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

Santa Saturday Saturday, December 6 and 13, 9:00am-12:00pm Tickets $25 / $13 children&nbsp;<a style="color: rgb(70, 120, 134);" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://46316.blackbaudhosting.com/46316/tickets?tab=3&amp;txobjid=a2ec3c95-9c05-4558-b033-4615a78731fa" target="_blank">HERE</a> Drie-cember is here with Santa’s annual visit to the Driehaus Museum! Join him in the museum’s Front Parlor to share your Christmas wish list and snap selfies with jolly old St. Nick. In addition to photos with Santa, families can enjoy festive activities for kids and explore the Drie-cember Market featuring seasonal treats and holiday gifts. This magical, family-friendly event will fill up fast—advance registration is encouraged.

Santa Saturday

Drie-cember MarketSaturday, December 6, 11:00am-5:00pmFreeShop local this holiday season at the Driehaus Museum’s annual Drie-cember Market, featuring dozens of vendors from the Chicagoland area. Visitors can find unique gifts, vintage jewelry, handmade crafts, and local art in addition to a selection of special holiday-themed products from the Driehaus Museum Store. Step into the holiday spirit with the museum’s sparkling decorations and seasonal activities for all ages.&nbsp;

Drie-cember Market

Opening Reception: Fri., Oct. 17, 5-8 pm Michael Miller is a multi-talented artist whose artwork includes painting, drawing, woodwork, and music. He began his career studying cabinetmaking at the Milwaukee Trade and Technical High School. From there Michael went on to study fine art at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee receiving both his BFA and MA in Painting and Drawing. After receiving his master’s degree in 1991 Michael taught art at both the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee and The Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design. Michael’s artwork often merges his background in cabinetmaking with his practice of painting and drawing.&nbsp; Michael has exhibited with Gallery A (Chicago), Tory Folliard Gallery (Milwaukee), Gallery Pink (Oak Park), as well as other galleries, art spaces, and universities. In recent years he has been invited to exhibit his work in group shows at Hairpin Arts Center, ARC, Oak Park Arts League, and SoNa Chicago Contemporary Art. Michael worked as lead carpenter and exhibit installer at the Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership and eventually became Operations Manager and Facility Manager there, a position he held until 2016. He currently is a freelance exhibit designer, builder, and installer and he continues his own art practice in his home studio in Oak Park, IL. Michael has vast knowledge of a variety of materials, at times grinding his own pastels to achieve the color palette he wants. He also regularly uses found objects and reused materials, both as an act of conservation and for the aesthetic. Michael’s focus is often on supporting other artists, using his skills in art construction and installation to help them realize their own vision. He wrote, “I have been very fortunate that much of my working life has been spent creatively in the service of, and alongside many other amazing and talented individuals. As a woodworker and furniture builder, an art instructor, or as an exhibition designer/builder, creating and installing exhibitions for museums and galleries, I have had the opportunity to share ideas, problem solve countless issues, and explore a multitude of materials, all while expanding personal horizons of art making.” SoNa Chicago is proud to share Michael’s recent work in a solo show. The show includes recent works that reflect themes he has explored over his years as an artist such as the preciousness of the environment, valuing community, and working together to achieve positive change. His work in&nbsp;A Measure of Time&nbsp;features landscapes, wood sculptures, an interactive puzzle installation, banners, and other works.&nbsp; Michael is a self-taught musician; he builds acoustic resonator guitars using found objects and recycled materials. Several of his guitars are featured in the exhibition.&nbsp; Image: Landscape 7, oil, ink, pencil, and shellac, on book board,&nbsp;&nbsp;20.5"h x 26”w,&nbsp;2024

Michael J. Miller: A Measure of Time

Oct 17 - Dec 6: Nikko Washington &amp; Jacob Rochester

Nikko Washington & Jacob Rochester 

Pastels Chicago 2025

Online Nov 29-Dec 5, In Person: Dec 6-7

Nature-Inspired Holiday Art Market

Dec 6 &amp; 7, 11am-7pm: opening of 36th Annual Small Print Exhibition &amp; Holiday Sale

36th Annual Small Print Exhibition & Holiday Sale

The Raclin Murphy Museum of Art presents the first monographic exhibition in forty years of the work of Walter Osborne, one of Ireland’s most-heralded artists. The exhibition charts Osborne’s trajectory from his student days in Dublin and Antwerp through his sojourn in Brittany and his early practice in England before returning to his native city in 1892 to care for his niece and aging parents following the death of his beloved sister Violet. Through his depictions of Dublin’s streets, parks, public spaces, domestic interiors and gardens, countryside, and most importantly its people, a vision of a vibrant––if divided––Ireland emerges. Osborne’s experiences abroad and his commercial acumen helped establish Dublin’s unique brand of Modern painting rife with the possibility of change. Iconic works by the artist on loan from the National Gallery of Ireland, Hugh Lane Gallery, Hunt Museum in Limerick, Crawford Art Gallery in Cork, and private collectors in Ireland and the United States offer a rich tapestry of life and art in Ireland at the close of the nineteenth century.&nbsp;This exhibition is made possible by the Donald and Marilyn Keough Foundation with additional support from the J. Brien and Maggie Murphy Endowment for Exhibitions, James and Barbara O’Connell Family Fund for Exhibitions, Friends of the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art, Charter Membership, and in partnership with the Keough-Naughton Institute for Irish Studies. Image: Walter Frederick Osborne (Irish, 1859–1903),&nbsp;Mary Guinness and Her Daughter Margaret, 1898. Oil on canvas, 54 × 60 inches (137.2 × 152.4 cm) unframed. Heritage Gift, 2023, National Gallery of Ireland Collection, NGI.2023.16. Photo credit: Photo, National Gallery of Ireland

Homecoming: Walter Osborne’s Portraits of Dublin, 1880–1900

FIGURE DRAWING:&nbsp;Sunday, Dec. 7th – 3-6pm. Live Model - FEE: $20 Timeless Bodies&nbsp;First Annual Midwest Ceramic Exhibition&nbsp;Timeless Bodies interprets the human form through sculptural realism and abstraction. Throughout history, the human form has been symbolized as a container of life, emotion, and spirit, reflecting both fragility and resilience. How does the body hold and convey our stories, memories, or cultural history? Artists were encouraged to celebrate the interplay of form and storytelling in clay.&nbsp;Juror &amp; Curator:&nbsp;Nancy Pirri is an artist from Chicago, working primarily in ceramics and creating figures of all sizes. Pirri has won awards from the Beverly Arts Center and the Rockford Art Museum, including work published in ‘500 Figures in Clay’ V2. She has exhibited nationally and internationally, including SOFA in Chicago representing women's rights anniversaries, and has acquired collectors from all over the world.&nbsp;She has exhibited with numerous galleries in the Midwest and is currently represented by Oliva Gallery, J. Petter Galleries (MI), Design at 329/Primitive/The Stalls, and Inner Haven Gallery.&nbsp; Image: Susan Volk

Timeless Bodies Figure Drawing Class

Holiday Spirits: A Collection of Victorian Yuletide Ghost StoriesThursday and Friday, December 11 and 12, 6:00-8:00pmTickets $40&nbsp;<a style="color: rgb(70, 120, 134);" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://46316.blackbaudhosting.com/46316/tickets?tab=3&amp;txobjid=50eef7e9-22b7-42b3-8e01-5dbecf09213c" target="_blank">HERE</a>As the December skies darken, join&nbsp;<a style="color: rgb(70, 120, 134);" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://www.ghostlightensemble.com/" target="_blank">Ghostlight Ensemble</a>&nbsp;by the Museum’s majestic fireplace as they revive the Victorian tradition of telling ghost stories at Yuletide with a multi-story (and multi-storied) immersive twist.

Holiday Spirits: A Collection of Victorian Yuletide Ghost Stories

Santa SaturdaySaturday, December 6 and 13, 9:00am-12:00pmTickets $25 / $13 children&nbsp;<a style="color: rgb(70, 120, 134);" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://46316.blackbaudhosting.com/46316/tickets?tab=3&amp;txobjid=a2ec3c95-9c05-4558-b033-4615a78731fa" target="_blank">HERE</a>Drie-cember is here with Santa’s annual visit to the Driehaus Museum! Join him in the museum’s Front Parlor to share your Christmas wish list and snap selfies with jolly old St. Nick. In addition to photos with Santa, families can enjoy festive activities for kids and explore the Drie-cember Market featuring seasonal treats and holiday gifts. This magical, family-friendly event will fill up fast—advance registration is encouraged.&nbsp;

<a style="color: rgb(66, 133, 244);" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.google.com/maps/search/3618+W.+Armitage+Ave.,+Chicago,+IL+60647?entry=gmail&amp;source=g" target="_blank">3618 W. Armitage Ave., Chicago, IL 60647</a>847-922-5736 PROGRAMMING:&nbsp;<ul><li>ARTIST TALK – Saturday, Nov. 15th, 2025 – 3-5pm</li><li>FIGURE DRAWING – Sunday, Dec. 7th&nbsp;– 3-6pm.&nbsp;&nbsp;Live Model - FEE: $20</li><li>CLOSING: Saturday, Dec. 13 - 5-9pm</li><li>HOLIDAY/GIFT PARTY – Friday, Dec. 19th, 2025 – 5-9pm</li></ul> Gallery Hours:&nbsp;Friday 5–8 PM, Saturday 12–4 PM, or by appointment Timeless Bodies interprets the human form through sculptural realism and abstraction. Throughout history, the human form has been symbolized as a container of life, emotion, and spirit, reflecting both fragility and resilience. How does the body hold and convey our stories, memories, or cultural history? Artists were encouraged to celebrate the interplay of form and storytelling in clay.&nbsp;Juror &amp; Curator:&nbsp;Nancy Pirri is an artist from Chicago, working primarily in ceramics and creating figures of all sizes. Pirri has won awards from the Beverly Arts Center and the Rockford Art Museum, including work published in ‘500 Figures in Clay’ V2. She has exhibited nationally and internationally, including SOFA in Chicago representing women's rights anniversaries, and has acquired collectors from all over the world.&nbsp;She has exhibited with numerous galleries in the Midwest and is currently represented by Oliva Gallery, J. Petter Galleries (MI), Design at 329/Primitive/The Stalls, and Inner Haven Gallery.&nbsp; ARTISTS EXHIBITING:Nikki Renee AndersonMonica BalcLynn BasaAaron BeckerSharon BladholmDebbie BurkLisa FarrisAutumn HorwathLynda Lawson KarrJayne KingDawn LiddicoattLinda MarcusJohannah Tomita MartinAmber MatthewsSuzanne MauroCarole McCurdyBobbi MeierArny NadlerAndryea NatkinAlexis Lee Ortiz-DuarteRoberta Ulrich-de OliveiraSusan VolkChristopher WilliamsRunhui XuThomas Zamiar Image: Arny Nadler (associate professor of Art Sam Fox School of Art and Design at Washington University St Louis Mo )&nbsp;&nbsp;

Timeless Bodies

Timeless Bodies&nbsp;First Annual Midwest Ceramic Exhibition&nbsp;OLIVA GALLERY<a style="color: rgb(66, 133, 244);" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.google.com/maps/search/3618+W.+Armitage+Ave.,+Chicago,+IL+60647?entry=gmail&amp;source=g" target="_blank">3618 W. Armitage Ave., Chicago, IL 60647</a>847-922-5736Nov. 7-Dec. 13, 2025 PROGRAMMING:&nbsp;<ul><li>ARTIST TALK – Saturday, Nov. 15th, 2025 – 3-5pm</li><li>FIGURE DRAWING – Sunday, Dec. 7th&nbsp;– 3-6pm.&nbsp;&nbsp;Live Model - FEE: $20</li><li>CLOSING: Saturday, Dec. 13 - 5-9pm</li><li>HOLIDAY/GIFT PARTY – Friday, Dec. 19th, 2025 – 5-9pm</li></ul> Gallery Hours:&nbsp;Friday 5–8 PM, Saturday 12–4 PM, or by appointment Timeless Bodies&nbsp;interprets the human form through sculptural realism and abstraction. Throughout history, the human form has been symbolized as a container of life, emotion, and spirit, reflecting both fragility and resilience. How does the body hold and convey our stories, memories, or cultural history? Artists were encouraged to celebrate the interplay of form and storytelling in clay.&nbsp;Juror &amp; Curator:&nbsp;Nancy Pirri is an artist from Chicago, working primarily in ceramics and creating figures of all sizes. Pirri has won awards from the Beverly Arts Center and the Rockford Art Museum, including work published in ‘500 Figures in Clay’ V2. She has exhibited nationally and internationally, including SOFA in Chicago representing women's rights anniversaries, and has acquired collectors from all over the world.&nbsp;She has exhibited with numerous galleries in the Midwest and is currently represented by Oliva Gallery, J. Petter Galleries (MI), Design at 329/Primitive/The Stalls, and Inner Haven Gallery.&nbsp; ARTISTS EXHIBITING:Nikki Renee AndersonMonica BalcLynn BasaAaron BeckerSharon BladholmDebbie BurkLisa FarrisAutumn HorwathLynda Lawson KarrJayne KingDawn LiddicoattLinda MarcusJohannah Tomita MartinAmber MatthewsSuzanne MauroCarole McCurdyBobbi MeierArny NadlerAndryea NatkinAlexis Lee Ortiz-DuarteRoberta Ulrich-de OliveiraSusan VolkChristopher WilliamsRunhi XuThomas Zamiar Image: Arny Nadler (associate professor of Art Sam Fox School of Art and Design at Washington University St Louis Mo )&nbsp;&nbsp;

Timeless Bodies, Closing Event

An innovative choreographer, Moriah Evans creates performances for a wide variety of contexts, from museum spaces to the stage, while exploring the “knowledge our bodies hold” and the political undercurrents of movement. This winter, the New York-based artist spends two weeks at the Renaissance Society with a small ensemble of dancers. For this expanded edition of the&nbsp;Intermissions&nbsp;series, which features a longer time frame than usual,&nbsp;Evans explores&nbsp;the&nbsp;possibilities of dance in a more open and durational form&nbsp;through this&nbsp;new work, letting it take shape beyond the boundaries of a single&nbsp;event. Balancing a mix of private rehearsals and public presentations, Evans and the ensemble will offer different expressions of the project at different times.&nbsp;Curated by Karsten Lund.&nbsp;Launched in 2017,&nbsp;<a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://renaissancesociety.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=28258b64874e626df0979c0de&amp;id=77671601cf&amp;e=375d06b725" target="_blank">Intermissions</a>&nbsp;is an ongoing programming series devoted to performance and other inventive time-based works, staged in the Renaissance Society’s empty gallery in between exhibitions. This recurring platform features two artists every year, supporting a wide variety of live projects.Image: Moriah Evans,&nbsp;Remains Persist,&nbsp;2022, Performance Space New York, NY. Pictured: Lizzie Feidelson, Sarah Beth Percival, Anh Vo, Varinia Canto Vila. Photo: Rachel Papo.

Intermissions: Moriah Evans

This year’s The Block Collects installation features two projects featuring works selected by students:2025 Student AcquisitionThe Block Museum of Art’s collection supports learning across disciplines through exhibitions, research, and class and co-curricular visits. One of the ways we grow this resource is through an annual student-led collecting initiative undertaken by the Block Museum Student Associates (BMSAs), an interdisciplinary group of Northwestern undergraduates. Throughout the academic year, they learn about museum interpretation, gallery teaching, and collecting practices, culminating in their recommending the purchase of one or more works of art that invite sustained looking and multiple avenues of inquiry.The 2024–2025 BMSAs recommended the purchase of three works by artist Chitra Ganesh inspired by images from the comic book series Amar Chitra Katha, which popularizes Indian epics and folklore. These comics seek to educate children in India and across its diaspora on South Asian history, culture, religions, and mythologies. Like many stories written for children, Amar Chitra Katha reinforces conventional models of gender relations and sexuality as well as citizenship, nationalism, religious expression, and public behavior. Ganesh subverts these narrative traditions and their embedded patriarchal norms by constructing alternative worlds where women, girls, and other marginalized communities are empowered. Ganesh has cited canonical and contemporary feminist and queer scholarship as sources of inspiration for her work.

The Block Collects 2025

December 13+1410am to 5pm both days 1340 W WashingtonChicago, IL Indoor Find the most unusual and stylishly crafted mix of vintage and modern decorative objects, housewares, fashion for men/women/children, art, hostess gifts and more from 125 vendors! Browse vendors on three floors in the Plumbers Hall building! Tickets on sale soon. <a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://randolphstreetmarket.com/schedule/#" target="_blank">Details</a>

Randolph Street Holiday Market 

Hyde Park Art Center announces a group exhibition curated by&nbsp;Dr. Rikki Byrd&nbsp;from its first Radicle Curatorial Residency. Inspired by Toni Morrison’s canonical text&nbsp;Beloved, the exhibition’s title&nbsp;Mark Me, Too&nbsp;reflects on how the marks of legacy and heritage are imprinted on the identities of five Black femme/nonbinary artists, told through their personal histories. Spotlighting works by Lisa DeAbreau,&nbsp;Ciarra K. Walters,&nbsp;Lex Marie,&nbsp;Natasha Moustache, and&nbsp;Lola Ayisha Ogbara, the exhibition runs from&nbsp;August 9 through December 14&nbsp;in the Kanter Family Foundation Gallery on the second floor of the Art Center. Admission is free.Drawing on their connections to Nigeria, Seychelles, the Caribbean, the Philippines, and the United States, these artists bring a diasporic point of view to mining the marks imprinted on their respective identities. While artists such as Lex Marie and Natasha Moustache offer distinct perspectives to tracing maternal connections and African American histories of motherhood, respectively, Ciarra K. Walters offers an exploration of what she calls "daughterhood," and how it informs her own self-making. Lola Ayisha Ogbara stretches this further in her work, drawing on adornment practices of Black girls and femmes, using acrylic nails, mannequin heads, and jump ropes, offering Black beauty as a form of critique, as well as an art form. Continuing the consideration of maternal lineage, Lisa DeAbreau draws on motifs of respectability and architecture to reflect on memory-making and archival encounters.Taken together, the artists' responses to the tradition of mark-making are twofold: through the representation of their own hand in the work, as well as marks of migration, movement, hybridity, legacy, and identity. By extending brushstrokes, threads, and unlikely materials––from birthing blankets to egg shells––the artists repurpose materials to reflect on how they carry these marks through their practice. The final works leave seams visible, overturn popular emblems, or obscure materials only to make them palpable under the surface, bringing forth the ways the past is never the past, what Morrison called "rememory."An opening reception will take place on&nbsp;Saturday, August 9, 2 - 4 p.m., free and open to all with no registration required.Mark Me, Too&nbsp;and Dr. Rikki Byrd’s residency are made possible due to the generosity of the Guida Family Fund for Creativity. The Radicle Curator is rooted at the Art Center for a sixteen-month period to participate in programs with the cohort of resident artists, conduct studio visits with artists around Chicago pertaining to their curatorial interests, and be in critical dialog with the Exhibitions and Residency team to curate an engaging group exhibition that addresses pressing civic issues of the time. ABOUT THE CURATORDr. Rikki Byrd is a writer, educator, and curator. She is the founder of Black Fashion Archive and the co-founder of the Fashion and Race Syllabus, and is currently an Assistant Professor of Visual Culture Studies at the University of Texas at Austin in the African and African Diaspora Studies Department, with a courtesy appointment in the Department of Art and Art History.&nbsp;Across&nbsp;her writing, teaching, and curatorial projects, she draws connections between Black aesthetic practices, including 20th and 21st century art, fashion studies, and performance.

Mark Me, Too: Five Artists

This fall, The Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University presents&nbsp;<a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://northwestern.us9.list-manage.com/track/click?u=904f932038284b4d9eea69636&amp;id=80aae993fa&amp;e=ec81127d70" target="_blank">Pouring, Spilling, Bleeding: Helen Frankenthaler and Artists’ Experiments on Paper</a>, on view September 17–December 14, 2025. The exhibition explores how artists have used printmaking—and works on paper more broadly—as a site for experimentation, improvisation, and aesthetic risk. The exhibition centers on the pioneering print practice of&nbsp;Helen Frankenthaler(American, 1928–2011). Known for her signature “soak-stain” technique in painting, Frankenthaler brought a similar sensibility to printmaking, embracing fluidity, chance, and the variable interaction of materials in her works on paper. Her lithographs, etchings, and woodcuts reflect a dynamic, process-oriented approach—what she has described as “pouring, flooding, spilling, bleeding.” The presentation marks the debut of a recent gift of 34 works from the&nbsp;<a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://northwestern.us9.list-manage.com/track/click?u=904f932038284b4d9eea69636&amp;id=4e47ecce69&amp;e=ec81127d70" target="_blank">Helen Frankenthaler Foundation</a>, part of the Frankenthaler Prints Initiative. In 2023, The Block was one of ten university art museums nationally to receive a portfolio of Frankenthaler’s prints and working proofs, along with funding to support interpretation and public engagement.&nbsp; Pouring, Spilling, Bleeding&nbsp;places this new acquisition in dialogue with over 30 works from The Block’s permanent collection, highlighting artists who have similarly challenged the boundaries of control and gesture in their artwork. Prints, drawings, and watercolors by artists of Frankenthaler’s close circle, including&nbsp;Grace Hartigan, Joan Mitchell, Robert Motherwell,&nbsp;and&nbsp;David Smith, provide a broader&nbsp;context for Frankenthaler’s contributions to postwar abstraction and printmaking. The conversation expands beyond the historical frame of Frankenthaler’s contemporaries, bringing in artists who have since drawn inspiration from Frankenthaler’s approach—Lynda Benglis&nbsp;and&nbsp;Amy Sillman—as well as artists who have welcomed chance and the unexpected in their artistic practice, such as&nbsp;John Cage, Max Gimblett,&nbsp;and Frankenthaler’s studio&nbsp;assistant&nbsp;Kikuo Saito. Curated by&nbsp;Stephanie S.E. Lee, 2024–25 Block Museum Graduate Fellow in Art History, and&nbsp;Corinne Granof, Academic Curator, the exhibition draws from in-depth research, including time spent in the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation archives. There, the curators uncovered visual and textual documentation of Frankenthaler’s collaborative print process, insights that shape the presentation of&nbsp;Divertimento&nbsp;(1983), shown alongside a full suite of working proofs. "In many ways, these working proofs show what the editioned print cannot: they are traces of decision-making, experimentation, and artistic dialogue between Frankenthaler, her circle, and the print workshop. That is what we wanted to bring to life in the exhibition,"&nbsp;said Stephanie S.E. Lee.&nbsp; <img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1757532227/camxlmonrdqcxz3uud6e.jpg">

Pouring, Spilling, Bleeding: Helen Frankenthaler and Artists’ Experiments on Paper

Third Wednesday | Hygge Silent Book ClubWednesday, December 17, 6:00-7:30pm Free; registration recommended&nbsp;<a style="color: rgb(70, 120, 134);" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://46316.blackbaudhosting.com/46316/Third-Wednesday-Night-17Dec2025" target="_blank">HERE</a> Visitors are invited to bring a book of choice and get ‘hygge’ with the Driehaus Museum in this silent book club inspired by Scandinavia's cozy yule traditions. Cookies and warm beverages will be served. After an hour of cozy quiet, stick around to chat and meet fellow readers.

Third Wednesday | Hygge Silent Book Club

The more abstract is form, the more clear and direct is its appeal.”&nbsp;— Wassily Kandinsky, Concerning the Spiritual in Art, 1912&nbsp; Exhibiting Artists : <a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.michellebolinger.com/" target="_blank">Michelle Bolinger </a>(b.1981), David Burlick (1882-1967), <a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://marisolcervantes.com/home.html" target="_blank">Marisol Cervantes </a>( b.1996), Gerald Coarding (1911-1986), Joseph Friebert (1908 – 2002), <a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.marygriffin.net/" target="_blank">Mary Griffin</a> (b.1986), John D. Graham (1881/86/88-1961), <a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.staciemayajohnson.com/" target="_blank">Stacie Maya Johnson</a> (b. 1977), William S. Schwartz (1896-1977), Charles Green Shaw (1892-1974), and<a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.brucethorn.com/" target="_blank"> Bruce Thorn </a>(b.1952).&nbsp;&nbsp;Madron Gallery presents Conversations in Abstraction, a group exhibition that brings together contemporary and historical artists whose abstract paintings create a visual communication that transcends the barriers of time, geography, and theory. At its core, abstraction invites the viewer to peel back the layers of color, line, shape, and texture, discovering deeper meaning and connection—compositions designed to spark dialogue. The 23 paintings on display serve as markers that span more than a century of artistic creation. Over the past five years, Madron has been collecting artworks produced during the early exploration of abstraction in America. By exhibiting historical and contemporary artworks alongside each other, we not only examine how abstraction has developed over time but also explore how artworks created decades apart remain relevant to one another.&nbsp; Image: Bruce Thorn (b. 1952), Flamingo, 2025, acrylic on linen, 54 x 144 inches.

Conversations in Abstraction

In her first solo exhibition in the Midwest, Lagos-based artist Temitayo Ogunbiyi draws our attention to the medicinal capacities and visual complexities of local flora, showing exquisite drawings, paintings, and sculpture that respond to the social and natural environments of Chicago. While honoring the cancer journey of a close friend who was based in Chicago, Ogunbiyi considers the conventions of botanical documentation and the health trends associated with such North American plants as paw paw, echinacea, and milkweed.In a larger sense, the exhibition considers exchanges of friendship and translations of language by referencing various geographies that the artist has occupied. Thereby, Ogunbiyi aspires to forge new connections. In Chicago, she plans to engage a variety of viewers through community programming, including the manufacture and distribution of a bespoke ice cream flavor, communal food practice, and the incorporation and recirculation of vintage furniture in the exhibition display.For the first time, the Arts Club will concurrently feature a garden commission as part of the gallery exhibition. Taking the rough form of an abacus, Ogunbiyi’s installation on the western exterior wall is composed of cast grinding stones made of melted plumbing fixtures sourced in Nigeria. Through reference to the ancient mathematical tool, the abacus, the artist asks “Who counts?”—considering ‘counts’ as a verb and state of being. She invites all to enter the conversation.The exhibition is curated by Janine Mileaf, Executive Director and Chief Curator at The Arts Club of Chicago. It is made possible by a grant from Conor O’Neil; specific programming is supported by the Goethe-Institut. A version of the exhibition, curated by Rebecca Lowery, will travel to the Wexner Center for the ArtsColumbus, Ohio, in 2026.

Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will have revelations along felled branches and longer roots/routes

<h2>Silver Lining: The Prints of Derrick Adams</h2><h4>Exhibition Dates:&nbsp;October 8–December 19, 2025</h4><h4>Reception:&nbsp;Thursday, October 9, 7–9 pm</h4> Over the past six years, artist Derrick Adams has created nearly twenty vibrant prints in collaboration with Tandem Press. This exhibition highlights the results of that partnership—works that celebrate leisure, domestic life, and personal style through bold color, repeating patterns, and cadenced compositions. Adams first came to Tandem Press in 2019, following a recommendation from artist Mickalene Thomas. His first print with the studio,&nbsp;Self-Portrait on Float, shows him lounging on a unicorn pool float—gold-leaf accents, rainbow details, and all—Adams gazes out at the viewer with his head gently tilted, surrounded by a sea of vivid teal.&nbsp; Throughout these prints, we see a celebration of rest, domesticity, recreation, and style—recurring motifs in his larger body of work—filtered through the medium’s rich graphic possibilities. Working closely with Tandem’s collaborative printmakers, Adams has taken full advantage of the studio’s technical resources and experimental spirit, resulting in prints that pulse with color and rhythm.&nbsp; Silver Lining&nbsp;not only documents a significant chapter in Derrick Adams’s artistic practice but also celebrates the democratic and expansive nature of printmaking. Through these works, viewers are invited into scenes that affirm rest as resistance, leisure as power, and joy as a vital, everyday act.&nbsp; <h2>About the Artist:</h2>Derrick Adams&nbsp;(b. 1970, Baltimore, Maryland) is a multidisciplinary artist who closely considers the influence of popular culture on the formation of self-image. His work also questions how African American experiences intersect with art history, American iconography, and consumerism. He received a BFA from Pratt Institute and an MFA from Columbia University. He is also an alumnus of the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture and the Sharpe-Walentas Studio program. He has received multiple notable awards, including a Robert Rauschenberg Foundation Residency (2019), Gordon Parks Foundation Fellowship (2018), Joyce Alexander Wein Artist Prize from the Studio Museum in Harlem (2016), and the Louis Comfort Tiffany Award (2009). Derrick Adams has been exhibiting extensively since 2001, including solo exhibitions at the California African American Museum, Cleveland Museum of Art, Milwaukee Art Museum, Hudson River Museum, The Gallery in Baltimore City Hall, Museum of Arts and Design, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver. His work has also been included in numerous important exhibitions at institutions such as the Henry Art Gallery in Seattle, the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati, The Studio Museum in Harlem, MoMA PS1, and the Brooklyn Museum. His work is held in many permanent public and private collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Baltimore Museum of Art, Birmingham Museum of Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Derrick Adams lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. This exhibition is supported by the Anonymous Fund.

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