Most people are lucky to have one act that hits. William Horberg is well into his third. Horberg was born in Chicago and grew up around Belmont and Broadway in the Lakeview neighborhood in the 60s and 70s. He ran a repertory movie theater called the Sandburg at the corner of Division and Dearborn from […]
Tag: artists
Posted inFeature
The moon—it’s for the birds
On the moon, there are no humans. The birds that populate the lunar planet don’t get caught up in ideas like weekends or “the economy.” They stay connected via a vast fungal network, and there is plenty of universal worm (there’s one big worm that they all eat) to keep everyone fed. Michael DeForge’s latest […]
Posted inArt Feature
’Art is the fuel for all things’
Editor’s note: for this issue, Coco Picard talked to Chicago artist and professor Nick Cave about his art practice and work, as well as his exhibition “Forothermore.” Edited text from the comic is transcribed here to ease readability. The artist, activist, and educator Nick Cave’s first retrospective, “Forothermore,” is on view at the Museum of […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Julie Doucet is back
In 2018, the Reader ran a cover story: “Julie Doucet is done making comics.” The underground artist famously abandoned the scene in 2006, leaving fans of her cult-classic series Dirty Plotte and graphic novels like My New York Diary bereft. Through the years, her autobiographical comics became renowned in the canon. She explored other art […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The big world of Brandon Breaux
Yes, Chance the Rapper did give a big push to artist Brandon Breaux’s career when Breaux designed the covers for three of the singer’s mixtapes: 10 Day, Acid Rap, and Coloring Book. Breaux also recently landed two high-profile commissions—the February 2022 Ebony cover honoring editor André Leon Talley, and the cover of Carry On: Reflections […]
Posted inArts & Culture
A shooting star of a talent, gone too soon
The 1960 oil painting Garden of Music—the magisterial centerpiece of a knockout survey of the art of Bob Thompson— shows Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane, and a half dozen other jazz luminaries coexisting in a pastoral landscape. Some figures are silhouettes, while others are rendered with distinct features. How the painter balanced so many disparate elements […]
Posted inArt Review
Between the flesh and the machine
Skin and stone, organic and sterile, hard and soft: juxtapositions aren’t new in art. This push-and-pull tactic has been done, and done again, but it’s not always executed well. New York-based artist Hannah Levy manages to push and pull her viewers in the right direction for her new solo exhibition, “Hannah Levy: Surplus Tension,” now […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Exploring the Terrain
The fall art season has been underway since the beginning of September, but some Chicago art lovers have been waiting for a recent tradition to kick off to mark the start of their autumnal art appreciation. This year marks the fifth iteration of the Terrain Biennial, a (mostly) outdoor and multisite exhibition of artist projects […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Postcards from a stranger
You may have seen one of Jenny Lam’s blank, prestamped, self-addressed postcards affixed to a light pole or on a bookstore shelf somewhere in the city. The postcards always feature the same prompt: “Tell me one thing you dream of doing before you die. Use this card as your canvas.” Lam, a Chicago-based artist and […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Drawing beyond the margins
Black cartoonists from Chicago are featured in a new book and included in a new exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.
Posted inCity Life
Mapping out a reader’s delight
Upcoming events and distractions from our listings coordinator
Posted inMusic
Chicago beat maker Spectacular Diagnostics brings a mystical touch to underground hip-hop
Chicago hip-hop producer and visual artist Robert Krums has been making music for nearly two decades, and for most of that time he went by the name Earmint. About five years ago, he reinvented himself as Spectacular Diagnostics. Fortunately, the reputation in the national underground he’d earned as Earmint helped him assemble a hit squad […]
Posted inArts & Culture
How Chicago artists are spreading the message that Black Lives Matter
Muralists use boarded-up storefronts as their new canvas as part of Paint the City.
Posted inCity Life
The Reader’s stay-at-home chronicles: days 43 and 44
What we’re reading, watching, listening to, etc., to pass the time.