of CraftThrough January 21, 2018 Variations on a Theme: Vessels from RAM’s CollectionThrough July 22, 2018 Unpacking Karen Johnson Boyd’s Clay Collection at RAMRacine Art Museum Racine, Wisconsin 262.638.8300 ramart.org
THE NEUBAUER COLLEGIUM RICHARD GRAY GALLERYFOR CULTURE AND SOCIETY Richard Gray Gallery, Hancock: 875 N. Michigan Avenue, 38th FloorAt the University of Chicago Mon–Fri 10-5:30, Sat 11-55701 S. Woodlawn Avenue Gray Warehouse: 2044 W. Carroll Avenue773 795 2329 Wed–Sat [email protected] / www.neubauercollegium.uchicago.edu 312 642 8877Mon–Fri 11-5, Sat–Sun closed [email protected] / www.richardgraygallery.comSeptember 12–December 15 Terence Gower: Havana Case Study September 14–November 11 Jaume Plensa: Secret GardenTHE RENAISSANCE SOCIETY (Gray Warehouse) September 14–November 11 Jaume Plensa: One Thought FillsAt the University of Chicago5811 S. Ellis Ave., Cobb Hall, 4th Floor Immensity (Richard Gray Gallery, Hancock)773 702 8670 September 13–17 EXPO [email protected] / www.renaissancesociety.orgTues–Fri 10-5, Sat–Sun 12-5 SCHINGOETHE CENTERSeptember 9–November 5 Jennifer Packer: Tenderheaded of Aurora UniversityRHONA HOFFMAN GALLERY 1315 Prairie Street, Aurora, IL 630 844 7843118 N. Peoria Street [email protected] / www.aurora.edu/museum312 455 1990 Mon 10-4, Tues 10-7, Wed–Fri [email protected] / www.rhoffmangallery.com September 28–December 13 Strange Weather: Nathalie MiebachTues–Fri 10-5:30, Sat 11-5:30September 8–October 14 Nathaniel Mary Quinn: Nothing’s Funny SMART MUSEUM OF ARTSeptember 8–October 14 James Wines: Arch-Art: A Conduit At the University of Chicago for Context 5550 S. Greenwood AvenueSeptember 13–17 EXPO CHICAGO, Booth 419 773 702 0200 [email protected] / smartmuseum.uchicago.edu Tues–Wed 10-5, Thurs 10-8, Fri–Sun 10-5 September 12–Summer 2018 Emmanuel Pratt: Radical [Re]Constructions September 14–January 14, 2018 Revolution Everyday September 14–December 17 The Hysterical Material
Dance DANCE TOP 5Newcity SEPTEMBER 2017In Discomfort, Beauty 1 Shen Wei Dance Arts. Rehearsal of (((waver)). Photo: Ji Yang. Auditorium Theatre. The Carole McCurdy Blends Argentine MacArthur \"Genius\" Award-winning Tango and Butoh at De brillator choreographer and designer, famed for choreographing the Beijing By Sharon Hoyer Olympics Opening Ceremony, brings two gorgeously surreal visions to the Each year, the Chicago Dancemakers becomes a mature love affair. When you’re Auditorium stage. September 23 & 24 Forum bestows upon a handful of choreogra- dancing in a close embrace with a partner, phers a no-strings grant to create and present there are moments of intense connections 2 Orphée et Eurydice. new, innovative work. All styles are welcome where you lose yourself, your partner loses Lyric Opera.This rst-ever and dozens of dancers from classical, modern, themselves and you become one being on the collaboration between the Lyric street, rhythmic, postmodern traditions and oor; that’s the hook. But there are moments Opera and the Joffrey Ballet features beyond have been able to dive deeply into of miscommunication or missed signals. All the full company performing their creative processes thanks to CDF lab that is very much in my mind putting this choreography from the acclaimed grants. Carole McCurdy is one of last year's together. John Neumeier, in Gluck's rendition recipients and presents the fruits of her labor of the classic tragedy. September September 15-23 at De brillator Gallery. Her Butoh came into my life in 2004 when I moved 23-October 15 project \"(((waver))\" pulls from two very different back to Chicago and was exploring other dance forms that have captured her imagina- forms. I took a workshop with Nicole LeGette 3 Chicago Human Rhythm tion—Argentine tango and butoh—to explore and something about butoh I connected with Project. Dance Center of the embrace of otherness, and the eternal in the way I connected with tango. It’s not Columbia College. Rhythmic dances wavering \"between female and male, presence social; in fact it’s almost asocial and perhaps ranging from conceptual pieces by and nostalgia, attention and forgetting.\" not even quite human, but to me the link was CHRP's new artist-in-residence Dani about this capacity for feeling the world Borak to Michelle Dorrance's thrilling What drew you to these two very dispa- differently through transformation. In tango you blend of blues and tap round out an rate dance forms? do it by connecting with another body and eclectic bill. September 21-23 I started with social dance forms—swing, feeling the world with and through another salsa—then I moved on to Argentine tango body. In butoh you’re doing it with your own 4 Blackbird's Ventriloquy. Links and the other dances fell away. I got so body—you drop your conventions about what Hall. Molly Shanahan/Mad Shak hooked—I take yearly trips to Buenos it means to move through the world. continues her investigation of Aires—and really fell in love with it. Any time movement norms and the exchange you get deeply involved in a dance form the You’ve been working on this project for between audience and performer in problems and challenges of it emerge and it almost a year and you’ve made state- this fresh iteration of her ongoing \"Blackbird\" project. September 22-30 5 Visceral Dance. North Shore Center for the Performing Arts. Visceral's fth season features new works by artistic director Nick Pupillo and Princess Grace Choreography Fellowship recipient Danielle Agami. September 1680
ments about how this piece is about the community you’re in, could be considered through you. Ideas of gracefulness andembracing Otherness within and without. aggressive. All these ways the boundary elegance versus something that’s even,I was wondering how these themes may between external and internal manifests is maybe raunchy. I think it’s there in both forms.have changed or evolved throughout the problematic and delicious in tango; multiple The cliché of tango is that it’s elegant and it’sprocess. levels of dissolving the boundaries. In butoh I sexy. And for sure there’s a sexiness in itBecause we’ve been working on this for a long think the internal/external divide is the whole because you’re feeling another personspan of time there have been moments when playing field. A really strong butoh performer intensely, and that resonates with the idea ofone or the other of us will disappear for a will be able to project the energy way past the sexual intimacy. But of course it’s not sexualreason—extended vacations or trips, people walls of the performance space, or past the intimacy; it’s actually just intimacy. And that’swho have left for one reason or another. Things boundaries of the city. a whole area in a lot of our cultures that isget dropped and picked up again over the forbidden and makes people uncomfortable.course of time. The other valence that comes There’s another dichotomy between these It is the biggest learning curve in tango: beingthrough is a sense of wavery-ness in terms of forms I want to ask you about. Tango is in someone else’s arms and them being intime. Things seem to disappear and reemerge. earthy, but it is also elegant—these are your arms, and allowing yourself to be held.Nostalgia is a big theme in tango music; I’m generalizations, but I think it's fair to sayseeing that happen a lot. tango could be characterized as elegant. Most of the people I know are on the And butoh tends toward the grotesque… spectrum of social justice warriors and there’sOne striking thing about both tango and It can be. I don’t think those generalizations a lot there about personal space. And forbutoh is the idea of listening closely: in are wrong, but as I’ve been exploring these damn good reason. With tango you aretango to your partner, externally, and in two forms I see so many ways the characters offering yourself to be held and maybe holdbutoh, internally. In your notes about this of these dances are super broad and mutable someone you might disagree with or mightpiece you talk about the self needing to and can evolve for individual performers and not particularly like at that moment. So thedisappear in both forms. I was wondering as genres. Despite the fact that there’s a very sense that you’re willingly bridging theseif you run into challenges striking a limited vocabulary in tango for the most boundaries is awkward and uncomfortable…balance between having to be attentive to sense—you’re basically grounded and you’re what I’m trying to get at is that I want towhat’s happening both outside and very either stepping forward, backward, to the side respond to the beauty in that discomfort. A lotdeeply within? or across yourself—but once those vocabu- of butoh can be uncomfortable to watch—I don’t even think I need to add anything. That lary elements get combined there’s unlimited body movements or facial expressions thatreally captures the idea that we create a strong expression two people can create with it. might not be beautiful to look at. We canboundary between inside and outside. In social There’s a kind of contract between the two open up our idea of beauty to include thingstheory we talk about creating personal dancers to work within that vocabulary and that are not easy.boundaries. In Argentina, if you are introduced be totally open and not anticipate. To me thisto a stranger, you put your arms around them resonates with butoh, which is about being in At De brillator Gallery, 1463 West Chicago,and kiss them on the cheek—that’s polite. the moment as a performer in the space, also Friday-Sunday, September 15-17 andWhereas doing that in the US, depending on allowing other spaces and times to channel Thursday-Saturday, September 21-23 at 9pm.TASTE OF SUNDAY, CLARKOCTOBER 1, 2017 STREET 2-6 p.m. In Rogers Park Experience the diverse flavors SEPTEMBER 2017 Newcity of Clark Street in Rogers Park.Food / Music / Crafts / Beer & Wine Tastings Tickets and Info at rpba.org 81
Design Epicenter of Elegance The Making of River North Design District By Michael Workman It’s a particular kind of civic challenge to Starting with a handful of members including that successful contemporary art gallery build up part of a city as a district, a challenge Golden Triangle, Montauk Sofa and Organic districts need to thrive. There are essential rooted in the careful cultivation of image, allies, Looms, alongside Casa Spazio/Jesse/Home differences, of course: though it’s nonsensical resources and reputation. In fact, for the better Element—whose owner Mike Cao has served to equate art’s value with its price tag, design as RNDD’s president since the beginning—the is functional and inherently more commercial. part of the past decade and a half, Jill Maremont has been doing just that in the River effort has since grown to encompass affiliate History, of course, is important too. If enough North neighborhood, striving to brand the area members outside the neighborhood, including people invest in showcasing Chicago as a worldwide as a mecca for international design law firms, outside designers, craftsmen and capital of design innovation, informed as it is outside the powerhouse real estate of the others, though the effort’s focus remains on by the vanguardist influences of the New Merchandise Mart. The Mart, owned by the showrooms. “The Mart really anchors that Bauhaus, Buckminster Fuller, György Kepes, Vornado Realty, one of the largest commercial neighborhood, so all of these showrooms sort Massimo Vignelli, Mies and the vast spectrum real estate firms in New York, veritably oozes of pop up around because it’s really conve- of others, it could provide an important luxury commerce. But just as the massive Mart nient to hit the ones at the Mart, then hit the socio-economic and cultural lure rarely found building is delimited by its own zip code, its ones outside of the Mart. Everything is elsewhere. In any case, Maremont and fellow shops are often seen as off-limits to the wider consolidated in one spot,” says Maremont. RNDD members recognize the audience-culti- public. “The Merchandise Mart can be a little “But what I’ve really been helping with is the vation value of embracing visual art as a intimidating and a lot of the showrooms are for branding. Nobody called it the River North component of their programming, especiallyNewcity SEPTEMBER 2017 designers only, and so the thing about the Design District until I started telling people concurrent with the opening of EXPO and the district is that it’s open to everyone,” explains that’s what it was called. It was something that launch of the Chicago Architecture Biennial. In we basically created.” fact, with the help of committee chair Lisa Bell, Maremont. “Designers are much of the Maremont and the RNDD membership clientele of these showrooms, but it’s meant so Not all such ventures are successful long-term. typically spend as much as nine months of the that the public can feel comfortable walking Witness the West Loop gallery district that, for year planning for it. into them off the street.” And they’re literally a time, was a thriving zone for contemporary everywhere in the surrounding blocks, art. Modeled on New York’s Chelsea neighbor- “There are a lot of galleries in the neighborhood countless design studios and showrooms radiating out from every direction around the hood and spearheaded by Kavi Gupta gallery, and we have really, really embraced that. This Mart—showrooms Maremont now counts as the district-building attempt stagnated as year it’s our third annual walk which, on the among the membership of the River North rising rental prices drove out most of the first Friday after Labor Day, it’s the biggest Design District, or RNDD. grass-roots and small- to mid-size galleries season to buy art and what we’ve done is82
Featuring Michael Del Piero of GOOD Design/ Photo: Janet Mesic Mackie DESIGN TOP 5 piggyback onto their date and it’s actually North as a destination for luxury goods might 1 Chicago Architecture gotten so big that we have thousands of be off-putting to those whom might consider Biennial. Chicago Cultural people that come through and every single the perceived price points themselves as a Center and throughout the city. showroom has an event, we have a kickoff matter of inaccessibility. Maremont argues The architecture capital of the party, an after-party, and it all sells out every that’s precisely the purpose for all this world asserts its reputation with year. This year, we’re pairing designers with programming they’re putting on: that it’s a vigor as the sophomore edition artists and they set up a vignette within the chance to take a closer look. “For example, brings out 141 practitioners from showroom and you get something really the Golden Triangle, it might look intimidating twenty countries, from its home to creative and cool within the windows and because of the location, and it all looks so more than ten anchor sites and people can pop in, have a drink, have a bite cool, but they have things that everybody can program partners. Fortunately, it then move onto the next.” There are at least afford, and they have sales throughout the runs from September 16 to sixteen showrooms this year with pairing such year,” she asserts, also arguing that invest- January 7, so you have some time as Aimee Wertepny of Project Interiors with ment in durable goods is fundamentally about to take it all in. artists Jill King and Sheila Ganch, displayed at valuing sustainability. “I also think that people, Toto; Susan Brunstrum/Sweet Peas Design maybe especially young people, are starting to 2 Past Forward: with Casey Matthews at Chicago Luxury Beds; realize that if they buy an IKEA sofa, it’s not Architecture and Design and Nicholas Moriarty with Magdalena Krzak going to last forever. Then they’re just at the Art Institute. Art Institute at Ligne Roset, all of them curated by Daniel contributing to a landfill. So contribute as of Chicago. The AIC dramatically Kinkade of Daniel Kinkade Fine Art. much as you can for a sofa that’s going to last, ups its A&D game with the then in ten years reupholster it and you’ll have opening of its new permanent It’s an effort that took place over months of it for your whole life.” collection of modern and contem- planning, meetings and detailed collaboration. porary architecture and design on“I narrowed the list down from my roster of It’s these kinds of community-service notions September 12. artists to mainly local artists who had not had that have so far helped make River North a recent Chicago show, were new to my roster, echo in the minds of design enthusiasts as 3 River North Design or who hadn’t had exposure to designers or on par with L.A.’s La Cienega and the Miami District Fall Gallery Walk. the RNDD crowd,” explains Kinkade. “From Design District, both of which were inspira- River North. On a night that used there, we asked each designer to pick three tions for Maremont from the start. Building on to be the biggest visual art night favorites and, based upon their feedback, the those ideas of outreach and sustainability of the fall, the RNDD has stepped style of each showroom, the designers’ styles remains a central concern of the district’s in with design “dash,” with and feedback from artists, we matched them development, and central to its year-round special events and seventeen up.” It’s a program that’s generating notable programming. “A lot of our projects are showrooms open till 9pm. frissons of excitement among the participants. meant as inspiration,” says Maremont. “So,“We love art and having the opportunity to see what we’ve done the last couple of years is 4 David Hartt: in the forest. new work is very exciting,” says Michael Del we’ve done a Pecha Kucha format in which Graham Foundation. Massive Piero of GOOD Design, who was paired with we come up with a topic, which is a little installation revisits architect Moshe artist Greg Dickerson, “an artist we adore, will different from how you’d normally do it, then Safdie’s unfinished 1968 Habitat be the featured artist at Oscar Isberian Rugs. invite around five designers to come speak Puerto Rico project, opening Collected studio and ancient pottery from my about what’s inspiring them now.” September 14. travels will then be shown alongside their exceptional rug collection and Greg’s artwork.” The River North Design District Gallery Walk 5 Renegade Craft Fair. opens with special programs the night of Wicker Park, September 9 & Given all this commerce then, it’s a fair September 8, with projects continuing through 10. Get crafty with the 400 makers question as to whether the reputation of River October 8. setting up shop on Division Street, between Ashland and Damen.
&DiDnirningkingNewcity SEPTEMBER 2017 In Service of Sushi DINING & Diana Muntean and Joon Soh/Photo: Lauren Cornell DRINKING TOP 5 SuChi and the Making of a Restaurant 1 Taste of Polonia. By Danielle Levsky Copernicus Center. Zapiekanka, Flaki, Bigos; Joon Soh loves to sit at a sushi bar while top-quality sushi, affordably priced and delivered Polish food is so much drinking sake and sampling different types of with the kind of attention-to-detail service that more than pierogis. sashimi and nigiri. He enjoys chatting with chefs keeps customers coming back. about their food, their craft. Eleven years before September 1-4 he opened Ora, a sushi bar in Andersonville, Nae admits that he also wanted to get into the Soh worked in accounting and marketing; on business for his wife, Diana Muntean, who 2 Third Annual the side, he was constantly seeking out “good co-owns SuChi Sushi with Soh and Nae. Muntean SchnitzelFest. hidden restaurants.” worked in the medical field for four to five years Bohemian House. Guest before she began to explore her passion for chefs prepare their own Soh always thought he might want to be a cooking. “I wanted to give her this opportunity,” interpretations of the restaurant owner. He was sure that if he ever Nae says. “To enjoy life, to enjoy something that classic pan-fried cutlet. did open one, it would be a sushi bar. she wanted to do, even if it would not be so easy.” Beer will be involved because… Octoberfest. Between 2012 and 2017, Soh was Ora’s proud Muntean liked the idea of offering fresh and owner, but he had many more ideas he wanted delicious food to customers quickly, at a value September 16-22 to explore. He found a partnership with his friend price, with excellent service. Julian Nae, who owns a contracting company in 3 Chicago Chicago. In 2015, they started bouncing different “I’ve been cooking daily,” Muntean says. “I’ve VeganMania. ideas off each other for a new restaurant venture. been learning how to make maki and have even Broadway Armory. They were ready for a change of pace, and they felt the desire to create new rolls.” A celebration of compa- wanted to explore a different format. ssionate culture, or To help them run and market their new venture, something. September 23 “I do like sushi,” Nae says. “But when I go to a the owners hired a team of sushi chefs, including sushi place, I have the feeling that I’m spending Chef Jeff Waiyachote, and a general manager 4 Chicago Gourmet. a lot of money,” a feeling we’ve all had, though and marketing manager, Lauren Cornell, who had Millennium Park. we’ve understood that the best fish is going to previously worked alongside chefs in the kitchen. It’s the tenth anniversary cost more. Soh sought to subvert that paradigm. “I understand the rushes they may go through of Chicago’s premier food So, when the team opened SuChi Sushi in May at and the different forms of communication they’re festival; gets better every 651 West Washington, their goal was to provide receiving,” Cornell says. “I feel that understanding year. September 19-24 5 Oktoberfest Chicago. Southport and Lincoln. Beer, pretzels, bands, you know the drill. September 29-October 184
all aspects of our business allows me to be free,” Cornell says. “I wanted to make sure our in that. They concentrate on hiring friendly, a bridge between our teammates and the menu was accessible.” respectful people from the get-go; then they different experiences they have.” focus some serious customer-service training. “Plus, I love poké and sushi burritos, so I told Cornell and Soh lead by example, occasionallyThe constant communication between all the the team that I need to eat those,” she jokes. offering complimentary beverages, being team members propels their efforts to hold respectful and helpful with customers’ children, their food and service to very high standards. Soh and Nae’s focus on good quality fish is opening doors for people and memorizing essential to the success of their menu items. regulars’ orders. Seemingly little stuff like that“I think of our customers like my family,” Soh They have a two-three-day turnover for the means a lot to customers. says. “I serve my family good food, and I want fish and avoid using prepackaged frozen fish. to do the same thing for our customers.” They receive fish whole and filet them in-house “We pride ourselves on basic courtesies that as soon as they arrive, alternating between can sometimes go overlooked in a restaurant Soh focuses on the little things, like knowing different vendors, including True World Foods, setting,” Cornell says. “Because many of us how much soy sauce to use or catering to JFC, Yamasho and Martinez. More Asian-cui- come from a customer-service background, customers’ requests with urgency. To him, “a little too much service is we want to provide the warm better than too little.” experience of visiting family. Our employees recognize that and Nae likes that the restaurant is laid follow that because they know it out so customers have a clear view makes a difference.” into the kitchen, so that everyone can interact with chefs and witness Customer Jimmy Liddar, who has the cooking process. The restau- eaten poké across the whole city, rant space is designed to break says that SuChi Sushi’s Fresh Tune down barriers. Poké is the best he’s had and with the most generous portion of fresh In the kitchen, the SuChi Sushi fish. He often comes into SuChi menu development team—Munte- Sushi twice in a single day. “They an, Cornell and Waiyachote—have have the friendliest staff and been refining the menu during their ownership that I’ve come across in soft opening to bring new flavors to the West Loop,” Liddar says. “The their customers. final slice of pie to me is that they’re open on Monday and the fish is still The menu development team has fresh! There’s never been such a also been looking to experiment fast and affordable sushi place like with different textures, like fried this west of the river.” garlic slices, ikura (salmon roe) and even ingredients from other food genres “to Poké/Photo: Jill LoBianco-Bartalis In the future, in addition to take- bring new flavors into the sushi.” Their rice is based on a special recipe, as well, with sine-specific products come from H-Mart away, catering and delivery services, the vinegars and seasonings that create a citrus-like, fresh and tangy flavor. and Joong Boo Market Chicago. owners hope to explore opportunities like Waiyachote, who works often during dinner franchising and food trucks. hours, has been in the process of creating a roll with a base of tuna and yellowtail, “If we can’t get the highest quality salmon sticking to the basics of maki with little-to- from one company, we get it from another,” “We’ve thought about specialized franchise no sauce. Though it’s still in the process of branches, for instance, a poké food truck, being developed, he wants his menus to Soh says. “We are always looking for the provide “a fresh bite” for customers. Muntean a Korean BBQ kind of place,” Cornell says. is also working on new rolls, experimenting best vendors.” with bringing other culinary cuisines into “Having a specialized menu at each location her recipes. So SuChi Sushi delivers quality, but how about ensures quality.” To better serve their vegetarian customers, Cornell has been developing the Oompa their goal of keeping the prices down? All their With a poké food truck, Nae hopes to Loompa roll, which will have a base of sweet potato and should satisfy veggie-enthusiasts rolls, which are generously portioned, come who enjoy more spicy rolls. in at $11; compare that to the $17 signature establish schedules and delivery systems, advertising food truck times on their website Allergy sensitivity is important to the team, and sushi rolls at the also excellent and nearby especially to Cornell, who herself is gluten-free and social media. Soh continues to travel for and dairy-free.Their alternating menu options Kamehachi on Wacker or the $12-$18 rolls offer vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, pea- restaurant research, comparing different sushi nut-free and rice substitutions (fresh spring at Ryo Sushi on Madison. greens). Two of their specialties, the Kamikaze places and learning about takeout models. SuChi Burrito and the Fresh Tuna Poké Bowl, are available in gluten-free options. Because they want their menu to be accessi- Sushi has long had tremendous popularity.“I sat down with the team and we looked at ble, they focus on providing quality sushi at all the rolls, figured out what was already an affordable price by building efficiencies into According to June 2017 data research gluten-free and what we could make gluten- sourced from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, their system that enable them to minimize Sushi Encyclopedia and Asia-Pacific Journal, operating expenses. They cut costs where possible—like using cost-effective packaging there were 3,946 sushi restaurants in the US between 2010 and 2014, reflecting a twen- materials, minimizing dine-in service and ty-eight percent increase reflected in U.S. eliminating dishes and tables—all without SEPTEMBER 2017 Newcity sushi consumption. sacrificing the quality of the fish. “Everything is a formula,” Cornell says. “We But for Nae, it’s simple. He loves sushi for its know how much every roll costs, down to the natural flavors and fresh ingredients. The minute that it takes to make it. Our upfront variety of sushi and styles—fried, raw, sauced, costs are lower because of our small format, plain, non-fish proteins—make it accessible so we’re able to price our sushi as competi- to a much wider audience. tively as possible.” “It’s also visually beautiful,” Nae says. “You Visitors praise SuChi Sushi’s service extensive- take your time and savor the flavor of every ly and the owners and management take pride piece, every bite.” 85
Film “Lola, 15” FILM TOP 5 Jennifer Reeder’s 1 Dawson City: Frozen Time. Successive Moves Siskel. The latest, great film by Bill Morrison (“Decasia”) washes A First Feature, “Signature Move,” And Beyond over the brain like cool, cool history: an intricate singularity, a historical By Ray Pride palimpsest and of course, a visual hallucination that is a cinematicNewcity SEPTEMBER 2017 After twenty-two years of making shorts— psychological weight, as well as being gold rush that I could gush about including nine completed since 2011—Chica- richly feminine and, well, definitively in for pages but prefer to point go independent writer-director Jennifer Reeder Reeder-world. emphatically in its direction. has risen to a feature, “Signature Move,” which Indeed! Plus a sense of place as narrative, premieres at the Music Box after appearing at like all the close-up establishing shots at the September 16, 19-20 more than sixty festivals around the world. beginning. I love shots like that, plus keeping (Its producers include Newcity’s Brian and the wrestling-club stuff really pink and sexy. 2 Killer Of Sheep. Siskel. Jan Hieggelke.) Among prizes along the way, Totally tough but really feminine also. And the Charles Burnett’s brilliant Reeder’s film won the U.S. narrative feature music, of course, hand-picked by me. Music is Los Angeles 1978 neorealist prize at Outfest in Los Angeles in July. Read deeply important in previous shorts of mine, as classic returns in a restored edition. more about the Chicago-centric multicultural you know. And it felt super-important to keep Bountiful in sound and image and love-and-wrestling unlikely love story-comedy this soundtrack super-sexy but also, yes, understated performance, it’s an and its production in Brian’s making-of feminine, so with the exception of a few tracks, American masterpiece that’s recounting in Newcity’s October issue. it’s all music by women of color! The idea to absolutely necessary to know. keep the Pakistani soap-opera audio-only and “Signature Move,” while based on a rewrite all that dialogue to create a sub-plot/ September 9, 13 screenplay by your lead actor Fawzia parallel narrative, it’s all related to how I have Mirza, is discernibly a Reeder effort, like used whispering girls or texting in the previous 3 Columbus. Music Box. your shorts brightly colored and highly shorts. I hope that some of me shines through Video essayist Kogonada’s tactile in ways that carry substantial and that it also shows that my range can first feature is an elegant telling of a love affair set within the expanses of the southeastern Indiana town with the bounty of modernist architectural commissions. Opens Friday, September 8 4 Desert Hearts. Siskel. Donna Deitch’s rapturous 1959-set lesbian romance, released in 1986, returns in a Janus Films-Criterion 4K restoration. September 3, 7 5 Holy Smoke. Chicago Film Society, Northeastern Illinois University. Jane Campion’s overlooked 1999 love tempest between Kate Winslet and Harvey Keitel, shown on the CFS’ very own 35mm print. September 2086
include goofy comedy and not just moody- You shot something impromptu the Reviews broody teen-angsty. week you were in LA for Outfest? The short I shot in LA was commissioned Columbus Just how much shit do you have going by the Festival Du Nouveau De Cinema (FNC) A strange and beautiful place, Columbus, on? It’s daunting. in Montreal. It’s a really lovely festival, which Indiana, in the midst of cornfields and My next feature, “As With Knives And Skin” gave me a mini-retrospective last year. countryside and home to 46,000 people is shooting next summer I am currently This year, they asked a few filmmakers to and a cool range of architectural commissions getting the script in shape and we will start make a special film just for them. So I am from modern architects including I.M. Pei, casting this fall. I just finished a short called making a tiny doc—yes, a doc!—about the Harry Weese, Robert Venturi, Eero and Eliel“All Small Bodies,” which is a US-German bedroom of a teen girl [“Lola, 15,” pictured]. Saarinen and César Pelli. (Seven of the co-production. I shot it last summer in It will be a lovely standalone film but also a buildings are National Historic Landmarks.) Germany with German producers and German kind of proof of concept for a longer doc It’s a dreamy all-American clash, the beautiful funding. It’s a loose take-slash-feminist version project about teen-girl bedrooms across of form made strange placed up against the of the “Hansel and Gretel” fairytale. And I’m the world, other cultures, other socioeconomic visual iconography of the placid Midwest. working on a feature-length adaptation of it. situations. I love these commissions, they Walking the small town’s streets is one It’s an interesting time for women and the give me an opportunity to work on something happy hallucination after another. Highly-re- horror-thriller genre. I am in! super new and fresh and work quickly and spected, oft-lyrical video essayist-turned-writ- just get an idea out there, and everyone gets er-director-editor Kogonada’s first feature, Are shorts a workable thing for you bec- paid! Before the feature-length next summer “Columbus,” is an elegantly paced, serenely ause of the velocity you’ve been producing is a short, in the form of a trailer, called composed telling of an encounter set within and showing them at? Or because sud- “And Then She Is The Darkness,” which the expanses of the southeastern Indiana denly you’re getting sustained attention was a commission from Kickstarter. It’s a town. Here’s how Seoul-born-but-Midwest- from festivals and programmers? teen witch story! proud Kogonada has described his first sight I keep making shorts because I cannot stand of the place: “I read about this mecca of to not be making something and I have lots of These strangely affecting stills from modernist architecture in the farmlands of ideas, which, frankly, are better suited for a “Lola, 15” that I have here, these are Indiana. Walking around, I encountered… short form. I mean, so many feature films I see cross-fades, or superimpositions? an undeniable poignancy to it all—this quiet should be about eighty minutes shorter. But Yes, yes! Long lingering cross-fade. Multi- town in the conservative Midwest functioning also there are so many wonderful, as well as layers of colored lights and a dreamcatcher as a living (and ghostly) museum to the and financially fruitful, film festivals which cham- and the girl skating. That is how I can remain promise of modernism.” Following that pion the short form. Plus it’s prepared me for authentic but still create my own pathos. inspiration, his screenplay charts a meeting of the episodic [format] which seems to be every- two strangers, a native (Haley Lu Richardson) one’s jam right now. Short films are people, too, “Signature Move” opens Friday, September 29 and a visitor (John Cho) whose architect father and not just calling cards for feature-lengths. went into a coma while touring the town. at the Music Box. SEPTEMBER 2017 Newcity 87
Both contemplate loss and grief. Edison, showmen Alexander Pantages and Sid Grauman and Kogonada’s favored filmmakers include Yasujiro Ozu and Kore-eda even Donald J. Trump’s grandfa- ther Friedrich, who launched a Hirokazu, and their influence is worn lightly but well in his assured bordello there. The auteur 164 North State Street • Between Lake & Randolph excavates, and the connections debut. Emotion swells, and theDOLORES made are blissful in their rangy landscape, the frames and the SEPT 22 - 28 strangeness. Alex Somers’ score utopian architecture inextricablyTHE STORY OF DOLORES HUERTA is a persistent beauty. fuse to entrancing effect. With NEW FROM THE DARDENNE BROTHERS! Rory Culkin, Michelle Forbes,THE Parker Posey. 104m. (Ray Pride) I presented the late Sam Fuller aUNKNOWN copy of his first book from 1944 toGIRL “Columbus” opens Friday, sign, and after a blurt of gratified SEPT 22 - OCT 5 September 8 at the Music Box. swears, he inscribed it in blocky Kogonada will appear old-man print: “To Ray, This Proves BUY TICKETS NOW at opening weekend. You Were Born To Up-Dig.” No sir, www.siskelfilmcenter.org that would be Bill Morrison, the TEEN LIVING PROGRAMS’ Dawson City: Frozen Time man who was born to up-dig. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 27 As a film critic, you’re always Miss this cockamamie bliss, this 6:30 -9:30 PM hoping for that one movie that’s onrushing marvel, at your risk. CHICAGO CULTURAL CENTER PRESTON BRADLEY HALL sui generis, but also an amalgam 120m. (Ray Pride) 78 EAST WASHINGTON STREET of all the many, many things that Ante up and join us for TLP’s movies can do, some kind of bold, “Dawson City: Frozen Time” Annual Casino Night in La La Land! bristling charge toward an ideal of returns to the Siskel September movie perfection. Right? But when 16 and 19-20. Step into Seb’s Jazz Club to try your you find one… how do you write luck at casino games including craps, Manolo: The Boy Who Made blackjack, roulette, and texas hold’em. about its spell, its hold, without Shoes For Lizards Tickets include open bar, spoiling its magic? Here’s one hors d’oeuvres, raffle prizes, and 150 that’s puzzled me after a burst of Glimpses of the self-described points in chips for casino games! All proceeds from bedazzling. “Dawson City: Frozen “cobbler” to the world of fashion this event will support the services TLP provides for Time,” the latest, extraordinary film and hundred-thousandaires by Bill Morrison, washes over the everywhere, Manolo Blahnik, young people experiencing homelessness. working at designs at home or brain like cool, cool history: an For more information and to purchase tickets, visit intricate singularity and a cinematic on the factory floor are the tlpchicago.org/events/tlp-casino-night gold rush that I could gush about liveliest moments of the diverting process-and-praise documentary tlpchicago.org for hours but would rather point emphatically in its direction. I’ve “Manolo: The Boy Who Made tried a few approaches since first Shoes For Lizards.” Veteran fashion journalist Michael Roberts, glimpsing it that all collapsed, a friend of Manolo Blahnik for three spent, into piles of approving adjectives. In films like “Decasia” decades, directs, with behind-the- (2002), Morrison applied imagina- scenes interviews and testimony tive verve to bursts of celluloid film from a raft of the expected stock that had decayed across the suspects who have praised, worn decades, warping, flaking, melting. or touted his creations: “Sex and Morrison constructed a montage the City”’s Candace Bushnell, Vogue’s Anna Wintour, photogra- of fiction and fact, but largely a dream, always melting, the found pher David Bailey, Isaac Mizrahi, Rihanna, Paloma Picasso, Iman, footage edited into fantastically Naomi Campbell, Rupert Everett expressive motion. and Andre Leon Talley. The lyrical but consistently The gentility of the overall staggering “Dawson City” is a wholly other manner of found-foot- enterprise is well-represented by Blahnik’s own estimation: “the age film, 533 lost reels of nitrate images are exquisite and they film from the 1910s to twenties represent real glimpses of my life; unearthed in the Yukon Territory designing shoes, long periods where the cache of newsreels and bits of fiction had been buried working at the manufacturers, or enjoying the tranquility of an for fifty years in permafrost in a sub-arctic ice rink near Diamond English country garden.” And, indicating his substantial joie de Tooth Gertie’s Gambling Hall in a Gold Rush town. Morrison’s gift for vivre: “I just keep going, keep going! I just want to keep making suggestive montage is undimin- beautiful shoes!” 89m. (Ray Pride) ished, but in contemplating why these reels wound up way up north, he becomes a chieftain “Manolo: The Boy Who Made of documentary kismet, weaving Shoes For Lizards” opens Friday, a history of early Hollywood, September 22 at the Music Box. manifest destiny and figures like Shoeless Joe Jackson, Jack London, Robert Service, Thomas
Lit LIT TOP 5 Come In 1 The Readymade Thief. From the Cold American Writers Museum. Augustus Rose reads from his An Insider Views the Outside as debut novel “The Readymade Keir Graff Discusses “Montana Noir” Thief” which is full of puzzles, conspiracies, secret societies, By Toni Nealie urban exploration, art history and an indomitable heroine.Newcity SEPTEMBER 2017 Keir Graff knows what it’s like to be an the Condor” fame. Part of the successful outsider. He moved from Montana to Noir series by Akashic Books, its contribu- September 5, 5pm Chicago twenty-one years ago, hoping to tors include the editors, as well as Thomas build a literary life. Ambition achieved— McGuane, Walter Kirn and Debra Magpie 2 Code of the West. he’s well known as executive editor of Earling. Crime fiction lends itself to outsiders, Women and Children First. Booklist Publications at the American Library Graff believes. “A lot of time the characters Sahar Mustafah launches her Association, which provides information to are living outside of society or they don’t first collection, “Code of the help librarians shape their book buying. quite fit in or know how to make it work.” West” about native and He is the author of four novels for adults, These marginalized, out-of-kilter characters immigrant Palestinians. in addition to his “The Matchstick Castle” for include a cattle inseminator, a boxer and in middle graders. Recognized as one of the Graff’s own story “Red Skies of Montana,” September 8, 7:30pm city’s influencers on Newcity’s Lit 50 list, Graff an Indian immigrant turned ski-lodge also co-hosts with Javier Ramirez Publishing custodian who encounters a pair of arsonists. 3 Poison Girls. 57th Street Cocktails, a regular event to welcome There is tension in the big sky land and Books. Veteran journalist people into the Chicago literary scene. fraying human relationships—which is when Cheryl L. Reed discusses her bad things happen. The editors say in the debut novel “Poison Girls” Graff drew on his insider-outsider status for introduction, “While noir was definitely an about politics and privilege with his recent project “Montana Noir,” a urban invention, it knows no boundaries. Noir crime writer Sara Paretsky. collection of short stories he edited with is struggle. It’s doing the wrong thing for the thriller writer James Grady, of “Six Days of right reasons. It’s being trapped. It’s hubris. September 12, 6pm 4 Stacey Ballis and Mark Bazer. The Book Cellar. Author of nine novels and one cookbook, Stacey Ballis discusses “How to Change A Life” with writer Mark Bazer, creator/ host of The Interview Show. September 14, 7pm 5 And These Are the Good Times. Riverview Tavern. Death, sex, dancing and the FBI feature in Patricia Ann McNair’s new collection of essays, followed by Sunday Salon with Ada Cheng, David Hicks, David Lazar, Edward Kelsey Moore. September 24, 4:30pm and 7pm90
Music New Order / Photo: Nick Wilson On Beyond Punk MUSIC TOP 5 Riot Fest 2017 Embraces New Genres 1 Harry Styles. Chicago Theater. Just stop resisting. By Craig Bechtel This is his moment, and he’s more than earned it. You willNewcity SEPTEMBER 2017 Riot Fest, Chicago’s best annual indepen- year. And no, parents, there has never been bow down. September 26 dent multi-day music festival, is back for an actual riot at Riot Fest… just some espe- its twelfth year—its fifth outdoors with the cially vigorous mosh pits. 2 Salif Keita. Concord accompanying carnival accoutrements, and Music Hall. World Music its third in Douglas Park. The fest bests its Opening day, September 15, includes some Festival hits town, and Malian competitors where it counts: in the quality of “out there” undercard choices and crazy good singer-songwriter Keita is an the musical lineup. “Riot Mike” Petryshyn and headliners. Tobacco is the stage name of unarguable highlight, fusing his organization have always stayed true to Thomas Fec, leader of electronic psychedelia African rhythms to western their punk-rock roots, but each year they’ve purveyors Black Moth Super Rainbow, and forms. September 9 also expanded the musical palette to include based on his recorded solo output, you can acts outside that generously defined genre, expect the weekend to hit an early peak of 3 Ed Sheeran. Allstate and this year is exemplary in terms of including weirdness with his set. The genre-defying Arena. Touring to support not only other styles of rock, but hip-hop too. Saul Williams, HDBeenDope, Warm Brew his third album, the baby-faced And although they’re way too classy to and Action Bronson will supply some much but no-longer-boy-wonder promote it, there’s a healthy (although never needed (ahem) diversity, but Chicago’s own makes a persuasive play for sufficient) dose of female contributions this Vic Mensa will be the day’s don’t-miss rapper. respect. September 15 and 16 4 Josipa Lisac. Thalia Hall. Aretha’s back in town; Stevie Nicks too… but their Croatian contemporary is the diva you’ve got to see this month. September 26 5 Las Minas Puerto Flamenco. Harris Theater. A kind of crash course in flamenco, with eleven artists powering out an astonishing range of sheer exuberance and joy. September 2592
British originals Buzzcocks’ songs. And if strong female SEPTEMBER 2017 Newcity more recent material has been leaders are your thing, expect hit-or-miss, if only because their Peaches to “Fuck The Pain Away” early sharp, short and shocking and then some. singles are hard to surpass. Their first three albums, released in the For day three, the lede is the jaw- late 1970s, overflow with intelli- dropping reunion after twenty-one gent earworms. Industrial pioneers years of emo-punk heroes Ministry will be back for what Jawbreaker; but the lineup might should be a grinding maelstrom be the most solid from beginning of anger, and with Nine Inch to end. When Boston’s Mighty Nails headlining that night behind Mighty Bosstones first played a new EP…though if Al Jour- Riot Fest in 2008, at the since- gensen of the former and Trent shuttered Congress Theater, Reznor of the latter don’t team leader Dicky Barrett said it was up to reprise a rendition of 1000 the punkest room they had ever Homo DJs’ “Supernaut,” that will played. Now the ska-punk octet be a missed opportunity. Friday’s celebrates the twentieth anniver- most danceable (not moshable) sary of “Let’s Face It,” which moment will be the return of featured their breakthrough New Order (without Peter Hook), single, “The Impression That I Get.” but the train horn channeling Ear-shattering (hopefully) and SoCal roots rockers X, resurgent guitar shredding (undoubtedly) trio Massachusetts emo punks Dinosaur Jr. will likewise give the The Hotelier and sonic attack of album treatment to 1987’s “You’re Death From Above (sans the Living All Over Me,” and doing the1979) will also make this a day same for 1999’s “Keep It Like to remember. A Secret” will be indie rock icon Doug Martsch’s Built To Spill. Stoner metal rockers Queens of It seems like forever since NYC the Stone Age headline day two, indie rock heroes Versus toured, and there will be return perfor- and that’s another eye-popping mances from hip-hop collective, (and ear-popping) act on today’s Wu-Tang Clan (performing “Enter lineup. Taking their name from a the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)”), Mission of Burma record, and with ghoul punk purveyors Danzig a musical range inspired by fellow (performing “Danzig III”), and Big Apple mainstays Sonic Youth, Fishbone (performing “Truth the trio have a rich (and criminally & Soul”). Another highlight— unrecognized) catalog from which of both brutality and sensitivity— to draw, replete with winsome yet is screamo act At The Drive In, winning melodies propelled by back after a long hiatus. FID- dynamic electric guitar and lyrics LAR’s lackadaisical philosophy so sensitive they can border on could not be more different, but brutal. Chicago kids of all ages these teens (some of whom are should rock out to the smart sons of a T.S.O.L. member) still punk of The Orwells, whereas produce a rocking version of only their elders will recognize skate punk with a healthy dose the importance of a set by the of humor. More punk not to skip Kinsella brothers’ original band, today includes local and legend- Cap’n Jazz. There’s a chance to ary trio The Lawrence Arms get “All Fuzzed Out” with Beach performing their 2006 record Slang, soaked in sweat with“Oh, Calcutta!,” DC’s Bad Brains’ Andrew W.K., covered in fake first Riot Fest appearance in ten blood by GWAR or bathed in years and GBH. Hip-hop high- Gainesville, Florida’s post-hard- lights include duo Shabazz core Hot Water Music (behind Palaces, who just released two a new album release). Bethany fantastic albums simultaneously Cosentino and Bobb Bruno will and Beastie Boys’ Mike D doing further her Cali obsession with a DJ set. Also worth a listen Best Coast—even after the left should be Dead Cross (featuring coast slides into the Pacific, these members of Slayer, Retox and songs will endure. Also on the Faith No More’s Mike Patton on female-led enduring California tip, vocals), UK’s Slaves, Australia’s that dog. is another improbable The Smith Street Band, and reunion, and the thoughtful power Austin blues-rock duo Black pop trio will run through “Retreat Pistol Fire. Chaotic punks Potty From The Sun” in observance of Mouth, power-pop neophytes its twentieth anniversary. Doom- The Regrettes and neo-goths tree’s dynamic Dessa’s debut at Cold Beat have little in common, Riot Fest was 2013, and given but all are led by strong female her galvanizing performance then singers and craft compelling it would be a shame to sleep 93
through her set. Other women-centered acts This is a band that reminds you include daylight diatribes from Kitten Forever, why rock ’n’ roll used to make Upset, The Voluptuous Horror of Karen you happy… and still can, if Black and sunset serenades from M.I.A. and you’d just goddamn let it. Paramore. But in case you’re missing an injection of leftist testosterone, expect strong Most of the tunes are Dough- anti-government messaging from Prophets erty’s, and he’s an absolutely of Rage, the Chuck D (Public Enemy) bravura performer; his scorching collaboration with Rage Against The Machine. guitar on “Payday” is a highlight, as are his taut, snarling vocals Riot Fest runs September 15-17 in Douglas on my favorite tune on the Park; a complete schedule and tickets are album, the propulsive “Camera- available at the festival’s website. man” (“There is one set of footprints in the sand / Where Review there used to be two, that’s where he carried you / But what On The Off Chance about the third set in the sand? / That was the cameraman”). He’s White Shoes, Black Water ably abetted throughout by the If I start by saying Chicago-based On The Off band’s killer harmonies, which Chance is a band without irony, please don’t are so tight you couldn’t wedge take it as a swipe; it’s just the opposite. What a bookmark between them. I mean is that these guys are just so freaking happy to be playing rock ’n’ roll. There’s still Keys player and vocalist Steve plenty of wit and intelligence on their new release, “White Shoes, Black Water.” The Ashum has a couple of his own tunes here, to bolster yourself when the workaday world opening cut, “Rose-Colored Glasses,” gives us this line: “It’s intangible the handle on the hand and they’re a distinct flavor—more shimmering weighs you down. Kudos to all involved— you hold / Like a phantom limb sifting through a pot of gold.” And when lead vocalist (and the seventies R&B to Dougherty’s burnished including drummer/percussionist Jason Parks, tune’s composer) Dan Dougherty hits that last word, he ratchets it on up like a siren—which rockabilly—and “The Well” has not only the bassist Anthony Bartkowiak and vocalist might cynically be taken for grandstanding, but it’s really just sheer, unfettered exuberance. most gorgeous bridge on the album, but Rebekah Rakow. (Robert Rodi) possibly the most gorgeous bridge to any tune I’ve heard all year. “It is well within me / It is “White Shoes, Black Water” is available for well within my soul,” he sings, in such ecstatic, purchase on CD or limited-edition vinyl on reaching tones, you’ll find yourself humming it Dan Dougherty’s website. ROCKEFELLER CHAPEL PRESENTS JAZZ Locke | ORGAN MUSIC CHORAL SERVICES Joe Tea & Pipes: First Choral The Tenth Season Sunday: J.S. Bach Warren Wolf Duo SATURDAY SEPTEMBER 23 | 11 PM TUESDAYS | 4:30 PM SUNDAY OCTOBER 1 | 11 AMNewcity SEPTEMBER 2017 Bell Jazz SEPTEMBER 26 TO DECEMBER 5 THEN EVERY SUNDAY SUNDAY SEPTEMBER 24 | 1 PM Thomas Weisflog, Bryan McGuiggin, Celebrating the spiritual arts of cathedral and visiting organists play a half hour traditions: the theatre of liturgy, glorious The Hyde Park Jazz Fest offers a night of of seasonal music, with tea served music, poetry and literature illuminating piano, vibes, and marimba in the Chapel, beforehand. Free. sacred text, preaching rooted in reason followed by jazz on the carillon! Free. and rigorous inquiry. Free. All are welcome. Rockefeller Chapel 5850 S. Woodlawn Ave., Chicago, IL 60637 rockefeller.uchicago.edu 94
StageSteve Haggard, Ashley Neal and Ayssette Muñoz in a promotional photo for “Alias Grace” at Rivendell Theatre Ensemble/Photo: Nathanael Filbert Making a Monster Rivendell Theatre Ensemble Continues Its Dedication to Female-Identified Artists With World Premiere of Margaret Atwood Adaptation By Danielle Levsky For twenty three years Rivendell Theatre Ensemble has been “I knew the play was stunning and needed to be seen,” says Kessler.“committed to recognizing and cultivating the talents of women in She and Mallen held a reading of “Alias Grace.” She was immediately theatre from playwrights and actors to designers and technicians.” hooked. Even in our progressive theater community, this mission statement and the deliberate execution of it makes them sadly unique.On September 1, Rivendell opens the world premiere of “Alias Grace,” “I wanted to investigate this intangibility: are we just one definition or areadapted from the novel by Margaret Atwood by playwright Jennifer we made up of a pastiche, a big puzzle?” asks Mallen.Blackmer. Set in 1843, the story revolves around sixteen-year-oldGrace Marks, who is accused of killing her employers. Doctor Simon Blackmer’s first draft was a six-hundred-page epic story with alternatingJordan researches the case and Marks’ criminal behavior. Based on narrators. “The reading was three-and-a-half-hours long and had fifteenfactual events, Atwood’s novel is entirely fiction. actors,” according to Kessler.“Alias Grace” concludes the 2017 season, which featured three world “One of the best things to come out of this experience was the SEPTEMBER 2017 Newcity premieres and centered around the theme “The Mind/Body opportunity to work so closely with Atwood’s text,” says Blackmer. “I Connection.” Each play explores how we as humans separate our really got a chance to dig into her style and language. It was almost like primal instincts from our rational, intellectual selves. As a novel written she was in the room and I was learning from her, as a master storyteller. by a woman, adapted by a woman, directed by a woman and centered It’s like you’re having a conversation between two works of art.” around a female character, Rivendell found an ideal match in “Alias Grace.” Throughout each draft of “Alias Grace,” Blackmer thought more seriously about the themes in the story and what it was that engaged“We feel this kind of work is imperative for our community,” says her so much. Rivendell artistic director and co-founder Tara Mallen. “We’re showcasing universal stories that are told from a distinctly feminine “When a man kills someone because he has been mistreated, he goes lens.” to jail and is called a murderer,” says Mallen. “But when a woman kills someone because she has been mistreated, she is called a monster.”“We wanted to explore what happens when women are marginalized and how we maintain autonomy in situations where it is taken from us,” At the heart of this story was Grace Marks. she continues. “Truth and personal identity can be explored in a really interesting way.” “Everyone in her world tries to define her, put labels on her,” says Blackmer. “She defies every one of those labels.” Naturally, Rivendell’s production team are Atwood fans. Karen Kessler, who is the director of “Alias Grace” and also a co-founder of Rivendell, Kessler sees that while many stories are written through a white male met Blackmer at Ball State University where they both teach; Kessler is gaze, she also enjoys how “Alias Grace” seemingly starts through the a professor of directing and Shakespeare and Blackmer is a theater white male gaze then flips it around with Grace Marks now looking at Dr. professor and associate provost for entrepreneurial learning. In their Simon Jordan. time at Ball State, they became fast friends and collaborators. 95
STAGE TOP 5 Steve Haggard, who plays Dr. right nor fair while also not being1 A Funny Thing Happened on Simon Jordan, found himself furious about this reality. the Way to the Gynecologic Oncology Unit at Memorial digging into his own character, Sloan-Kettering. Cancer Center of trying to engage with the theme of “As a mother of a daughter, I want New York City. Route 66 Theatre Com- her to be irate about that,” says pany. A foul-mouthed twenty-something men’s power in society. comedienne and a middle-aged man Mallen. “So how do we re-embrace embroiled in a nasty divorce are brought together unexpectedly when their “Whether or not it is unconscious or this word ‘feminism’ and not be cancer-stricken mothers become intentional, it’s a power that’s often ashamed to say it? What does that roommates in the hospital. Opens abused,” says Haggard. “Dr. Simon mean in 2017?”August 29 Jordan is an addict, a manipulator By committing themselves to taking2 Alias Grace. Rivendell Theatre Ensemble. This world-premiere and a very privileged man. The adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s hardest thing for me has been to go chances on women artists, Mallen acclaimed novel takes a look at one of through this process and try to find hopes to answer those questions Canada’s most notorious murderers: compassion for him and not judge with action. While she has grown sixteen-year-old Grace Marks. Opens Rivendell, Mallen has found support September 13 him.” from other women artists in Chicago3 Building The Wall. Stage Left Theatre. In a time when shocking Recently, Atwood has seen a such as the late Martha Lavey, who campaign rhetoric turns into real policies, this Chicago premiere urgently reveals resurgence in popularity after the was a longtime leader at Steppenwolf the power of theater to question who we are and where we might be going. 2017 Hulu series adaptation of “The and passed away earlier this year. Opens September 21 Handmaid’s Tale,” based on the “How do we make sure the Chicago4 Fun Home. Victory Gardens Theater. Hailed as one of dystopian novel she originally theater community doesn’t become Broadway’s most original musicals this groundbreaking story is inspired by published in 1985. In addition toAlison Bechdel’s bestselling graphic being adapted for the stage, “Alias cutthroat and competitive?” asks memoir. Opens September 27 Mallen. “I think it’s important that Grace” is also being made into a5 Becky Shaw. Windy City Netflix TV series which will premiere female leaders of our community Playhouse. An explosive tale pay it forward, by making time for following a woman who has set up her later this year. best friend with her husband’s younger women coming into the co-worker and the chaos that ensues from bringing together a brutally honest Blackmer thinks it is a “wonderful community and answering their businessman and an emotionally fragile confluence of events” to have the questions. That’s the legacy that college dropout. Opens September 28 play’s world premiere at roughly the [Lavey] gave us.” same time as the Netflix adaptation This season Rivendell has housed release. three world premieres each written Blackmer met Atwood briefly on by a female playwright. In the past two separate occasions and has year, they joined the National New been a fan for a long time. Though Play Network’s Rolling World Premiere to get more opportunities they did not collaborate on the script, Atwood freely gave the rights to work on final development and for “Alias Grace” to be made into a workshop productions. play. Atwood said that she did not “We’re looking for a project for each necessarily need to be involved season to be a little raw, so we can because this was Blackmer’s interpretation of her work. Blackmer learn to become collaborators,” says Mallen. believes that Atwood is so open with her work because she is so With this being their fifth full season masterful in her craft. on North Ridge Avenue in “The worlds that Atwood invent are Edgewater, Rivendell is interested in just so rich,” says Blackmer. “She exploring audience engagement beyond talk backs, such as creates stories that really do connecting with town hall series transcend a genre. There are so many places to play that still make and book clubs across Chicago to participate in facilitated discussions. sense and tell the same story.” For “Alias Grace” in particular, they Kessler notes that good have been working with groups of adaptations are able to make the women who have been work their own. incarcerated. “It has to stop being a novel and “The truth is, we’re marching start being [Blackmer’s] play,” she forward,” says Haggard. “Theater needs to more accurately reflect the concludes. world in which we live.” In her time at Rivendell, Mallen has examined the recurring question of By including voices of those who how women navigate the workforce, are usually never heard, Rivendell is setting an example for a theater particularly in male-dominated community that is rapidly changing. arenas. She questions why and how her male counterparts make more money than she does. More “We have the understanding that importantly, she questions herself with our stories, we can help the for intellectually knowing it’s neither world evolve,” concludes Kessler.
TONY AWARD WINNER When a museum gaurd decides to touch a famous RembrandtBEST REVIVAL OF A PLAY AND BEST DIRECTOR painting, a remarkable journey “MAGNIFICENT” across the ages ensues. —THE NEW YORK TIMES “THEATER SIMPLY DOESN’TGET ANY BETTER THAN THIS.” —HUFFINGTON POST “ONE OF THE GREAT THEATRICAL PRODUCTIONS OF THE DECADE. NOT TO BE MISSED.” —THE TIMES OF LONDON THE YOUNG VICATHVEIBERWIDFRGOEMARTHUR MILLER’SPRODUCTIONOF DIRECTEDBY IVO VAN HOVEONSTAGE SEATING AVAILABLE THE REMBRANDT STARTS SEPTEMBER 9 A Chicago premiere by Jessica Dickey Frederick Weller and Catherine Combs in the Young Vic production Directed by Hallie Gordon of A View From the Bridge. Photo by Jan Versweyveld. Featuring ensemble membersGoodmanTheatre.org/View | 312.443.3800 Francis Guinan and John Mahoney GROUPS OF 10+ ONLY: 312.443.3820 Major Production Sponsor SEPT 7 – NOV 5 for The Rembrandt steppenwolf.org Major Production Sponsor Major Corporate Sponsors 312-335-1650
Newcity SEPTEMBER 2017 Life is BeautifulBy David Alvarado98
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NOWAT THE MCATUESDAYS AREFREE FOR ILLINOISRESIDENTS!OPEN UNTIL 9 PM TAKASHI MURAKAMI: THE OCTOPUS EATS ITS OWN LEG Through Sep 24 MICHAEL RAKOWITZ: BACKSTROKE OF THE WEST Through Mar 4, 2018MUSEUM OF Takashi Murakami. Flowers, flowers, flowers, 2010. Acrylic and platinum leaf on canvasCONTEMPORARY ART mcachicago.org/now mounted on aluminum frame; 59 × 59 in. (150 × 150 cm). Collection of the Chang family,CHICAGO #mcachicago Taiwan. © 2010 Takashi Murakami/Kaikai Kiki Co., Ltd. All Rights Reserved. Michael Rakowitz, May the Arrogant Not Prevail, 2010. Found Arabic packaging and newspaper, glue, cardboard, and wood; 194 ¼ × 235 ¼ × 37 ½ in. (493.4 × 597.5 × 95.3 cm). Collection Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, gift of Marshall Field’s by exchange, 2015.4. © 2010 Michael Rakowitz. Photo: Nathan Keay, © MCA Chicago. Installation view, Michael Rakowitz, The worst condition is to pass under a sword which is not one’s own, Tate Modern, January–May 2010. © Michael Rakowitz. Photo © Tate Photography. Lead support for Takashi Murakami: The Octopus Eats Its Own Leg is provided by Kenneth C. Griffin, Helen and Sam Zell, Anne L. Kaplan, Cari and Michael Sacks, Galerie Perrotin, Stefan Edlis and Gael Neeson, Gagosian, Andrea and Jim Gordon, and Susan Gaspari-Forest and Robert Forest. Major support is provided by Blum & Poe and Liz and Eric Lefkofsky. Generous support is provided by The Bluhm Family Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, The Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation, Jennifer and Alec Litowitz, Kaikai Kiki Co., Ltd., ComplexCon, Adidas, Matt Bayer and Joyce Yaung and the Bayer Family Foundation, The Japan Foundation, Robert J. Buford, Marilyn and Larry Fields, Nancy Lerner Frej and David Frej, and Dana and Brian L. Newman.
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