What We're Reading: 7/28
Alum Chris Ware Curates and Designs Comics Exhibition at Chicago Cultural Center
Artist, writer, and alum Chris Ware (SAIC 1991–93, HON 2019) and Chicago Cultural Historian Emeritus Tim Samuelson curated and designed the Chicago Cultural Center’s newest exhibition. Chicago: Where Comics Came to Life (1880–1960) spans almost a century of content from Chicago’s early comics scene, including pieces from Ware and Samuelson’s own collections. According to the Chicago Cultural Center’s website, the exhibition is an “intentional historical companion to the concurrently appearing survey of contemporary Chicago comics” at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago. Chicago: Where Comics Came to Life (1880–1960) will be exhibited through October 3 in the Sidney Yates Gallery at the Chicago Cultural Center.
Via SAIC
A little boy was trying energetically to climb atop one of the two lions that have long “guarded” the Art Institute as people poured through the doors on Saturday, becoming the latest of the millions of people who have gotten pleasure from the art inside.
Some of those creations have provided inspiration for artists in other realms — writers, musicians, playwrights — and the latest of these is June Sawyers, who has created a show titled “Nighthawks: A Theatrical Meditation on Solitude and Loneliness.”
Via Chicago Tribune
A 1.3-acre garden on the South Side filled with crab apple, Musclewood and Korean dogwood trees is being molded into a green oasis where residents will be able to enjoy the environment alongside educational programming and community-focused gardening.
Chris Abraham, head of the planting for Kenwood Gardens, has plans to add Minnie Pearl Phlox, Lilac Squirrel and other plants, but those aren’t the only seeds being laid. The garden is part of an ongoing effort led by artist, developer, urban planner and community activist Theaster Gates to transform neglected areas of the South Side neighborhood into sustainable community spaces.
Via Chicago Tribune