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

Our Free Days Are Taking The Night Shift! From March through November, we’re returning to Free First Tuesdays! On the first Tuesday of every month, enjoy extended hours from 5:00 pm to 8:00 pm - admission is free for all, no residency restrictions. Want more chances to visit? Take a look at our full lineup of 2026 Free Days below and mark your calendar! From March through November, we’re returning to Free First Tuesdays! On the first Tuesday of every month, enjoy extended hours from 5:00 pm to 8:00 pm - admission is free for all, no residency restrictions.

Free First Tuesdays

Chicago Symphony Orchestra musicians perform an evening of chamber music celebrating Amy Beach and Fanny Mendelssohn, two pioneering composers whose extraordinary works deserve a place at the center of the Romantic repertoire.

CSO Chamber Music: Carving Out History

Ellen Shubart will be signing copies of Chicago’s Greatest Buildings on our First Free Tuesday November 3rd. A lifelong Chicagoan, Ellen Shubart has worked as a teacher, a journalist, and ended her career as a sustainable city planning advocate.

Book Signing: Chicago’s Greatest Buildings

In ART LOAF: DAILY SLICE, interdisciplinary artist Palmarin Merges considers art-making as an essential part of everyday life and wellbeing. Inspired by her experiences walking through Japan, Merges gathers overlooked objects and visual fragments encountered along the way, transforming them through book arts, textiles, found materials, photography, and hand-carved stamps. On display from September 18 - November 8.

Art Loaf: Daily Slice

Transition&nbsp;September&nbsp;3, 2026 - November 8, 2026 Transition&nbsp;presents a body of work by Mélanie Denis created over three years, crossing three territories, three inner states, and three defining moments of a life. Through this series, the landscape becomes the reflection of a personal transformation, moving through grief, emancipation, and rebirth. View details <a href="https://www.pistachiosonline.com/collections/transition" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">here</a>&nbsp;

Transition

Explore the artistry of traditional Japanese paper-making with Human Body Watermarks, led by artist Mami Takahashi.

Workshop: Japanese Papermaking

Discover the art and philosophy of Kintsugi — the Japanese practice of repairing broken pottery with gold — in this all-level, hands-on workshop.

Kintsugi Workshop: Repair and Reconnect

Join Hiromi Inagaki, Curator at the Naito Museum of Pharmaceutical Science and Industry, for history of anesthesia!

Online Lecture: The History of Anesthesia and Hanaoka Seishū

From art history to operating room: discover how facial structure, proportion, and aesthetics guide modern plastic surgery.

Facial Aesthetics: from Art to Plastic Surgery Part 2

Brendan Fernandes: In the Round

Lean on your materials and create new ways of thinking inspired by the works of Kenzi Shiokava and Mike Cloud.&nbsp;

Family Day | Knock on Wood

On behalf of Lisa M. Key, Executive Director, and the Board of Directors, the Driehaus Museum invites you to join us for The Gilded Gala, an annual celebration of artistic excellence and Chicago’s cultural legacy. This signature event benefits the Museum’s transformative public programming and mission of expanding access to extraordinary art, architecture, and design. The 2026 Gilded Gala will honor Mansueto Office, Inc. for advancing the well-being of communities through philanthropic support of holistic educational and cultural initiatives, as well as the stewardship of our architecturally significant built environment to ensure long-term social impact. Suzette Bross Bulley, Gala ChairLisa M. Key, Executive DirectorZachary Lazar, Board Chair Tuesday, November 17, 2026&nbsp;5:30pm Reception7:00pm Dinner &amp; Program <a href="https://driehausmuseum.org/gala?mc_cid=ef680d6bbe&amp;mc_eid=d1db3f815c" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Details</a>

Gilded Gala 2026

Sounding/BODY: V. Vecker, Casey Adams, &amp; Paige Alice Naylor Friday, November 20 7 PM - 9 PM Join us for a performance by V. Vecker, Casey Adams and Paige Alice Naylor!

Sounding/BODY

Inspired by the Emma Stebbins scrapbook featured in our current Carving Out History exhibition, this workshop introduces beginner-level bookbinding techniques. Each guest will leave with 2-3 variations of pamphlets and saddle—stitch books that can be used for sketchbooks and journals, with resources to continue more complex structures on their own. Your ticket includes admission to the Museum following the workshop.

Bookbinding Workshop

This one person show follows artist Barbara Tinger through 5 decades! Her body of work includes: figures, still life, cityscape, painting, drawing and mixed media in both representational and abstract executions. If you love art, you will love Barbara. Her move into abstraction occurred later in life, as a rare health condition affected her vision. Come witness the talent &amp; dedication to a practice spanning so long and so varied and always given With Love, Barbara. A portion of sales will be given to The Chicago Lighthouse for the Blind.Image: Self Portrait - oil on board "16 x 24"

With Love, Barbara

The Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago is excited to announce a solo exhibition by Mike Cloud (b. 1974, Chicago; lives in Chicago) for its latest&nbsp;<a href="https://mcachicago.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c24ba7c5a91cefd699dc985e1&amp;id=b49b61817e&amp;e=4ba592fe2a" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="color: rgb(0, 124, 137);" target="_blank">Chicago Works</a>&nbsp;presentation, titled&nbsp;Chicago Works | Mike Cloud: Worldless Obstruction.&nbsp;Opening on May 2, 2026, in the MCA’s Turner Gallery and closing on February 7, 2027, the exhibition presents a series of newly commissioned works that continue Cloud’s experimentation with abstraction, symbolic language and the sculptural dimensions of painting.&nbsp;Cloud challenges historical framings of abstract painting as pure and apolitical, approaching his works instead as products of their political contexts and the capitalist systems through which they circulate. Crudely constructed from wooden stretcher bars, thickly layered in painted signs, and protruding into three-dimensional space, Cloud’s sculptural paintings are objects, rather than pristine surfaces, that possess a deliberately improvisational and, in his words, “unschooled” aesthetic. The artist sources his subjects from online news outlets, often alluding to contemporary stories of suffering and tragedy through his enigmatic visual vocabulary, developed over two decades. Forms resembling snowflakes, rainbows, four-leaf clovers, hearts and hands densely cluster across his canvases, which are stapled to configurations of stretcher bars that hover between abstract structures and recognizable shapes.The new paintings made specifically for this exhibition extend these strategies while foregrounding three recent developments in Cloud’s practice: emojis, an “X”-shaped painting, and the protrusion of his works off the wall and on to the floor of the gallery. Through the use of hinges, the paintings become modular, endowed with the capacity to be folded, installed upright, and exhibited in multiple configurations. Cloud’s work embodies the slipperiness of symbols, the malleability of meaning, and the potential for freedom within ambiguity.&nbsp;Cloud will be in conversation with exhibition curator Nolan Jimbo on May 2, 2026, in the Edlis Neeson Theater.&nbsp;Mike Cloud is the 27th artist to participate in&nbsp;<a href="https://mcachicago.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c24ba7c5a91cefd699dc985e1&amp;id=dd5f8f7c3d&amp;e=4ba592fe2a" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="color: rgb(0, 124, 137);" target="_blank">Chicago Works</a>, a solo exhibition series at the MCA that features artists who are shaping contemporary art in the city and beyond.&nbsp;Chicago Works | Mike Cloud: Worldless Obstruction&nbsp;is organized by Nolan Jimbo, Assistant Curator. ABOUT THE ARTISTMike Cloud was born and raised in Chicago. He earned a BFA from the University of Illinois Chicago (2001) and an MFA from Yale University (2003). He is currently Associate Professor and Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of Art, Theory, and Practice at Northwestern University.&nbsp;Cloud’s solo exhibitions include&nbsp;Circle Chat, Corbett vs. Dempsey, Chicago (2025);&nbsp;Called Ahead, Fahrenheit Madrid (2024);&nbsp;The Myth of Education, Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts, University of Chicago (2018);&nbsp;Bad Faith and Universal Technique, Thomas Erben Gallery, New York (2014);&nbsp;Systems, Sheldon Memorial Art Gallery, University of Nebraska, Lincoln (2006); and&nbsp;Special Project: Mike Cloud, P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, New York (2005). He has also participated in group exhibitions at Artists Space, New York; Xavier Hufkens, Brussels; Good Weather, Chicago; White Columns, New York; and The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York. Cloud received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2024, the Richard Pousette-Dart Award from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts’ in 2023, and the Jules Guerin Rome Prize from the American Academy in Rome in 2023.At the MCA, Cloud previously participated in the group exhibition,&nbsp;The Long Dream&nbsp;(2020), and his work,&nbsp;Cycle and Stable&nbsp;(2015), resides in the museum’s collection. His work is also held in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and the Studio Museum in Harlem, New York.&nbsp; SUPPORTGenerous support for&nbsp;Chicago Works | Mike Cloud: Worldless Obstruction&nbsp;is provided by the Sandra and Jack Guthman Chicago Works Exhibition Fund. Mike Cloud (b. 1974, Chicago, IL; lives in Chicago),&nbsp;Poison Arrows South Africa, 2026. Acrylic on canvas, hinges, pegs, rope, and watercolor tape; 48 × 47 × 75 in. (121.9 × 119.4 × 190.5 cm). Courtesy of the artist and Thomas Erben Gallery, New York. Photo: Colleen Keihm.

Mike Cloud: Worldless Obstruction

Shop local this holiday season with over 25 vendors in our historic Murphy Auditorium. Browse vintage jewelry, handcrafted goods, and unique gifts for everyone on your list.

Drie-cember Market

“It was a matter of getting out on a damn limb and sawing it off behind you.” This memorable phrase is how Lee Miller—by turns a fashion model, magazine photographer, studio operator, Surrealist innovator, international adventurer, and battlefield correspondent—summed up her approach to life and creativity.&nbsp;Lee Miller: Fearless&nbsp;is the first comprehensive survey of her photographs in more than 25 years and gathers together the major episodes of her singular career. Miller was born in Poughkeepsie, New York, in 1907. Intrepid from the first, she moved to Paris at barely 20 years old, simultaneously seeking work in front of and behind the camera. She pioneered Surrealist techniques and broached daring sexual subjects with a readiness that magnetized experimental artists and fashion editors alike. Miller excelled at portraiture as well and pictured a range of cultural figures in the 1930s, most of them personal friends, from Charlie Chaplin to Pablo Picasso.&nbsp; By age 30 Miller had run commercial studios on both sides of the Atlantic; taken a star turn in art cinema and become an haute couture icon; and moving on from Paris to Cairo, influenced Egyptian modern art while reinvigorating her own work through travels in Egypt’s deserts.&nbsp; Yet she undertook a challenge of an entirely different order during World War II, especially as a correspondent for&nbsp;Vogue&nbsp;accredited with the United States Army in 1944–45. The inhumanities Lee Miller witnessed in Europe, especially at the Buchenwald and Dachau concentration camps, brought out her courage and deeply contradictory emotions; the experience, which she chronicled in extensive written and photographic dispatches from the German front, also left her traumatized for a number of years. Following the war, Miller remade herself once more, gaining renown in England as a chef and gardener, while quietly continuing to lead an artistic life through her final years. Lee Miller died in 1977 on the East Sussex farm she owned with her husband, artist Roland Penrose.Lee Miller: Fearless&nbsp;is organized by the Art Institute of Chicago in collaboration with Tate Britain and Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris.&nbsp; The exhibition is curated by Matthew S.&nbsp;Witkovsky, Richard and Ellen Sandor Chair and Curator, Photography and Media,&nbsp;and vice president for strategic art initiatives,&nbsp;the&nbsp;Art Institute of Chicago,&nbsp;and Hilary Floe, senior curator, Modern and Contemporary British Art, Tate Britain,&nbsp;with Saskia Flower, assistant curator, Modern and Contemporary British Art, Tate Britain, and Michal Goldschmidt, former assistant curator, Modern British Art, Tate Britain. SPONSORSLead support is provided by the Harris Family Foundation in memory of Bette and Neison Harris.&nbsp;Major support is provided by Barbara Bluhm-Kaul and Don Kaul, Suzette and Ally Bulley, Tara Hirshberg, and The Opatrny Family Foundation.&nbsp;Additional support is contributed by Anne L. Kaplan.&nbsp; Image: Self-Portrait with Headband&nbsp;(detail), about 1932Lee MillerLee Miller Archives. © 2026 Lee Miller Archives, England. All rights reserved.&nbsp;<a href="http://www.leemiller.co.uk/" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="color: rgb(181, 9, 56);" target="_blank">www.leemiller.co.uk</a>

Lee Miller: Fearless

As the December skies darken, join Ghostlight Ensemble by our majestic fireplace(s) as we revive the Victorian tradition of telling ghost stories at Yuletide with a multi-story (and multi-storied) immersive twist. Performances last 90 minutes with time slots beginning at 5:30 pm each night.

Holiday Spirits: Victorian Yuletide Ghost Stories

The Italian Cultural Institute in Chicago presents A Palm of Victory, the first Chicago exhibition by Italian contemporary artist Emilia Faro, curated by Maria Chiara Di Trapani. The exhibition creates an evocative palm grove where color, form, and diverse artistic languages—including watercolor, video, and sculpture—come together around the image of the palm tree, a symbol of beauty, resilience, transformation, and rebirth. Visits: Monday-Friday, 10am-4:30pm, by appointment only. Admission is free and open to the public. Registration is required for all visits. To register, please email iicchicago@esteri.it with your preferred date and time of visit.

A Palm of Victory

<a href="https://driehausmuseum.org/programs/detail/santa-saturday-2026" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">TICKETS</a> Drie-cember is here with Santa’s annual visit to the Museum! Join him in our Front Parlor to share your Christmas wish list and have your picture taken with jolly old St. Nick. This magical, family-friendly event will fill up fast—be sure to book early!

Santa Saturday

Embrace the cold and let it influence your thinking. This month we think deeply like Rashid Johnson.

Family Day | Hibernate, Meditate

Drie-cember is here with Santa’s annual visit to the Museum! Join him in our Front Parlor to share your Christmas wish list and have your picture taken with jolly old St. Nick. This magical, family-friendly event will fill up fast—be sure to book early! <a href="https://driehausmuseum.org/programs/detail/santa-sunday-2026" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">TICKETS</a>

Santa Sunday

Put on your favorite holiday sweater, grab a cozy cup of cocoa, and get in the holiday spirit with the St. James Cathedral Choristers!

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