September 2025 Issue: Art 50 + Fall Arts (Print Edition)

Art 50 2025

Chicago's Artists' Artists

It's a turbulent time in the art world, with high-profile gallery closings and art-fair hiatuses, in Chicago and beyond—all prompting a narrative of market decline. And that's on top of national and international trauma brought on by our political regime that is playing out, highly visibly, in our museums and the halls of academia. But none of this can stifle the extraordinary creative force of Chicago artists. The city and its environs are an ever-fertile ground for great art, a fact increasingly recognized by the so-called art establishment. (Brian Hieggelke)

The Garment District's Last Stand

Buddie Miller carries on his father's—and Chicago's once-thriving legacy

Tucked among a smattering of bars, restaurants and boarded storefronts along the 200 block of South Wabash Avenue is the most curious of shops. A yellow sign juts out from its facade announcing FABRICS in red letters; a large cloth print of Bob Marley and a cardboard sewing button grace one window. Inside, hundreds of bolts of fabric, stacked skeins of yarn and spools of lace and trim reach to the ceiling. (Lori Rotenberk)

How Bronzeville Plays in Peoria

Preston Jackson never got his due in Chicago. So he took his magnum opus—and his guitar—home.

"Preston Jackson is the most compelling Chicago artist living in Central Illinois. His inspirational sculptural installation “Bronzeville to Harlem: An American Story” is a permanent part of the Peoria Riverfront Museum. The work contains over 300 small bronze and steel characters, bridges and buildings, including South Side Chicago treasures like Gerri Oliver's Palm Tavern, the Regal Theater and Satchel Paige and Bessie Coleman going into the headquarters of Negro Digest-Ebony magazine for interviews." (Dave Hoekstra) 

George Grosz in America: 1933-1948

The life of an artist, in art. An extended comic by Ivan Brunetti

FALL ARTS PREVIEW 2025

Yes, Please

 “Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind” at the MCA

"The word yes—written in miniscule script and seen only with the help of a ladder and magnifying glass—is the climax, the place of puncture in Yoko Ono’s “Ceiling Painting/Yes Painting.” The piece was first shown at the artist’s 1966 exhibition at Indica Gallery in London, which is where she would first meet John Lennon. Ono’s partnership with Lennon would shape her private and public life for decades to come." (Annette LePique)

+ Can't-Miss Fall Art Events 

A Force of Movement

The Joffrey Ballet's seventy years of pushing boundaries

"This season marks multiple milestones for the Joffrey Ballet: it’s the company’s seventieth season and also its thirtieth year since it relocated from New York to the Third Coast. With its two-story marquee above State Street and a “Nutcracker” rendition set during the 1893 Columbian Exposition—which happens to turn ten this year—the company is now synonymous with Chicago." (Sharon Hoyer)

+ Can't-Miss Fall Dance Events

Shifts Happen

The all-women leadership team reshaping the Chicago Architecture Biennial

"As the Chicago Architecture Biennial (CAB) gears up for its sixth edition—“Shift: Architecture in Times of Radical Change”—a new, all-women leadership team is reshaping the organization’s future. With a focus on civic engagement, global dialogue and bold ideas, artistic director Florencia Rodriguez, chairs Nora Daley and Sarah Herda, and executive director Jennifer Armetta are guiding CAB into a fresh chapter—one that not only explores architecture as a cultural force, but places it as part of everyday life." (Vasia Rigou)

+ Can't-Miss Fall Design Events 

Youthquake! 

Art houses meet a new movie-mad generation

"A new movie is just one you haven't seen yet. 'I will continue to fight for cinema because right now, as filmmakers, we have to fight to keep cinema alive,' Sean Baker, the preeminent independent filmmaker of the year, said as he accepted the Palme d'Or in Cannes for "Anora" in 2024." (Ray Pride)

+ Can't-Miss Fall Film Events 

"A visual and visceral banquet that goes on for blocks"

An oral history of the Printers Row Lit Fest, as it turns forty

"The Printers Row Book Fair was but a one-year-old just learning to walk when we started Newcity in 1986. Since our ambition then was merely to be a neighborhood newspaper, the fledgling event was one of the biggest stories in our small 'town.' We covered it accordingly, assembling a multi-page guide to the budding fair. And we always had a booth to give out our little local publication." (Brian Hieggelke)

+ Can't-Miss Fall Lit Events 

A Nineties Icon Transformed

“A Night of Mellon Collie and Infinite Sadness” for the Lyric Opera

+ Can't-Miss Fall Music Events 

Magic City

Chicago in the new golden age

"For decades, it was Lawry’s The Prime Rib, but in March 2026, the 36,000-square-foot McCormick Mansion will be transformed into a Magic Mansion and renamed The Hand & The Eye. As a $50 million development, the big money investment venue (or as they say, 'not just a venue: it’s a journey') will be the largest in the world dedicated to a surprising art: magic." (Robert Eric Shoemaker)

+ Can't-Miss Fall Stage Events 

Arts & Culture

Art: “Iñigo Manglano-Ovalle: A Want for Nothing” at the DePaul Art Museum

Dance: Chicago Danztheatre Ensemble reimagines the Full Circle Festival

Design: Reframing Farnsworth

+ Mood: Coffee Table Books

Film: Partying at the end of reality with the Chicago Underground Film Festival

Lit: Melissa Fraterrigo traverses the perilous terrain of girlhood

Music: Sound & Gravity is something stranger and more imaginative than Pitchfork

Stage: An interview with Susan Booth about "Ashland Avenue"

Reviews

It's time to get out there

Poetry

“on wishin dat baba Kent [Foreman] & mama Maria [McCray] cud

celebrate dis 40th berfday wif us [asé]”: A new poem by avery r. young

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