West Town, Wicker Park, Ukrainian Village, Kinzie Corridor, Humboldt Park

West Town

Wisconsin

IL • MI • IN

West Loop, Fulton Market, East Garfield Park

West Loop and West Side

Evanston, The North Shore, Northern, Western and Southern Suburbs

Suburbs

Old Town, Lincoln Park, Lakeview, Roscoe Village, Bucktown, Wicker Park, Logan Square, Lincoln Square, Ravenswood, Uptown, Edgewater, Andersonville, Rogers Park

North Side

Michigan Avenue, Streeterville, The Gold Coast, The Loop, and South Loop

Michigan Avenue

Pilsen, Bridgeport, Chinatown, plus Hyde Park, Jackson Park/Dorchester, and Bronzeville

South Side

Superior and Franklin streets, West Chicago Ave, and down to Merchandise Mart and the River

River North

3rd Floor GalleryExperience the powerful new exhibition by South Asian artist Grishma Shah, where art, identity, and disability converge in a compelling exploration of personal and societal contradictions.&nbsp;Dissonance&nbsp;challenges perceptions of discomfort, inviting you to reflect on the tensions that shape our lives. Through installations and mixed-media artwork, Shah’s work celebrates the complexity of existing at the intersection of culture and self-expression.Join us for the opening reception on May 16, from 7-9pm.&nbsp;Cover Artwork: “All Dolled Up For Zoom ”Mixed Media on canvas -2020Image Description: Pandemic bride showing off her bright red bangles and henna-tattooed hands. Blue paint representing spotty video call.&nbsp;

Dissonance

﻿Project Onward Exhibition of the works by Chicago artists from Project Onward that supports artists with developmental and mental disabilities. These sensational works are in a wide variety of media.

Project Onward Exhibition

Epiphany Center for the Arts | Guild Room201 S. Ashland Avenue, Chicago&nbsp;60607Coral reefs are an ancient microcosm with a changing diversity of phantasmagoric beauty. As a crucial building block of our planet that feeds twenty-five percent of sea life, the urgency to save coral from repeated bleaching episodes is becoming clear. The Ring of Fire and Coral Triangle, located in the Southern Pacific Ocean, shows why it matters. Endorsed by UNESCO for ocean awareness during the United Nations Ocean Decade, Margot McMahon’s&nbsp;Ring of Fire: Friends, Reefs, and Bouncing Back&nbsp;exhibit brings attention to how human activities, such as burning fossil fuels, significantly contribute to climate change and rising sea temperatures, which severely impacts ocean life and marine biodiversity. United States’ weather patterns originate in the Southern Pacific Ocean. A warmer ocean slows currents causing west coast droughts, more volatile storms, and Midwest flooding. On McMahon’s 2017 diving excursion to the Palauan reefs in the Ring of Fire with a childhood friend, they witnessed the largest recorded global bleaching event, impacting the Coral Triangle: a marine epicenter with the highest coral reef and fish diversity in the world. On a return trip in 2023, the two friends and environmental activists observed a revitalization of the coral reefs through a healthy reef bounce-back, made possible by&nbsp;reduced carbon emissions during the global Covid-19 lock-down, conservation efforts,&nbsp;and sustainable practices. Over the seven years of reef recovery worldwide, McMahon painted her&nbsp;Ring of Fire&nbsp;series to show the symbiotic relationship between a vast variety of plants, animals, and minerals that form the most diverse ecosystem on earth.&nbsp;Her ocean landscapes also emulate prayer cloths to express a spiritual energy that conveys healing, while highlighting the biodiversity and stunning magnificence of the reefs. Through her technique mixte process, combining egg tempera and oil paints, McMahon’s coral reefs are luminous, as light penetrates and reflects through the layers, giving the paintings a depth and vibrancy that echo the resonance of the ocean. Coral reef bleaching events are caused by environmental stressors that include increased water temperatures due to global warming and human pollution. These stressors disrupt the interdependent relationship between coral and algae, leading to the whitening or bleaching of corals. With the increase of carbon emissions since 2023, the world is currently experiencing its&nbsp;fourth global coral bleaching event, which NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) announced in April 2024 and is ongoing. This event has affected coral reefs across all major ocean basins, including the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans.For more information, go to: www.epiphanychi.comPhoto Credit: Margot McMahon

Margot McMahon: The Ring of Fire: Friends, Reefs, and Bouncing Back

Artists Reception: Friday, June 20, 6–8pm Featuring the work of&nbsp;Mark Banks,&nbsp;Kathy Los-Rathsburn and Andy Paczos,&nbsp;Steel &amp; Silence&nbsp;explores the haunting beauty and enduring presence of industrial landscapes. Beauty that otherwise goes unnoticed is thrust to the forefront for this exhibition.

Steel and Silence: Paintings of Chicago's Silent Streets

The Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago is excited to announce&nbsp;<a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://mcachicago.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c24ba7c5a91cefd699dc985e1&amp;id=97ccbc71af&amp;e=4ba592fe2a" target="_blank">Collection in Conversation with Pablo Helguera</a>, a community-informed exhibition running from August 2, 2025, to July 5, 2026, in the MCA’s stairwell galleries. For this exhibition, the MCA invited artist and educator Pablo Helguera to draw a selection of works from the museum’s permanent collection, inspired by conversations with Chicago artists, writers, activists, and educators.&nbsp;In the fall of 2024, the MCA invited twenty individuals with different backgrounds and life experiences to meet and discuss the role of art in moments of uncertainty and possibility. This exhibition, which is curated by Helguera and representatives from the MCA’s curatorial and learning teams in response to the group’s discussions, will be organized by theme throughout the three floors of the MCA’s stairwell galleries, confronting trauma, resistance, complicity, and the power of individuals and movements during times of uncertainty. Each floor of the exhibition will be accompanied by the voices of individuals whose unique perspectives from the conversations informed the selection of works. With this exhibition, the MCA experiments with a new mode of presenting its permanent collection—in conversation with the people it is meant to serve.Chicago participants include Olivia Gude, Tempestt Hazel, Jeremiah Hulsebos-Spofford, Ankit Khadgi, Maira Khwaja, S. Y. Lim, Stephanie Manriquez, Magdalena Moskalewicz, Nissa Rhee, Monica Rickert-Bolter, Mérida M. Rúa, Pia Singh, Carlos Salazar-Lermont, Sufyan Sohel, and several others who wish to remain anonymous.Collection in Conversation with Pablo Helguera&nbsp;is organized by guest curator Pablo Helguera with Miguel Aguilar, Manager of Learning, School Partnerships and Curriculum, and Iris Colburn, Curatorial Associate. ABOUT THE CURATORPablo Helguera (b. 1971, Mexico City, lives in New York)&nbsp;is an artist working in installation, sculpture, photography, drawing, socially engaged art, and performance. Helguera’s work focuses on a variety of topics ranging from history, pedagogy, sociolinguistics, ethnography, memory, and the absurd, in formats that are widely varied including the lecture, museum display strategies, musical performances, and written fiction. His project,&nbsp;The School of Panamerican Unrest, is one of the most extensive socially engaged public art initiatives on record. Helguera has exhibited at major institutions worldwide and received numerous awards, including a Guggenheim Fellowship. He has held key roles in museum education, including at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, and the Guggenheim Museum. Currently, he teaches at The New School and writes the weekly column&nbsp;Beautiful Eccentrics. He is the author of&nbsp;Education for Socially Engaged Art&nbsp;(2011) and&nbsp;The Parable Conference(2014).SUPPORTLead support is provided by the Pritzker Traubert Collection Exhibition Fund, Cari and Michael Sacks, and the Zell Family Foundation. ABOUT THE MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART CHICAGOThe Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago is a nonprofit, tax-exempt organization accredited by the American Alliance of Museums. The MCA interweaves exhibitions, performances, collections, and educational programs while providing a place for audiences to contemplate and discuss contemporary art in pursuit of a creative and diverse future. The MCA believes in the values of inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility (IDEA) as a platform to enact structural change. The museum is generously supported by its Board of Trustees; individual and corporate members; private and corporate foundations, including the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation; and government agencies. The MCA is a proud member of Museums in the Park and receives major support from the Chicago Park District.&nbsp;<a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://mcachicago.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c24ba7c5a91cefd699dc985e1&amp;id=5d2c89b640&amp;e=4ba592fe2a" target="_blank">The MCA is located at 220 E. Chicago Avenue</a>&nbsp;and is open 10 am to 5 pm Wednesday to Sunday and Tuesdays from 10 am to 9 pm. Tuesday evenings (5-9 pm) are free for Illinois residents. The museum is closed on Mondays.&nbsp;Admission is free for all youth 18 and under, members of the military and veterans, and MCA members. Free admission for anyone 18 and under is generously provided by Liz and Eric Lefkofsky, and Northern Trust. Find more information about MCA's exhibitions, programs, and special events at&nbsp;<a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://mcachicago.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c24ba7c5a91cefd699dc985e1&amp;id=e89923038a&amp;e=4ba592fe2a" target="_blank">mcachicago.org</a>&nbsp;or at 312.280.2660. Howardena Pindell,&nbsp;Free, White and 21,1980. Single-channel video (color, sound). Collection Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; gift of Garth Greenan and Bryan Davidson Blue, 2014.22. © 1980 Howardena Pindell. Image courtesy Garth Greenan Gallery.

Collection in Conversation with Pablo Helguera

Sacristy GalleryLaurie Buman’s series,&nbsp;Santos y Milagros (Saints &amp; Miracles) | The Light Within the Darkness, is the culmination of over a decade of work. This collection explores social issues affecting the most vulnerable members of society. Through the lives of the Saints, Buman addresses contemporary concerns and shares the stories of these heroic women.Each piece is layered with meaning beyond the obvious—every item and image carries its own history, coming together to form a larger narrative that transcends the physical. With these images, Buman seeks to inspire awareness, protection, and positive change in the world.For more information, go to: www.epiphanychi.comPhoto credit:&nbsp;Epiphany Center for the Arts

Laurie Buman:Santos y Milagros (Saints & Miracles) | The Light Within the Darkness

The University of Iowa Stanley Museum of Art’s permanent collection encompasses over sixteen thousand artworks. Our inaugural exhibition, <a href="https://stanleymuseum.uiowa.edu/art/exhibitions/current/homecoming">Homecoming</a>, reintroduces our extraordinary collection to the public.Homecoming comprises a series of related installations.&nbsp;“Generations," curated by Diana Tuite, Visiting Senior Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, foregrounds the University of Iowa’s history of innovative arts education and scholarship.&nbsp; "Fragments of the Canon:&nbsp;African Art from the Saunders and Stanley Collections," curated by Cory Gundlach, Curator of African Art, features African art collected by a Black Iowan, Meredith Saunders. “History Is Always Now,” also curated by Gundlach, displays the Stanley’s celebrated collection of African art in a way that emphasizes movement and cultural exchange through time and across space. Smaller, more focused installations, curated by Gundlach, include "Centering on Cloth: The Art of African Textiles," which highlights the global scope of interactions that surround the creation, use, and circulation of cloth in Africa, and "About Face: African Masks in Iowa,"&nbsp;which emphasizes the historical and artistic relationships between West and Central African masks from the world-renowned Stanley Collection of African Art.&nbsp;Developed collaboratively by curators, educators, and faculty under the museum director’s guidance, Homecoming&nbsp;illustrates the importance of our world-class collection and allows us to envision new futures in art.In order to protect sensitive works of art from extended exposure to light, many of the works on display in Homecoming will rotate every six months--meaning that there will always be something new to see during the inaugural exhibition's&nbsp;three-year run.

Homecoming

Krannert Art Museum‘s major reinstallation of its pre-Hispanic Andean arts collection will center past Andean communities as active agents in the creation of their own art histories. Comprising over 700 objects, the KAM collection includes exquisite textiles, ceramics, and objects fashioned in gold, silver, wood, and shell from cultures that flourished throughout the coastal and highland regions of Peru from 1500 BCE to the Spanish colonial period.Image: Model Depicting the Manufacture of Chicha, Lambayeque or Chimu, North Coast, Peru, 1100-1470 CE. Silver-copper alloy. The Fred Olsen Collection. 1967-29-304

Andean Gallery Reinstallation

Slemmons GalleryArtist Alok Vaid-Menon has said,&nbsp;“There’s something audacious and beautiful about insisting on maintaining your humor and delight.”&nbsp;For Laurie LeBreton, humor and delight are a direct result of her work as a fiber artist. She works primarily in handmade paper to convey these ideas, using her favorite properties of paper – the messy pleasure of making it, its ability to absorb color, and both its apparent fragility and veritable strength.The paper tapestries in LeBreton’s exhibit&nbsp;INSISTING AND MAINTAINING&nbsp;are typical of her work in many ways. The simplicity and repetitiveness of their construction lead LeBreton to calm and peace. There’s an element of playfulness: She turns a series of flat objects into a three-dimensional structure. She uses this simple structure to comment on impermanence through various means of installation. She uses color to express joy.Finally, through this work, LeBreton also honors traditional women’s crafts – quilt making, sewing, and weaving, with the intent to convey warmth and comfort, and to express love.For more information, go to: www.epiphanychi.comPhoto credit: Epiphany Center for the Arts

Laurie LeBreton: INSISTING AND MAINTAINING

Renowned multimedia artist Dieter Roth’s preferred form, and the one he spent his lifetime pursuing, was the&nbsp;Gesamtkunstwerk, a German term for “total work of art.” Working across a diverse range of media, disciplines, and creative activities, Roth developed an artistic practice that dissolved the boundaries between art and life, upending traditional categories, hierarchies, and even timeworn notions of singular authorship. Often collaborating with other artists, including his son Björn, Roth produced an ever-expanding body of work that gestured toward the cumulative effects of a life spent making and remaking.&nbsp;The sculpture&nbsp;Balabild 5&nbsp;(c. 1975–2005), made in collaboration with Björn Roth, is a complex portrait of their shared creative life, expressed through an array of artifacts that passed through their family art studio in Iceland. Made of materials including wooden flooring from the original studio, canvas, paint and paint tubes, brushes, lightbulbs, photographs, and other found items,&nbsp;Balabild 5&nbsp;was developed over decades and is intended to look forever unfinished, as if the artists have frozen the energy of their studio and could step in at any moment to keep working. Björn Roth has called their studio “a laboratory, to search for beauty in nothing.”&nbsp;Dieter Roth and Björn Roth: Balabild 5&nbsp;is curated by Jason Foumberg, Daskalopoulos Collection Manager.

Dieter Roth and Björn Roth: Balabild 5

OPEN LENS XV June 5 - July 6, 2025 The Artist Reception is June 14, from 4:00PM - 7:00PM

Open Lens XV

Opening May 18: The Future Voyagers Exhibition Opening Reception | Sunday, May 18 | 1:00 pm - 3:00 pm | Brushwood Center at Ryerson Woods | FreeExhibition runs May 18 - July 6&nbsp;Join&nbsp;Brushwood Center and&nbsp;Chicago Voyagers&nbsp;in a celebration of the opening of&nbsp;The Future Voyagers Exhibition!&nbsp;Be the first to view the brand new exhibition and have a chance to hear directly from artists that created the works.&nbsp;1:00 pm&nbsp;Exhibition opens for viewing2:00 pm&nbsp;Panel discussion with: Bernie Rupe (Chicago Voyagers), Edo (exhibiting artist), Kevin West (exhibiting artist), moderated by Dani Abboud (Brushwood Center)Light refreshments will be served.&nbsp;About the Exhibition:&nbsp;The Future Voyagers Exhibition&nbsp;is a two-part exhibition that visualizes the future of American exploration: one where adventure knows no gender or color. The exhibition at Brushwood Center at Ryerson Woods, opening May 18, 2025, is the first part of this two-part endeavor where we will get a first look at studies for larger portraits. The completed portraits will be unveiled at the final exhibition in Chicago later this summer.

The Future Voyagers Exhibit

Brush &amp; Chisel showcases the work of two local artists: a painter and a sculptor.Brad Purse, a former Advertising Art Director, has embraced oil painting after leaving the advertising world. His paintings are surreal and often incorporate elements of humor and irony, inviting viewers to look deeper into each scene. Purse seeks subjects that offer unusual interpretations of familiar visual elements, aiming to create intriguing images using both oil paint and occasional graphite. His work often features a humorous or observational twist, representing a unique perspective on everyday norms.Brad Cahill is a sculptor who works primarily in stone. He is presenting his series, "One Lone Drone" in this gallery show. This series draws a comparison between the occupants of a typical office environment and those of a hive or colony. While some of their actions are obvious, much of their busyness can seem baffling and inexplicable, even to themselves. As a collective entity, workers are agents of production, contributing to the growth and success of a larger structure, while their individual identities and purposes often remain hidden. Cahill's therianthropic statues aim to reveal the personalities of anonymous characters and to elevate otherwise insignificant beings.Fine Line will hold an opening reception on Thursday, June 12, from 6 to 8 PM, with both artists in attendance. This reception, like all Fine Line receptions, is free and open to everyone.The Kavanagh Gallery is open Monday through Saturday from 10 AM to 5 PM, and admission is always free to view the art. Brush &amp; Chisel will be on display from June 12 to July 10 (the gallery will be closed from July 4 to 6 for the Fourth of July weekend)&nbsp; Image: Left: Pop-up Air Safari at Failing Wildlife Monument by Brad Purse.&nbsp;Right: Nu Tru Luv Brad Cahill

Brush & Chisel 

(<a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://artsoflife.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=676dcf6750de4694fd657fca1&amp;id=cf934c3253&amp;e=ed6a12e728" target="_blank">Dorothy Carlos</a>&nbsp;performance)&nbsp;﻿

Closing Reception for sounds better with you

SoNa Chicago Contemporary Art is proud to present the exhibition, Better World, featuring the artwork of Alan Emerson Hicks. Better World takes its title from a 1970s commercial produced by the Plastics Council of America that promised a brighter future through plastic. His work responds to this false optimism, reflecting on the environmental and cultural consequences of single-use plastic production in contemporary American society. The artist’s practice spans sculpture, wearable art, and dimensional assemblage. The sculptures are constructed from repurposed plastics over steel armatures and are designed to resemble human figures—commenting on both form and the act of building form through assemblage. These figures suggest presence, identity, and humanity within a material culture of disposability. Hicks’s two-dimensional works explore mass production and transformation through the use of dollar store items and goods sourced online, particularly from Chinese suppliers—materials now affected by recent U.S. tariffs. These pieces often incorporate butterflies and natural imagery as metaphors for change, fragility, and the uneasy relationship between nature and synthetic consumer goods. The work is in constant flux, evoking a sense of transformation and suspended development. These pieces fall into two distinct styles: one, a dimensional couture approach using stickers and objects layered onto boards; the other, shallowly layered compositions sealed in Envirotex resin, creating a dense, atmospheric quality. Hicks also creates wearable dresses from plastic waste and consumer packaging, many of which have been featured in sustainable fashion shows like Trashion Revolution. These works blur the boundaries between sculpture, performance, and activism. Through assemblage, Hicks builds form while commenting on form—referencing nature, transformation, and African American historical figures. His work is in constant evolution, much like the materials and systems it critiques. Better World is both an ironic echo of the past and a call to imagine alternative futures shaped by care, reuse, and reimagining. Hicks has exhibited nationally and internationally, including a recent solo show at the Center on Halsted in Chicago. He works out of his studio in Bronzeville on the South Side of Chicago. Image: Natural Selection, Alan Emerson Hicks, Found object, stickers and paint on board, 13.5"×13.5"

Alan Emerson Hicks: Better World

This iteration of&nbsp;Et cetera&nbsp;features works by Iris Bernblum, Meghan Borah, Patrick Carroll, Mari Eastman, Andreas Fischer, Sherwin Ovid, Scott Wolniak and Gwendolyn Zabicki and is&nbsp;on view April 4 - July 12, 2025. Et cetera, a new, ongoing presentation of works from our Gallery inventory, is open for in-person viewing&nbsp;in our East Wing gallery during regular gallery hours, and online via our website. The goal of&nbsp;Et cetera&nbsp;is to provide opportunities for public viewing of works from Goldfinch's inventory while also serving as a gentle corrective to the idea that access to a Gallery's "back room" is only for the privileged few. All of the works on view are available for acquisition. Visit our website for more information on each work and&nbsp;<a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="mailto:claudine@goldfinch-gallery.com?subject=Et%20cetera%20works" target="_blank">contact us</a>&nbsp;if you would like to arrange a private showing outside of regular Gallery hours.&nbsp; To view all of the works in this edition of Et cetera,&nbsp;<a style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://goldfinchgallery.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=857fcb5b671b71824107951c2&amp;id=6bbff3cd1f&amp;e=eea4831c04" target="_blank">visit our website.</a>

Et cetera

Oliva Gallery presents Offering, a two-person exhibition by Laura Peterson and Nikki Renee Anderson exploring the emotional landscapes of identity, vulnerability, and transformation. Through sculpture, painting, and installation, the artists examine how personal histories intersect with broader cultural narratives. Anderson’s ceramic environments confront feminine archetypes and reclaim intimacy and self-representation as acts of power, while Peterson’s layered portraits, informed by her work as a behavioral health therapist, navigate themes of grief, healing, and emotional renewal.Together, Peterson and Anderson create a meditative space that invites reflection and emotional engagement. Offering is not just an exhibition, it is a dialogue between two artists deeply committed to exploring the tension between fragility and strength, stillness and change, and the evolving nature of the self.

Laura Peterson & Nikki Renee Anderson: Offering

For the <a href=https://smartmuseum.uchicago.edu/exhibitions/the-50th-an-anniversary-exhibition/>Smart’s 50th anniversary</a>, South Side artist Robert Earl Paige creates a multi-part pattern-based installation and sprawling public art project that invites communities into a collective experience of space.Give the Drummer Some! is rooted in Paige’s decades-long practice as an interdisciplinary artist, designer, and educator who bridges cultural boundaries. A lifelong resident of the Woodlawn neighborhood just south of the University of Chicago campus, he merges African aesthetics, modernist painting, and Bauhaus architecture in creations that blur the line between fine art and craft. Paige’s infectious rhythm of repeating motifs originates as a complete environment in the Smart’s lobby, where the artist layers gold-trimmed fabrics and Chicago-inspired designs over the building’s walls, floors, and furniture. The project then extends outward, wrapping around the exterior of the Museum and ultimately out across the UChicago’s historic Hyde Park campus and beyond.Through Paige’s iconic and wildly patterned designs, Give the Drummer Some! makes the Smart’s building more porous and inviting, and fosters a shared sense of belonging between campus, neighborhood, and global communities.THRESHOLDRobert Earl Paige: Give the Drummer Some! is commissioned as part of the Smart’s ongoing Threshold series. Launched in 2010, the initiative brings large-scale installations of contemporary art to the Smart’s lobby and courtyard on a regular basis. The prominent placement of these commissions ensures that all visitors—whether they have come to the building for a class, an exhibition, or a program—will be welcomed with thought-provoking new art.ON CAMPUSThroughout the Smart’s 50th anniversary season, Give the Drummer Some! will extend to additional UChicago locations, responding to new sites and collaborations in unique ways.Image: Robert Earl&nbsp;Paige

Robert Earl Paige: Give the Drummer Some!

Between Worlds marks a major moment for LALO— his first solo show and one that's been eagerly awaited by collectors and fans alike. The exhibition features 14 new paintings across three sizes—24x24, 36x36, and 48x48 inches—each one capturing his signature cast of playful, slightly unhinged, and sometimes dangerous characters as they descend on Earth.These mischievous figures touch down in cities and landscapes across the globe: Chicago and Los Angeles (a nod to where he studied and now works), but also Paris, Morocco, South Korea, Brazil, Costa Rica, Spain, Cambodia, New York City, Iceland, Italy, and even Antarctica. Together, the works create a globe-hopping, cartoon-fueled invasion that's as funny as it is surreal. LALO's world blends the punch of street art with the energy of animated storytelling. His paintings feel like your favorite Saturday morning cartoon took a detour through a graffiti-covered alley and came back weirder, funnier, and a little more chaotic. Think Murakami or KAWS—with a wild streak and original characters that shape-shift across settings.

Between Worlds: LALO Solo Show

OS Projects is pleased to present Things Seem Strong, a solo exhibition of photographs by Milwaukee artist Mark Brautigam, opening May 10 and continuing through July 12. A reception for the artist will take place on Saturday, May 10, from 1–3 pm. Mark Brautigam’s artwork interrogates our sense of time, on both a personal and geological scale. Using photography and video as his primary media, Brautigam explores how these different timescales manifest across our lives and the landscape. In his OS Projects exhibition, Brautigam directs his attention to the Driftless Area, a region encompassing southwestern Wisconsin and parts of Minnesota, Iowa and Illinois that was spared the repeated leveling forces of glaciation common throughout the Upper Midwest. Cycles of sedimentation and erosion have continued to shape the landscape of the Driftless for millions of years, creating a geological terrain that stands in stark contrast to the areas that surround it. The photographs in Things Seem Strong were made in the Driftless Area of Wisconsin, Illinois, and Minnesota from 2017-2020. Installed across the walls of the gallery like a film strip or the unbound pages of a book, the series contrasts two vastly different senses of time: the human sense of time, which we rely on to define our lives, and deep time, which defines the history of the planet. While many of the images feature the unique landforms of a region hundreds of millions of years old, they also depict fleeting moments of humanity and a world that is seasonally cyclical, ultimately pitting the ephemeral against the eternal. About the Artist Mark Brautigam is an artist whose work explores the intersection of place, time, and memory. He attended the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Minnesota, and served as an officer in the United States Marine Corps for four years. He has exhibited at the Haggerty Museum of Art, the Philadelphia Photo Arts Center and the Newspace Center for Photography. His work is in the collections of the Milwaukee Art Museum, the Museum of Wisconsin Art, the Haggerty Museum of Art and the Racine Art Museum, as well as the We Energies Foundation Art Collection and numerous private collections.

Mark Brautigam: Things Seem Strong

Perspectives From Japan: A Group Exhibition of Japanese Mosaic Artists

Opening Reception: Saturday, May 17, 2025, 4pm — 7pm (the gallery will be open 12pm — 7pm)&nbsp;About the exhibitionFor a new project at the Renaissance Society,&nbsp;Germinations, Ximena Garrido-Lecca continues her research into plants originally domesticated by Andean and Mesoamerican cultures and their subsequent global dissemination. Taking center stage here is&nbsp;Solanum tuberosum, also known as the potato. Domesticated more than 8,000 years ago in the Altiplano region, the potato has been a pillar in the lives of Andean communities, where it is grown as a source of sustenance and attributed symbolic and spiritual value. Today, more than 4,000 potato varieties have been adapted to different altitudes and climatic conditions around the world.In Chicago, Garrido-Lecca unveils a large-scale installation that features a huge rectangular section of bare earth covered with sprouting potatoes and two observatory platforms, along with other elements. Across its interrelated parts, the exhibition is inspired by Andean cosmovision, the planting and harvesting of potatoes as ritual events, and a traditional unit of measurement known as the&nbsp;papacancha, which unites space, time, and climate. Throughout&nbsp;Germinations,&nbsp;Garrido-Lecca draws on the Andean concept of&nbsp;Pacha, a word with diverse interrelated meanings, which evokes, among other things, a cyclical and simultaneous dimension in which past, present, and future occur.In multiple ways, Garrido-Lecca also accentuates how the exhibition itself exists within time. The potatoes in the central&nbsp;papacancha&nbsp;field change over the passing weeks. And each day within the exhibition potatoes are boiled, one by one, and then dried, recreating a pre-Hispanic custom of measuring time using the cooking of potatoes as a reference. The resulting potato pulp is then carried to a workstation within the show, where it is&nbsp;mixed with plaster and molded into new forms, which the artist likens to&nbsp;canopas —&nbsp;offerings to the earth like those used&nbsp;for abundance rituals in Andean communities.Curated by Karsten Lund.&nbsp; Events&nbsp;Opening Reception&nbsp;Sat, May 17, 4-7pm&nbsp;with artist talk at 4pm Notes on Space-TimeDiscussion and exhibition walk-through&nbsp;with curator Karsten Lund and physicist Daniel HolzWed, May 21, 6pmAs the exhibition draws on different concepts of space-time,&nbsp;Germinations&nbsp;explores the relation of Andean and ancestral knowledge and contemporary scientific&nbsp;knowledge. For this casual talk and exhibition tour, curator Karsten Lund is joined by physicist and cosmologist Daniel Holz, from the University of Chicago. Holz is a leading researcher into gravitational waves, studying how ripples in space-time reveal the hidden lives of black holes and an expanding universe. Public Reading:&nbsp;Myths from the Huarochirí ManuscriptThu, Jun 12, 7pmTaking place within the exhibition&nbsp;Germinations,&nbsp;this public reading in English and Spanish presents excerpts from the Huarochirí Manuscript,&nbsp;one of the few surviving records of Quechua worldviews from the Andean region. The lively myths in this a 17th-century text feature tricksters, grieving mothers, fire gods, and elemental spirits, who embody the struggle for cosmic balance and other aspects of the underlying cosmology. Performance: Lia KohlSun, Jul 13, 7pmFor this live performance within the exhibition, Ximena Garrido-Lecca has invited Lia Kohl, a sound artist and musician in Chicago, to occupy this corner of space-time. A nimble performer and composer with a wide-ranging experimental practice, Kohl explores experiences of simultaneity here, as it connects to sound and music, while incorporating recordings of gravitational waves and other sources.Visit&nbsp;<a style="color: rgb(70, 120, 134);" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://renaissancesociety.org/" target="_blank">renaissancesociety.org</a>&nbsp;for more information.Image: Digital collage, courtesy of the artist.

Ximena Garrido-Lecca: Germinations

Reimagining Time: Echoes of the Past, Visions of the Future&nbsp;brings together the visionary works of Tim Merrett and Richard Whitten, two artists who challenge our perception of history, space, and artistic tradition. Richard Whitten constructs intricate architectural dreamscapes, blending elements of classical design with mechanical precision. His meticulously crafted compositions invite us into imagined worlds where function meets fantasy, evoking a sense of curiosity and wonder. And Richard is offering 4 exquisite small sculptures used as maquettes in creating his imaginative work. Richard Whitten grew up in Manhattan, NY , a child of an American Businessman and a Chinese Painter. He earned a B.A. in Economics from Yale University and an M.F.A. in Painting from the University of California at Davis where he studied with both Wayne Thiebaud and Robert Arneson. He has had numerous exhibitions on both coasts. Notable are major solo exhibitions at the Frye Art Museum in Seattle, Washington, the Newport Art Museum in Newport, Rhode Island, and the Zillman Museum of the University of Maine. The Fenimore Art Museum has recently presented his was in a two-person exhibition: “A Cabinet of Curious Matters: Nancy Callahan and Richard Whitten” 2023, and the Morris Museum presented a solo exhibition of Whitten’s work: “Set in Motion: from the studio of Richard Whitten” in 2024. He is honored to be a recipient of a 2023 Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, and a resident of Yaddo in June 2024. Tim Merrett reinterprets classical imagery, weaving past masterpieces into contemporary narratives that blur the boundaries between eras. His paintings spark a dialogue between the old and the new, asking viewers to reconsider the role of history in shaping modern identity. Tim Merrett takes possession of art history as his creative birthright, unabashedly appropriating images from past masters and bringing them into tension with contemporary experience. Past and present ebb and flow on his canvases, taking arts historical images, by Fantin Latour, for example, and inserting them as “resting places” within areas of bold color or salvaged objects.Tim Merrett's work can be found in private collections throughout North America and Europe and in corporate collections like Kinross Gold Corporation (Toronto), Zest/She Magazine (London UK), Museum of Biblical Arts, (Dallas, CO), Royal Bank of Canada, and Toronto's Badminton and Racquetball Club Together, their works offer a captivating exploration of how art can transcend time—preserving history while simultaneously reinventing it for the future. Through this exhibition, visitors are invited to step into a realm where memory, invention, and imagination converge. Richard Whitten will be in attendance at the gallery for the public opening and on Saturday, June 7th 11 am- 2 pm

Reimagining Time– Echoes of the Past, Visions of the Future: The Artwork of Tim Merrett and Richard Whitten

People throughout the Arabian Peninsula are taught to live in relationship with spirits that live beneath the earth called&nbsp;“ahl al ‘arth,”&nbsp;(people of the earth). Kuwaiti-Iraqi artist and art therapist&nbsp;<a style="color: rgb(17, 85, 204); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.farahsalem.com/" target="_blank">Farah Salem</a>&nbsp;grew up aware of regular interactions with these spirits. The knowledge that we don’t “exist alone, but rather in relationship with plants, rocks, animals, and unseen forces” drives her artistic practice. This exhibition presents new and existing sculpture, photography and installation work that continue the artist’s study and reinterpretation of healing and ceremonial migratory practices of people of the Arabian Peninsula that seek to repair one’s relationship with oneself, the earth, and other beings. Salem created the concept for this exhibition during her Radicle Residency at Hyde Park Art Center (2021) and the exhibition is curated by Mariela Acuña.

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