{"id":413524,"date":"2023-03-27T14:03:24","date_gmt":"2023-03-27T19:03:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/urbanmatter.com\/chicago\/?p=413524"},"modified":"2023-03-27T21:34:07","modified_gmt":"2023-03-28T02:34:07","slug":"8-spring-art-exhibitions-in-chicago-to-mark-on-your-calendar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/urbanmatter.com\/chicago\/8-spring-art-exhibitions-in-chicago-to-mark-on-your-calendar\/","title":{"rendered":"8 Spring Art Exhibitions in Chicago to Mark on Your Calendar"},"content":{"rendered":"

Spring is finally (somewhat) approaching Chicago. As the season of life and possibilities unfold, we highly recommend you pay one of Chicago’s many museums, galleries, and art spaces a visit to see, hear, and experience our world through a different perspective. Going with the seasonal theme of hope, revival, and excitement, we’ve chosen 8 spring art exhibitions in Chicago that we think you shouldn’t miss. Meanwhile, don’t be afraid to take advantage of free museum days<\/a> and go outside the box! Let us know what shows you discovered beyond this list.<\/p>\n

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Image Credit: Will Rawls<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Will Rawls, [siccer]<\/a><\/h2>\n

MCA, 220 E. Chicago Ave, Chicago, IL 60611<\/strong><\/p>\n

WHEN:\u00a0<\/strong>April 27 \u2013 30, 2023. Artist Talk: April 29th, 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm.<\/p>\n

The 2021 winner of the Creative Capital Grant, [siccer]<\/em> is an interdisciplinary project exploring the themes of the human body, language and communication, and race and ethnicity. Encompassing dance, photography, and sound,\u00a0[siccer] <\/em>addresses the relationship between blackness and image-making through a live performance accompanied by a video installation. Throughout the performance, an automated camera snaps an image every few seconds while the intervals between shutter clicks offer brief interludes when the camera fails to capture the dancers\u2019 movements. As the performers improvise during these gaps between photographs, they rescript the terms through which blackness and queerness are made visible.<\/p>\n

[siccer]<\/em> is performed on April 27, 28, and 29, at 7:30 pm and April 30 at 2:00 pm. Tickets are available here<\/a>. The video installation is on view at MCA from March 22 through June 18, 2023. Those interested in learning more about the projects can also join the Artist Talk<\/a> on April 29, starting at 2:00 pm.<\/p>\n

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Image Credit: Michiko Itatani<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Michiko Itatani: Infinite Hope<\/a><\/h2>\n

Jean Albano Gallery, 215 W Superior St, Chicago, IL 60654<\/strong><\/p>\n

WHEN:\u00a0<\/strong>April 5\u2013June 3. Opening Reception: April 14<\/p>\n

Based in Chicago, Michiko Itatani’s art stems from fragments collected from the experiences of the artist and those throughout the world’s history. The artist then mutates, combines, rearranges, and recreates these fragments in her paintings to develop new relationships between them. As a result, Itatani’s paintings are incomplete, fragmented, and always under inquiry. Or should we say they are always hopeful, evolving, and full of possibilities like the season spring?<\/p>\n

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Image Credit: GRAY Chicago<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Jaume Plensa: Forgotten Dreams<\/a><\/h2>\n

GRAY Chicago, 2044 W Carroll Ave, Chicago, IL 60612<\/strong><\/p>\n

WHEN:<\/strong> April 7\u2013June 3<\/p>\n

Widely celebrated for public sculpture that engages the human form, architecture, poetry, and language, Jaume Plensa presents recent work in the exhibition Forgotten Dreams at GRAY Chicago. The exhibition includes two large-scale works in cast aluminum: a series of twenty-one doors, titled Forgotten Dreams, 2020. This piece marks Plensa\u2019s return to the use of doors as a universal motif and symbol of the human condition.<\/p>\n

The second piece, Where Are You? (2022) consists of 21 freestanding sculptural portraits exploring the artist’s concept that “we are islands linked and separated by an ocean.” Also included in the exhibition are a series of drawings, a discipline that Plensa considers an extension of his sculptural practice, and two additional portraits \u2013 Flora Silence, 2022, in marble, and Hortensia Silence, 2022, in granite \u2013 from the artist\u2019s Silence series. As one of the highly anticipated spring art exhibitions in Chicago, Forgotten Dreams is sure to leave you pondering about interhuman relationships in the modern landscape.<\/p>\n

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Image Credit: Michael Lee Zirulnik<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Strips & Needles\u2014A Day in the Life<\/a><\/h2>\n

International Museum of Surgical Science, 1524 N. Lake Shore Dr, Chicago, IL 60610<\/strong><\/p>\n

WHEN:<\/strong> Mar 24 \u2013 Sep 4, 2023<\/p>\n

“Strips & Needles\u2014A Day in the Life” is a narrative art and medicine initiative centered on the installation of 366 Lucite panels with the purpose of creating a humanizing opportunity for healthcare providers and students of medicine and allied health fields to reflect and reconsider the patient. With over half of the U.S. population facing direct, adverse impacts of diabetes, building a supportive community, raising awareness and interest in building a stronger healthcare system, and bringing the disabled into the public’s purview are all critical to effectively confronting our country’s diabetes epidemic.<\/p>\n

Finally, the project also directly benefits patients and families living with diabetes, healthcare providers, and the general public.<\/p>\n

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Image Credit: Bryana Bibbs<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Bryana Bibbs: Numb<\/a><\/h2>\n

Olivia Gallery, 3816 W Armitage Ave, Chicago, IL 60647<\/strong><\/p>\n

WHEN:\u00a0<\/strong>April 7 \u2013 May 6, 2023. Opening Reception: April 7th from 5:00 pm to 9:00 pm<\/p>\n

Telling stories of trauma and mental health, Bribb works between traditional and experimental processes and uses her large-scale pieces to navigate past experiences in what Bibbs considers to be “chapters.” In earlier work, Bibbs was driven by an urgency to understand her personal experiences translated into the fast processes of mark-making in painting. As time progresses, Bibbs’s most recent work reflects parallels between the slow navigation of personal experiences and the rhythmic textile techniques of hand-carding, hand-spinning, and hand-weaving, both of which are a form of transformative repetition.<\/p>\n

“Numb is how I felt during these traumatic experiences I had gone through for nearly a decade. With this exhibition, I hope to continue to move forward in ending the stigma and encouraging others to share their stories of trauma in a way that is healthiest for them,” says the artist.<\/p>\n