Join us and support Public Media Institute and our community's efforts to make Chicago's cultural, independent media, and movement work more meaningful, powerful and prosperous than ever. Join us Wednesday, October 23rd from 6:00 PM - 10:30 PM at Co-Prosperity, 3219 S. Morgan Street. There will be live music, dinner, and an auction with over 30 artworks. 

Use the buttons below to get your general admission tickets ($125) or to view our online auction!
Student or artist? Click the button below to get your discounted tickets! ($60)

More artworks are coming soon!

All tickets include:
🍽️ Dinner Dozzy's Grill – Experience the bold, authentic flavors of West African cuisine, thoughtfully crafted to create a one-of-a-kind cultural dining experience. Let Dozzy’s Grill take you on a culinary journey with their signature dishes and warm, radical hospitality. Indulge your sweet tooth with desserts from Elizabeth's Cakes and Eli's Cheesecake.

🍻 Open Bar – Sip and enjoy drinks, courtesy of Marz Brewing and Jeppson's Malort.

🎤 Live Music – Groove to beats by DJ Logan Bay, Weird Lady Music, and RADIUS.

🎟️ Artwork Auction – Bid on exclusive, one-of-a-kind art pieces through our Qgiv online auction platform, and help support our cause! Pick the ticket that feels right for you. If you can’t join us in person, please consider attending one of our many free events throughout the year. Your support, in any form, is invaluable. Spread the word, and let’s continue to co-build the communities of the future—together.

Sponsors:

Landscapes from Under the Rubble: Destroyed Artworks from Gaza
Curated by Linda Abdullah
Co-Prosperity, 3219 S Morgan Street, Chicago

Opening Friday, October 4, 6-10PM

Open Hours:
Saturday October 5, 12 PM - 6 PM
Wednesday October 9, 12 PM - 6 PM
Thursday October 10, 12 PM - 6 PM
Friday October 11, 12 PM - 6 PM
Saturday October 12, 10 AM - 2 PM
Sunday October 13, 12 PM - 6 PM
Monday October 14, 12 PM - 6 PM

“Landscapes from Under the Rubble” is an exhibition featuring eight Palestinian artists from Gaza. Their work exhibition encompasses work created prior to October 2023 and destroyed by the bombing, work produced by artists who were able to escape Gaza in 2024, and new works being created daily under the relentless attacks by the Israeli occupying forces.

In the face of the destruction of their homes, studios, and galleries, as well as the loss of lifetimes of work, countless artists in Gaza have been compelled to flee continuous massacres. Some artists in this show were able to escape through Rafah Crossing, while others managed to rescue their families but were unable to leave themselves. Many are currently residing in tents with their families, awaiting ceasefire, a pause in the genocide that’s just been postponed until at least after the US election.

“This is our only window to tell the world: we are still alive,” says Salem, a visual artist and professor at Alaqsa University. He began posting daily sketches on Facebook as a means of documenting diaries from a war zone. Other individuals are organizing art workshops for children and mothers as a form of respite from the daily trauma they endure.

Since 2007, Gaza has been subjected to a siege that has restricted Palestinian movement and crippled the economy, leaving a 360-kilometer square of land isolated from the rest of the world. The blockade severely limited art funding and materials, forcing Palestinian artists in Gaza to be resourceful with whatever resources they could find, often hindering their ability to attend their own exhibitions.

Since October 7, the attacks on Gaza have deliberately targeted hospitals, schools, universities, bakeries, and cultural spaces. Shababeek, a hub for the art community that housed a collection of over 20,000 works was completely destroyed by Israeli occupying forces in April 2024. Eltiqa’, Gaza’s first contemporary art space, was similarly destroyed, along with all the studios and artworks it housed. By attempting to destroy Palestinian culture, the occupation seeks to render impossible not only the reconstruction or buildings, but also the reconstruction of ways of knowing, ways of expressing.

Artists who have managed to escape Gaza are deeply traumatized by the horrors they have endured. Some have been able to reflect on their experiences, while others are paralyzed by creative block. Those who are unable to leave are living in tents, unsure if they’ll see the next day. Some use pomegranate, charcoal, tea, and hibiscus stains to leave their mark on a piece of ruled paper.

This exhibition serves as a documentation of the experiences of eight artists over the course of nearly a year of ongoing genocide. “The life of a Gazan artist is not easy, as we are often isolated from the world,” Salem elucidates. “However, art serves as a bridge between us and other people.”

Artists Bios:

Mohamed Abusal @mabusal
Born in Gaza in 1976. Although a graduate in finance and management, Abusal retrained as an artist in 2000 and attended many workshops to develop and refine his artistic skills. Abusal exhibited his work internationally in countries like France, where he has held several solo exhibitions, United States of America, United Kingdom, Australia, and United Arab Emirates. In 2005 he was awarded the Charles Aspry Prize for Contemporary Art. He is a founding member of Eltiqa’ artist collective in Gaza City. Abusal’s stoic manner and diligent approach – in style and technique – make him one of Palestine’s brightest talents.

Shareef Sarhan @shareef_sarhan
Born in 1976, Sarhan is a Palestinian artist, professional photographer, and freelance designer. He started his career in 1995 after graduating from YMCA, Gaza, Palestine with a degree in Fine Arts. Sarhan holds a diploma in arts from the University of ICS in the United States. Sarhan’s artworks have been exhibited in Ramallah, Bethlehem, Jerusalem, and internationally in Jordan, United Kingdom, France, United States of America, Italy, United Arab Emirates, and Egypt. He is a founding member of the Windows from Gaza for Contemporary Art group (Shababeek) and an active member of the Association of Palestinian Artists.

RANA BATRAWI @ranabatrawi
Rana Bartrawi (b.1983, Palestine) is an established artist and an art teacher based in Gaza, Palestine. She obtained a bachelor’s degree in fine art from Al Aqsa University, Gaza, in 2007 and has since developed a fantastic catalogue of work – primarily sculptures and reliefs – drawing inspiration from Gaza’s rich cultural and archaeological heritage and recent history. 

Batrawi participated in many group shows in Palestine and internationally. Batrawi remains passionate about introducing art to women and children and has conducted many sculpture workshops with support from the Palestine Cultural Fund and the AM Al Qattan Foundation. She is also a committed volunteer participating in many fairs and on art panels. In 2023, she became a jury member of the Ismail Shammout Fine Art Award, Dar al-Kalima University, Bethlehem, Palestine. She currently in residency at Collège de France pavilion. 

Sohail Salem @sohail.salem
Born in Gaza in 1974, Salem is a visual artist and a professor of fine arts at Al-Aqsa University in Gaza. Salem received his B.A. in Fine Arts from Al-Aqsa University in 1999. He secured several prestigious art residencies in Jordan, Switzerland and France. Salem is a co-founder of Eltiqa' Group of Contemporary Arts where he was a supervisor of the contemporary art program GCAP. He participated in many local and international exhibitions and produced four solo exhibitions

RAED ISSA @raed.issa.art
Raed Issa is a contemporary artist born in Al Bureij refugee camp, Gaza, in 1975. Issa holds a Diploma in Computer Science from Al Aqsa University, Gaza. He is laureate of the Cité des Arts fellowship in Paris in 2011. He is a founder of the Fine Art Program of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society in Gaza and a founding member of the Gaza Contemporary Art collective Eltiqa'. His art explores the themes of vulnerability, loss and bereavement of living under siege and war. He has been exhibited in Palestine, Jordan, Switzerland, Japan, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Italy, Australia, Ireland and at Documenta fifteen. Much of his art work was destroyed during the Israeli war on Gaza in 2014.

DENA MATAR @mattardena
Born in Gaza in 1985, Matar is a Palestinian artist known for her dynamic use of color and line to offer an optimistic perspective on life in Gaza. She earned her degree in Fine Art and Education from Al-Aqsa University in Gaza in 2007. Despite the profound challenges of living under siege, Matar has made significant contributions to Gaza’s artistic scene through her paintings and by mentoring young artists. She is a member of the Eltiqa’ artist collective in Gaza City and has participated in numerous local exhibitions and workshops, collaborating with organizations such as the A.M. Qattan Foundation and the French Cultural Centre. Matar’s work has gained international recognition, with exhibitions in Geneva, France, and the Mosaic Rooms in London as part of the ‘Occupied Space’ exhibition in 2008. In 2012, she was selected for an artist residency at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris. Critics have likened her vibrant and imaginative style to that of Joan Miró and Pablo Picasso, yet it remains uniquely her own. 

BASEL ELMAQOSUI @basel_elmaqosui
Born in Gaza in 1971, Elmaqosui is a visual artist and freelance photographer. He is a graduate of the Arts Program in Gaza in 1995. He is a recipient of multiple awards such as: the Charles Asprey Award for Palestinian artists by A.M Qattan Foundation, the bronze price for the best photo from the Union of Arab photographers, Germany and the Oscar of Nile Culture biennale in Cairo in 2009. Elmaqosui presented his work in 7 solo exhibitions and participated in numerous group exhibitions. He worked as an art teacher and is a founding member of the collective Shababeek for Contemporary Art.

’AMERICA NEEDS TO HEAR MORE PALESTINIAN VOICES’ by Coco Picard on Chicago Reader, 2024

Bebesota
September 13 - October 25, 2024
Opening Reception: September 13 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM

Bebesota features large silkscreen printed bandanas, custom spinner rims and gold hoop earrings. By introducing these iconic materials from the hood into a gallery setting Bebesota calls attention to the vast space between the art world and various communities of so called outsiders. Exaggerating the scale is a symbolic gesture of intervention, a way of colonizing and claiming space in the world as a queer, Latina from a barrio. The value of art rests in its ability to communicate across barriers.

Vanessa Viruet, a Chicago-based artist of Puerto Rican descent, creates large-scale works delving into complex histories rooted in textiles, including identity, heritage, gender, and class. Her art has been exhibited at the National Museum of Puerto Rican Arts and Culture and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Detroit.Viruet has also exhibited in conjunction with Chicago Textiles Week, the Surface Design Association, and the Annual Lowrider Festival. Residencies include ACRE, Lillstreet Art Center, and the Fabric Workshop and Museum.

Viruet holds a BFA and an MA in Teaching from the Maryland Institute College of Art, and an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art. She has served as an art instructor for Chicago Public Schools for ten years. She is a Lecturer in Fiber and Material Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago where she also works with students in the Low Residency MFA program.

Join us for two weeks of counter-programming in the shadow of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. These events, put together by local and national artists and organizers, will include opportunities to workshop street art before the convention, gather to learn about the history that brought us here, and organize the movements of the future while the politicians make their speeches.

Radio partnerships with Pacifica, Democracy Now!, and WZRD will bring you round the clock news on WLPN Lumpen Radio and Lumpen TV, and movement workshops and panels coordinated by The Dissenters will bring leading activists and organizations from contemporary struggles against empire, the carceral state, and cop cities to engage with all of you who still care about tearing down the pig system.  

Week 1: Art Builds, Workshops, Democrazy Fair, and Lumpen Magazine Launch Party!

August 12, 6 - 9 PM: Puppets For Protest Workshop with Grace Needlman

Learn how to build various types of street puppets in the tradition of Bread and Puppet. 

Explore different materials and techniques for making large-scale, lightweight puppets for parades and demonstrations. Connect with other makers and activists to get your giant puppet ideas off the ground! Whether you have an idea for a puppet and need help figuring out the design or are looking for a crew to build with, this is a fun space to build skills and community. 

August 13, 6 - 9 PM: The Anarchist’s Guide to Running for Office with Matt Muchowski

A workshop on how to run for local office from an anarchist perspective

August 14, 6 - 10 PM: Democracy in the Dark with Jason Lazarus

Experiment with free speech messaging at night.  Prompts, materials, and food provided.  

If we assume darkness, how can voices for justice become the light?  This workshop invites participants to actively experiment with how we might reimagine free speech messaging at night. Prompts, physical materials, and food will be provided.  We are also seeking participants who would like to join in leading the workshop by sharing kindred experiments and ideas designed specifically for darkness, please dm for more information.

August 16, 8 PM - late: Tech Noir Lumpen Launch Party ft. Bambi Kunst

Tech Noir, the nightclub featured in the first Terminator film. Live performance synth dance party, a return to the dystopian futures of the past.  Look out for a performance from Bambi Kunst in wearable sculpture by O Tenzing, Democrazy Bambi Chips Themself at Tech Noir

August 17, 10 - 4 PM: Democrazy Fair: Radical Book, Zine, and Art Pop-up with Chicago Dissenters Day 1

FEATURING: Books from Pilsen Community Books, PM Press, Skunk cabbage books, Haymarket, and Other Forms. Printing for Protest by Fatherless. “Chicago ‘68'' Strategy Board Game Teach-and-Play Demo with Yoni Goldstein.

CHICAGO '68 is an antiwar wargame about revolutionary spectacle and collective action at the DNC riots of  '68. Join Designer Yoni Goldstein for a live demo and teach-and-play of this upcoming historical board game!

10 AM: Art from the Heart - Art-Making ft AI-Hub

1 PM: Colonial Violence at Home and Abroad: A Public Health Issue ft. Healthcare Workers for Palestine - Chicago

3PM: Workplace Organizing for Palestine ft. Chicago Labor Network for Palestine

August 17, 7 - 10 PM: The Poet’s Platform presented by Exhibit B

Poets respond to the DNC platform with one of their own.

August 18, 10 - 4 PM: Democrazy Fair: Radical Book, Zine, and Art Fair Pop-up with Chicago Dissenters Day 2!

2:30 - 4:30 PM: Welcome to Chicago: Radical Memories, Revolutionary Horizons ft. March on the DNC Coalition, Chicago Torture Justice Center, NotMeWe, Chicago Alliance Against Racist + Political Repression. Special Guests: Laura Whitehorn, Jalil Muntaqim, David Gilbert, and Red Fawn Fallis

**Evening at Marz Brewing**

7 PM: Artcraft 4 Liberation: Community, Co-optation + Resistance presented by DJs Against Apartheid, Various Chicago DJs

FthGNC Dance Party (Marz Brewing)

Week 2: PANELS, TALKS, AND THEATER!

August 20: 10 AM - 4:30 PM: Panels with Chicago Dissenters

10 AM: Autonomous Organizer Training ft. Unity & Struggle

1 PM: StopCopCities: Domestic Warfare and Decolonization ft. StopCopCity, NDN Collective

3 PM: Undoing Border Imperialism: Migrant Defense + Mutual Aid ft. International Migrant Alliance, Chicago Mutual Aid Organizers

August 20, 11:30 AM - 1:00 PM:  I Wish to Say Performance with Sheryl Oring

Twenty years ago, artist Sheryl Oring set out with a typewriter and offered people a chance to speak their minds as part of her I Wish to Say project. With this work, she sets up a public office – complete with a manual typewriter – and types people’s postcards to the U.S. president. Dressed as a 1960s secretary, she records whatever participants say. Originals are mailed to the White House and Oring keeps a carbon copy for her archive.
To date, Oring has typed 4,241 postcards, typed at hundreds of locations around the United States, from parks and town squares to college campuses and festivals. From August 19-21, she is bringing her show to Chicago to document the mood in the city during the Democratic National Convention and she’ll be at Co-Prosperity from 11:30 to 1 p.m. on Tuesday, August 20. Oring invites people to stop by and speak their minds.

August 21, 10 AM - 4:30 PM: Panels with Chicago Dissenters

10 AM: Sharpening the Tip of the Spear: Prison Abolitionism + Inside/Outside Resistance ft. In the Belly, In the Mix: Prisoner Podcast, Coalition to Decarcerate IL

1 PM: End Permanent Punishment: From Murder Registries to Death by Incarceration ft. Chicago Torture Justice Center

3 PM: US Out Of Asia Pacific ft. Nodutdol, Anakbayan, Cancel RIMPAC, International League of Peoples’ Struggle

August 21, 7:30 - 9:30 PM: '68 – a new American musical by Jamie Leo and Paul Leschen

A “sit in” concert version of the 2018 musical about the last big Chicago DNC. A festival of life. You are history, next Wednesday, August 21. Join Chicago-area activist folk and rock musicians and singer/actors in performing a sit-down reading / sing-through of '68, the new musical theater work that has been described as the ‘HAIR’ for our generation. The event is being conceived as a 1960’s “happening” —but streamed live and broadcast, as well as featured on national broadcast platforms. BYO instrument! (Sheet music and chord charts to be provided). We will self-organize to create history together. To hear a song samples + style: 68musical.com. Expect a 60+/- minute rich historical narrative that includes songs with a narrator. We ask a $10 donation to support performers, but no one will be turned away.

‘68 composer Paul Leschen is an outstanding composer, musician, and music director, and Jamie Leo (in addition to writing the book and lyrics), has directed unique, award-winning performances. Join us in honoring  the history we sing and speak of and deliver a memorable experience to the audience.

August 22, 10 AM: Student Intifada: Reflections + Lessons from the Encampments presented by Chicago Dissenters ft. Direct Action 4 Palestine, SJP Chicago, Justice, Unity, & Social Transformation, Palestine Solidarity Working Group w/ Actionists from “CA”, “IL”, “MA”, “NY”, “OH”

August 22, 1 PM: Encampments, Blockades and Revolts: Strategic Reflections since Occupy presented by Chicago Dissenters ft. Escalate Network

August 22, 7:30 PM - 10:30 PM: I WANT AN AI FOR PRESIDENT by Garrett Laroy Johnson and Kristin McWharter 

A new experimental theater piece about of leadership models and artificial intelligence

Please join us for a playtest of a new interactive performance "I WANT AN AI 4 PRESIDENT" developed by Garrett Laroy Johnson and Kristin McWharter. This live action role play style performance dives into the complexities of workplace leadership models and the evolving anxieties surrounding computer intelligence and the automation of labor. We hope you will join us for this intimate experience designed for small audiences. Attendance is limited, please RSVP via google form.

August 23, 10 AM - 3 PM: Breaks in the Chain: Resisting the Industrial Base of US Imperialism and the Fight to Free Palestine presented by Chicago Dissenters ft. Palestinian Youth Movement, Workers for a Free Palestine, Unity & Struggle

Co-Prosperity is thrilled to present Of Love: A Labor, a solo presentation of Ruth Burke’ installation in our window space. What are the textures and traces of care? How do labours of love materialize? Of Love: A Labor, a solo exhibition by the interdisciplinary artist Ruth K. Burke, attends to the tactile remnants of domestic interspecies relationships. This is not an exhibition about animals but of animals, and emerges in relation with animals. As is the habit of art history, non-human animals are all too often obscured by the powers of their own symbolism. Their transmutation into metaphor distracts us from their vibrant material lifeways that permeate earthly existence. 

Burke’s practice, more broadly, interrogates how we might challenge these objectifying paradigms, and instead care-fully invite animals into artistic practice as active agents and co-producers. This is embedded within the context of agricultural animal husbandry in the American Midwest. The word husbandry derives from the Old Norse husbondi or ‘house dweller’, which evokes proximity and duration. For millennia, draft animals have lived and worked alongside humans, shaping the land, shaping bodies, shaping ethical questions of power, of labor, of kinship. Here in Illinois, the ancestral lands of native peoples including the Peoria, Illini, and Myaamia nations, draft animals also pull the heavy load of settler colonialism, as they were once instrumentalized as key tools of the colonial project. Burke is concerned with how draft animal power may be harnessed otherwise, and how oppressive human power might be shifted and softened in these domestic contexts. Through installation, performance, and large-scale earthworks created in collaboration (co-laboring) with animals and plant-life, Burke attends to how non-human agencies might partake in and sustain art-making practices for collective acts of multispecies worldbuilding. 

Every installation that makes up Of Love: A Labor emerges as residue from the relational practice of living alongside animals and engaging in the labor of animal husbandry. Living on a farm in rural Illinois alongside her many companion species, including horses and a team of oxen, Ruth understands labor as a collective and interdependent process. Reflecting upon how the oxen haul countless bales of hay and straw for themselves and the horses to eat, aerate the compost broken down by a host of decomposer species, and plow, disc, and fertilize the kitchen garden, she acknowledges that: “Our work together sustains our life together.” Ruth attends to the remnants of these daily cycles of care-labor with a sculptural sensibility. Transforming ubiquitous materials and processes into relational meditations, she considers an aesthetics of interspecies care that bares an ephemeral tenderness. As Burke puts it: “I think and feel through my body when I'm working with the animals. Like the ability to measure 20 lbs of alfalfa hay without a scale, I'm trying to bring an attuned kinesthetic-haptic knowledge into the studio and making process”. On the gallery floor lies trails of scattered hay and furls of carefully coiled bailing twine and netting. The swirling, fluid arrangements echo the cyclical flow of interspecies care routines, but a closer look tells us that the threads catch, twist, and knot. The contours of care are not always smooth, they are punctuated by power, conflict, refusal, and grief. Our knotty species entanglements bind us materially and emotionally, and yet to attend to them is often complex and contradictory, and therefore requires an ethics rooted in difference.

Installed behind the main gallery window is a large-scale digitally collaged mural, which presents a durational mapping of cow licks shared between Ruth’s bovine companions known as ‘allogrooming’. Markings are produced by rough curling tongues gliding across downy hair, leaving behind undulating furrows of affection in kaleidoscopic coats – an ephemeral inscription of animal language. A layer of twine running across the photographic panels traces the shape of the ‘flight zone’; an animal handling model that demarcates a herd animal’s personal space, which if encroached upon whilst handling may cause alarm or ‘flight’. For Burke, this concept becomes a metaphor for the precariousness of relational thresholds, human and more than human, which are constantly established and re-established in the complex dance of relating. “I'm thinking about how we human animals also share flight and pressure zones in common with bovines, '' Burke says. “For both species, these thresholds are sites where we negotiate consent, pleasure, pain, and trust.” These species thresholds become particularly fragile when bodies occupy a state of discomfort or trauma, and an interspecies empathy requires care-full attention to the haptic experience that defines such bodily boundaries.

The coiling twine, and the intimate palimpsests of cow-lick-love-language, are motifs that are repeated throughout the exhibition. Repeated rituals of care. Rhythms of care. The rhythms of two young oxen chewing their cud on a video screen on the gallery wall. How we attune to non-human rhythms is at the heart of Burke’s wider practice, and Of Love: A Labor gently invites the viewer to feel into the textures and tenderness of a relational world that subtly reverberates through its materialization in the gallery space.

- Florence Fitzgerald-Allsopp

Artist Bio 

Ruth Burke is an interdisciplinary artist, from and of the Midwest, who collaborates with animals in her creative practice. She is a teamster, farm laborer, professor, equestrian, and cultural worker. Straddling the practice of contemporary art and the fields of human-animal studies, and agriculture, Burke has exclusively focused on human-animal relationships in her practice since 2015. In addition to exhibition, her current focus is a series of large-scale native plant earthworks powered by animal traction. 

Ruth Burke recently received the 2022 ISU University-level Creative Arts Initiative Award, which recognizes scholars with exceptional promise early in their careers, and is a 2024 Sustainable Agriculture Research & Education (SARE) Partnership Award Grantee. Burke has been a resident artist at ACRE, Detroit Community School, and was a fellow in the 2017 inaugural cohort at the Animals & Society Institute. Burke has presented her work at venues and institutions nationally and internationally, co-authored works in peer reviewed journals, created earthworks in three US states, and received numerous grants from various entities. 

Ruth Burke holds a BFA from the Ohio State University, and an MFA  from the University of Michigan. She is currently an Assistant Professor of Video Art in the Wonsook Kim School of Art at Illinois State University.

www.ruthkburke.com

In Concert with Jen de los Reyes: Mid-career survey exhibition and publication

The first mid-career retrospective of influential social practice artist, organizer, and educator Jen de los Reyes* Canadian-born, Ithaca, NY-based Reyes has made a concerted effort to live and make work in accordance with her principles, including pragmatic organizing practices informed by her early years in punk music communities and recent anti-corporate and anti-racist direct action 

Key projects of Reyes’ include flagship social practice conference Open Engagement (2007—2019) which showcased and launched a generation of socially engaged art; community urban garden Garbage Hill Farms in Chicago’s Southwest Side; The Disappearing Birds of North America: 389 Birds on the Verge of Extinction, a multi-faceted project with 389 artists and designers; and presentations including “Matching Minorities//Doubtful Doubles” (2020), an online workshop which called out racist practices in museums and educational institutions.

This retrospective exhibition, organized by Anthony Stepter, Astria Suparak and Nick Wylie, illuminates more than twenty years of artmaking, organizing, writing, and radical teaching by Jen de los Reyes. Through careful consideration of her life and career, patterns emerge that connect Reyes’s work to broader social contexts and art movements.
On the occasion of this exhibition, Co-Prosperity has produced a three book risograph publication series contextualizing the artist’s career and impact. The publication includes essays by Sampada Aranke; René De Guzman; Tom Finkelpearl; Eliza Gregory, Mark Menjivar, and Lexa Walsh; Zoë Heyn-Jones; Lee Painter-Kim; Stephanie Parrish; and Anthony Stepter, Astria Suparak, and Nick Wylie. Publication was designed by Josh Cook and Oscar Solis.

The opening reception for the exhibition will take place on Friday June 21 from 6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.

Public Programming

Class In Progress: LAND: Art, Ecology, and Environmental Activism 

Saturday, June 22, 2024, 3:00 p.m.

Free admission

As part of the Pedagogies section of this exhibition, Reyes will be sharing a glimpse into her own classroom. Class In Progress: LAND: Art, Ecology, and Environmental Activism outlines the syllabus, content, motivations, and assignments from her forthcoming class. In this moment of climate collapse the relationship of art to the land has an urgent new meaning. The course surveys artist’s engagement with land from a material, historical, spiritual and political perspective.
The talk will consist of twelve micro lectures that are a portrait of the weekly progression of the semester. Attendees will leave with an in progress reading list, and draft assignments and engagements.

Artist Talk Radio Broadcast

Wednesday, June 19, 12:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m.

lumpenradio.com + www.lumpen.tv

WLPN-LP 105.5FM 

Broadcasting on Lumpen Radio, tune in for an artist talk by Reyes interspersed with song selections related to the artist’s practice. The live broadcast will be archived and available for listening at the exhibition.

Dance Party

Friday, July 26, 2024, 7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m.

As a nod to over a decade of Open Engagement dance parties that capped off each of the annual convenings, the exhibition will close with a dance party that will bring together some of the conference’s favorite DJs.

How to Make a Scene 

Saturday, July 27, 2024 3:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. at Co-Prosperity and streaming live on lumpen.tv
www.lumpen.tv

Join Jen de los Reyes and a panel of artist organizers from Chicago past and present as they discuss their projects and practices as part of a series of talks in collaboration with Art + Design Chicago. 

If there's an overarching ethos to Jen de los Reyes’s art practice, it might be: how should a person be? The existential question, investigated by writer (and fellow Canadian) Sheila Heti in her 2010 novel, encompasses both life and work—the intersection where Reyes’s expansive, genre-defying practice comfortably exists. For Reyes, teaching, organizing, farming, making, and living are all of a piece; each facet of her work/life seamlessly bolsters the other areas. 

In Concert With Jen de los Reyes, a mid-career retrospective lovingly curated by Anthony Stepter, Astria Suparak, and Nick Wylie in coordination with the artist, deftly illustrates Reyes’s decades-long commitment to modeling how art can serve as a catalyst for a more ethical, sustainable, caring way of life. 

The earliest work on view, Daughter Mother Daughter: Joy Luck Experience, consists of the artist watching the end of the film The Joy Luck Club with her sister and mother. It’s a simple, everyday activity yet one layered with emotion; it’s personal and political, playful and deeply considered. It cleverly paves the way for the work that has followed, separated here into the themes of ecologies, pedagogies, and scene building, though it could be argued that any project could fit into each of those sections.

For The Disappearing Birds of North America: 389 Birds on the Verge of Extinction, Reyes invited 389 artists to depict one of the birds highlighted in a National Audubon Society report on the species at risk of extinction due to climate change. The renderings are installed in a vast wall collage; the beauty and diversity of the birds makes the impact of the human-made climate crisis tangible and painful. The project is accessible and action-oriented (proceeds from a planned book will go toward conservation efforts); it invited in others and is informative without being heavy-handed or overly didactic. Such is Reyes’s way.

Open Engagement, the itinerant social practice conference that Reyes founded and ran for over a decade, is depicted through conference materials and takeaways. Perhaps the artist’s best-known project, Open Engagement was where I first learned about Reyes’s work, via the 2017 justice-oriented iteration, which was headquartered at UIC. I was just beginning to write about Chicago’s art community, and Reyes was one of the first artists to make me feel that there was an exciting current of energy pulsing through the city. 

Though all these projects are awe-inspiring and illustrative of Reyes’s oeuvre, it is the artist’s teaching materials that feel the most representative. According to the publication that accompanies the exhibition, Reyes knew from a young age that she wanted to be an art professor. On display are a grid of Reyes’s syllabi over the years, ranging from courses on the history of social practice to the potential of printed media to the relationship of art to land. A cursory look through the pages is like a window into Reyes’s mind. Beautifully designed and carefully crafted, the classes are rich in material while also lending considerable attention to student’s wellbeing. An ethics of care agreement urges students to “approach conflict with care” and “make as much space as you take.” One poetic class assignment requires students to view either the sunrise or sunset each day and write down their observations. 

If you’ve ever had the privilege of hearing Reyes’s speak, you’ve likely noticed her intrinsic, easy ability to impart knowledge. As such, this exhibition offers an abundance of information, through past lectures, books and other reading materials, and from the aesthetic and well-designed projects. (Reyes makes social practice and sustainability look good.) To me, the biggest takeaway of the artist’s work is her generosity. Through her teaching, community building, and small-scale, big-impact farming, Reyes models a holistic way of working and living that is more just, more caring, more beautiful. Like the best social practice art, Jen de los Reyes makes work that remakes the everyday; her “art is the forgetting of art.” Or, as artist Sister Corita Kent—one of Reyes’s lodestars put it, “The only rule is work. If you work it will lead to something. It’s the people who do all of the work all the time who eventually catch on to things.” Through Reyes’s unflagging work ethic, she’s inviting us to catch on.

-Kerry Cardoza

Artist's Bio:

Jen de los Reyes, born in Winnipeg, Canada, is an artist, educator, writer, and radical community arts organizer. With roots in the Riot Grrrl and DIY music scene, her practice incorporates pedagogical, ecological and organizational methodologies. She founded and directed Open Engagement, an international conference on socially engaged art that was active from 2007–2019. She worked within Portland State University from 2008–2014 to create the Art and Social Practice MFA program with a curriculum focused on place, engagement, and dialogue. She is the author of several publications, most recently Defiantly Optimistic: Turning Up in a World on Fire. Reyes was the Associate Director of the School of Art & Art History of the University of Illinois at Chicago, where she taught in the departments of Art and Museum and Exhibition Studies. She is currently Associate Professor and Associate Dean for Diversity and Equity at the Cornell University College of Architecture, Art, and Planning. She splits her time between Chicago, where she founded Garbage Hill Farm, and Ithaca, NY. She describes herself as “defiantly optimistic, a friend to all birds, and proponent that our institutions can become tender and vulnerable.”

How to Make a Scene is a conversation series about artist-run cultural ecosystems of the 1980s and 1990s in Chicago. The series launched June 20th on Lumpen Radio, and continues through October with more radio broadcasts with the live conversations started at Co-Prosperity on July 13th, 2024. This series is a collaborative effort between the Public Media Institute and MdW, with support from the Terra Foundation for American Art as part of the city-wide initiative, Art Design Chicago.

The project aims to connect veteran artist organizers with those working today through a combination of intimate events at Co-Prosperity, broadcasts on Lumpen Radio, and live streams on LumpenTV. The series offers audiences trailheads for further exploration of Chicago's storied history of alternative gallery spaces, independent publications, and socially engaged collectives.

The series continues through fall to include sessions moderated by Ben Foch, Nicole Marroquin, Mary Patten, and Greg Ruffing, with more names to come!

All of the panels will be archived on Mixcloud, Vimeo, and the 2024 MdW Atlas, which will be printed as a book in 2026.

September 19th, 2024 11:00AM - 12:00PM & September 28th, 2024 12:00 - 2:00PM

Tune in here to listen to the first part of the conversation!

Join us for a very special two-part How to Make a Scene conversation hosted by Mary Patten, Greg Ruffing, Rebecca Wolfram, and others from Axe Street’s history. For this iteration of "How to Make a Scene,” we will create a kind of metaphorical séance, what we call “More Tales of (the) Subversive Axe.” This two-part transmission will conjure the spirit of Michael Piazza, Bertha Husband, and Elizam Escobar through their words, their music, and their art making, while we also summon the bodies, hearts, and minds of Axe Street’s survivors, its children, its collaborators and memory-keepers – that is, ourselves.

Axe Street was a community arts center located in the Logan Square of Chicago that was founded in 1985 and closed in 1989.

This two-part discussion on The Axe Street Arena Collective featured Mary Patten, Greg Ruffing, Rebecca Wolfram, and others.

August 31st, 2024, 3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
The August 31st conversation will spotlight four individuals who both create art/music and generate opportunities for others, with a focus on performance art. The discussion is moderated by Salem Collo-Julin with panelists travis, P. Michael, Da Wei Wang, & Rosé Hernandez. Following the panel, ONO will perform a special set featuring travis, P. Michael, Da Wei Wang, and Benjamin Karas.

Moderator:
Salem Collo-Julin: is editor in chief of the Chicago Reader. Collo-Julin has served on the editorial staff of the Reader since 2019. From 1999-2014, Collo-Julin was a member of the midwestern art group Temporary Services, and co-edited the book Prisoners’ Inventions (Whitewalls, 2003). She also co-founded Temporary Services’ publishing imprint, Half Letter Press. In addition to her work with the Reader, their writing has been found in Windy City Times, the Journal of Aesthetics and Protest, Lumpen, AREA Chicago, the book Organize Your Own (ed. Anthony Romero, Soberscove Press, 2016), and other publications. They are a native Chicagoan and their favorite Chicago alt-biweekly besides the Reader is the (defunct) Chicago Seed (1967-1974). Photo: Sarah Joyce

Panelists:
Rosé Hernandez is a multifaceted artist and healer based in Chicago, originally from Dallas, Texas. Since moving to Chicago in 2006 to study at the School of the Art Institute, she has become a prominent figure in the local arts scene. Hernandez co-leads the arts collective Burning Orchid and founded The Energetic Body, focusing on wellness through energy healing, herbalism, and performance art. Her work explores themes of body, desire, and spirituality, often integrating practices like butoh and Reiki to foster human connection and healing. Photo: Morgan Ciocca

travis is the frontman of ONO, a legendary experimental band from Chicago that has been pushing the boundaries of music and performance art since 1980. Known for his powerful vocal performances and unique stage presence, travis channels deep themes of trauma, spirituality, and conflict into the band's immersive shows. His collaboration with ONO's co-founder, P.Michael, has made the group a staple of Chicago's underground music scene, offering audiences a profound and transformative experience.

P. Michael, a founding member of the noise gospel band ONO since 1980, was born in Hyde Park, Chicago, into a music-loving family—his father was a jazz saxophonist, and he is related to Pete Cosey, who played with Miles Davis. Raised in the West Chesterfield neighborhood, known for its influential black musical artists, P. Michael is a multi-instrumentalist trained in music theory by soul arranger James Mack. He attended the School of the Art Institute for film and printmaking, St. Xavier University for pre-med Biology, and graduated from Roosevelt University with a Bachelor of Arts in arts and science in 1984.

Da Wei Wang is a prominent figure in the Chicago avant-rock scene, known for his work with the industrial-gospel-punk band ONO and as an improviser in Street Tentacle. His fractured, atonal guitar style blends elements of dada funk, existential doom, and ambient raga, using extended techniques to create dense, textured soundscapes. His solo album, *Liquid Metal Core*, released by Asian Improv Records in 2021, showcases his distinctive, rough guitar work and features drummer Ben Karas from ONO.

Performers:
ONO bandleader P. Michael Grego and frontperson travis had met before 1980, sharing a love for written and spoken word, the transcendent, and the genuine. Through continual poking and prodding, P Michael convinced travis to join him in ONO, the name coming from shortening “onomatopoeia,” and underscoring a desire to create “noise not music.” P Michael would handle the audio. travis the words. Since January 5, 1980, ONO’s roster has changed drastically, but always fiercely defended a singular construct: “The ONO STATEMENT OF PURPOSE: Experimental Performance, NOISE, and Industrial Poetry Performance Band; Exploring Gospel's Darkest Conflicts, Tragedies and Premises.” ONO band photo: Trip Warner.

Upcoming Events:
The series will continue with future sessions moderated by Ben Foch, Nicole Marroquin, Mary Patten, and Greg Ruffing, with additional names to be announced. All panels will be archived on Mixcloud, Vimeo, and the 2024 MdW Atlas, which will be published as a book in 2026.

Saturday, July 27, 2024, 3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
with a panel discussion from 3:30 PM - 4:30PM

Moderator Jen delos Reyes will speak with panelists Joanne Aono (Director of the alternative art project, Cultivator - Chicago Art Exhibitions & Farm Art Projects), along with Brian Holmes & Claire Pentecost (Watershed Art and Ecology, Chicago) 

This conversation between four artist organizers focused on ecologies will take place, fittingly, in the “Ecologies” section of the exhibition “In Concert with” showcasing the work of De Los Reyes and her collaborators for the past 20+ years. 

How to Make a Scene is part of Art Design Chicago, a citywide collaboration initiated by the Terra Foundation for American Art that highlights the city’s artistic heritage and creative communities.

Moderator Jen de los Reyes, born in Winnipeg, Canada, is an artist, educator, writer, and radical community arts organizer. With roots in the Riot Grrrl and DIY music scene, her practice incorporates pedagogical, ecological and organizational methodologies. She founded and directed Open Engagement, an international conference on socially engaged art that was active from 2007–2019. She worked within Portland State University from 2008–2014 to create the Art and Social Practice MFA program with a curriculum focused on place, engagement, and dialogue. She is the author of several publications, most recently Defiantly Optimistic: Turning Up in a World on Fire. Reyes was the Associate Director of the School of Art & Art History of the University of Illinois at Chicago, where she taught in the departments of Art and Museum and Exhibition Studies. She is currently Associate Professor and Associate Dean for Diversity and Equity at the Cornell University College of Architecture, Art, and Planning. She splits her time between Chicago, where she founded Garbage Hill Farm, and Ithaca, NY. She describes herself as “defiantly optimistic, a friend to all birds, and proponent that our institutions can become tender and vulnerable.”

Joanne Aono is a visual artist, curator/administrator, and holistic farmer. Her research- based drawings, paintings, and installations address identity, immigration, and the environment. She directs the alternative art project, Cultivator - Chicago Art Exhibitions & Farm Art Projects and serves on the exhibition committee of the Riverside Arts Center. Aono has received several Chicago DCASE grants, an Illinois Arts Council grant, and an Artist Run Chicago HPAC grant.

Cultivator was founded in 2015 with the first exhibitions in Aono’s Ravenswood studio and on Bray Grove Farm in north central Illinois where the artist moved to in 2014. Since then, thirty-two artists have exhibited their art with the alternative arts venue. Cultivator with Aono have been featured in Lumpen Magazine, Bad At Sports, Hyperallergic, and in an Arts Midwest film.

Brian Holmes is a polyglot essayist, artist and researcher, focusing on political ecology. He lived in Paris from 1990 to 2009, where he worked with artist-activist groups, served as translator and English editor of Documenta X publications and was on the editorial board of the journal Multitudes, while publishing across Europe and the world, in edited books, museum catalogues, radical journals, tracts, websites, etc. Upon returning to the United States he took up online cartography as a visual research practice and began working closely with the environmental art group Casa Río in Argentina. In Chicago he has been a member of the Compass group and more recently of Deep Time Chicago. With the latter group he has engaged in extensive collaborations with the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (now Geoanthropology) and the Haus der Kulturen der Welt’s Anthropocene Curriculum program (now Anthropocene Commons). Brian’s cartographic work has been exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Photography and at Gallery 400, both in Chicago; at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, Illinois; at Artists’ Alliance in New York; at the Pacific Northwest College of Art in Portland, Oregon; at Centro Cultural Parque de España in Rosario, Argentina; and at Antenna in New Orleans. He is co-founder of the space (with Claire Pentecost) Watershed Art and Ecology in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago.

Claire Pentecost is an artist and writer whose poetic and inductive drawings, sculpture and installations test and celebrate the conditions that bound and define life itself. Her projects often address the contested line between the natural and the artificial, focusing for many years on food, agriculture, bio-engineering, and anthropogenic changes in the indivisible living entity that animates our planet. Since 2006 she has worked with Brian Holmes, 16Beaver and many others organizing Continental Drift, a series of seminars to articulate the interlocking scales of our existence in the logic of globalization. She is also a founding member of Deep Time Chicago, dedicated to cultural change in the Anthropocene. She is co-founder of the space Watershed Art and Ecology in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago.

A sample of Pentecost’s exhibition venues include dOCUMENTA(13); Whitechapel Gallery; the 13th Istanbul Biennial; Nottingham Contemporary; the DePaul Art Museum; the Third Mongolian Land Art Biennial; Sursock Museum, Beirut; Times Museum, Guangzhou. Institutions inviting her to lecture include MIT; CalArts; RISD; Northwestern University; Rice University; The University of Virginia; Creative Time Summit and many others. She is represented by Higher Pictures, New York, and is Professor Emeritus at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC).

July 13th, 2024 3:00 PM - 5:00 PM

Click here to listen to this panel discussion!

Moderator Anthony D. Stepter is an organizer, educator, and curator from Grand Rapids, MI, now based in Chicago. He is the Programs Director at ACRE (Artist's Cooperative Residency & Exhibitions). Previously, Anthony was the assistant director of the Museum and Exhibition Studies program at UIC. He has an MA from SAIC and undergraduate degrees from Grand Valley State University. Anthony has worked at the Art Institute of Chicago, SAIC, and Grand Rapids Art Museum. 

As an independent curator, he has organized exhibitions and projects for venues like ACRE, University of Chicago's Arts Incubator, and Open Engagement. Anthony aims to foster connections between arts institutions and communities. Guided by antiracist and feminist perspectives, his work invites publics to meaningfully engage with art and ideas while building supportive networks.

Carlos Arango, former executive director of Casa Aztlan and president of Frente Nacional De Inmigrante, is a prominent artist based in Chicago, associated with Casa Atzlan, a cultural and community center in the Pilsen neighborhood. Carlos Arango joined Casa Aztlan in 1986 after moving to Chicago from Los Angeles, where he had previously relocated from Mexico. He became the executive director of Casa Aztlan in 1994. Before his official involvement, he was already familiar with Casa Aztlan due to its notable advocacy work for immigrants and residents.

Under Arango's leadership, Casa Aztlan continued to provide crucial services to the community, including education, immigration assistance, and cultural programs. He was significantly involved in community activism, notably organizing a major march for immigration reform in 2006 that drew over 500,000 participants, including Chicago's Mayor Richard M. Daley. Arango remains committed to helping immigrants become informed about social issues and participate in matters of social justice​.

Ed Marszewski is the Director of Public Media Institute (PMI), publisher of Lumpen Magazine and other titles. PMI launched the low power community radio station, Lumpen Radio (WLPN-LP) on 105.5 FM. PMI also programs the long-running cultural center, Co-Prosperity Chicago and the Buddy store located in the Chicago Cultural Center. Ed is also the co-founder of Maria’s Packaged Goods & Community Bar, Kimski, Marz Community Brewing Co., and other projects.

Felicia Grant Preston is a visual artist and retired art instructor. She was raised in Chicago where she attended Chicago Public Schools. Her talent was recognized as a child and she received nurturing and encouragement from her parents and teachers. Preston received a BA in art from Southern Illinois University in 1976, an MS ED from Northern Illinois University in 1979, and an MA from Chicago State University in 2003. In addition, she has studied at the University of Illinois, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Governor State University and The Savannah College of Art and Design. Her work has been included in the Paul R. Jones collection at the University of Delaware, which is considered the largest collection of African American art. Recent publications include the University of Delaware’s 2005 date book, Abstract and All That, University of Delaware exhibition catalogue, and African art: the Diaspora and beyond by Daniel T. Parker.

Preston’s work has been exhibited in Chicago at the Museum of Science and Industry’s Black Creativity exhibition, A.R.C. Gallery, Woman Made Gallery, R.H. Love Contemporary Gallery, Artemisia Gallery, Hyde Park Art Center, South Side Community Art Center, Susan Woodson Gallery, Beacon Street Gallery, Nicole Gallery, The South Shore Cultural Center, Neleh Artistic Expressions and Guichard Gallery to name a few. She has also exhibited at The Arsenal Gallery in New York, Fort Wayne Museum of Art Alliance, in Fort Wayne Indiana, Vaughn Cultural Center in St. Louis Missouri, The Art Exchange Gallery in Detroit Michigan, The Savannah College of Art and Design in Savannah Georgia, Florida Community College in Jacksonville Florida, Art Jaz Gallery in Philadelphia Pennsylvania, in addition to numerous private collections.

Thursday, June 20th at 11:00 am on Lumpen Radio

Click here to listen to this panel discussion!

The first conversation launches with moderator Anthony Stepter joined by panelists Patricia Nguyen (Axis Lab), Nell Taylor (Read/Write Library), and Andrea Yarbrough (in c/o Black Women) live on Lumpen Radio (105.5 fm) on Thursday, June 20th at 11:00 am.

Moderator Anthony D. Stepter is an organizer, educator, and curator from Grand Rapids, MI, now based in Chicago. He is the Programs Director at ACRE (Artist's Cooperative Residency & Exhibitions). Previously, Anthony was the assistant director of the Museum and Exhibition Studies program at UIC. He has an MA from SAIC and undergraduate degrees from Grand Valley State University. Anthony has worked at the Art Institute of Chicago, SAIC, and Grand Rapids Art Museum. As an independent curator, he has organized exhibitions and projects for venues like ACRE, University of Chicago's Arts Incubator, and Open Engagement. Anthony aims to foster connections between arts institutions and communities. Guided by antiracist and feminist perspectives, his work invites publics to meaningfully engage with art and ideas while building supportive networks.

Patricia Nguyen is an artist, educator, and scholar born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. With a Ph.D. in Performance Studies from Northwestern University and currently an assistant professor in American Studies at the University of Virginia, she has over 20 years of experience in arts education, community development, and human rights. Co-founder and executive director of Axis Lab, a community-centered art, food, and design studio in Uptown, Chicago, Patricia focuses on inclusive and equitable development for the Southeast Asian community. Axis Lab critically engages socio-economic concerns through creative programming that draws on cultural and historical knowledge of the immigrant and refugee population to incite equitable development. The organization reflects an intersectional approach, centering marginalized voices to address structural injustices and exploring creative possibilities to envision a just world.

Nell Taylor is the founder and executive director of Read/Write Library and a user experience, data, and discovery consultant. Clients range from global NGOs, government, and Fortune 500 brands to arts education data. Previously, she led planning, research, and communications at an artist's studio that produced interactive video installations for Esquire, Qualcomm, Sundance Film Festival, and the National Portrait Gallery. Nell has spoken at SXSW Interactive, TEDActive, MIT, DPLAFest, Code4Lib, and ORD Camp, among others. She was a 2015/16 National Arts Strategies Creative Communities Fellow. Read/Write Library has been featured in the New York Times, on NPR’s All Things Considered, and as the cover story in the Chicago Reader.

Andrea Yarbrough is a multi-disciplinary artist, curator, and educator based on the South Side of Chicago. Leading the initiative "in c/o: Black women," she focuses on creating sites of care through collaborative placekeeping efforts, transforming vacant spaces into community resources. This project unites writers, curators, farmers, and artists to reclaim and regenerate neglected spaces, emphasizing care work and solidarity for Black women. Yarbrough's practice integrates urban agriculture, civic engagement, and art, using everyday materials to create functional objects and installations that address issues like redlining and divestment. She holds a Master’s degree in Museum and Exhibition Studies from the University of Illinois at Chicago and is committed to ecological and community restoration through art.

Public Opening Reception: 7:00 - 9:00 PM, April 27, 2024 

OPEN HOURS: Saturdays 12-5pm and by appointment (email: info @ publicmediainstitute . com).

More Beautiful, More Terrible: Humans of Life Row is a counter-narrative, a sustained act of resistance, an exhibition that reveals the intimate experiences, transformative ideas, and beautiful dreams of people facing the stark realities of life sentencing in Illinois. These sentences are commonly described as death by incarceration because they condemn people to confinement until their death. Nevertheless, as contributing artist, Reginald BoClair, states, “Though sentenced to die in prison, we are alive.”

In the United States, more than 200,000 people are serving life sentences. In Illinois, approximately 4,300 people are serving life or de facto life, a sentence of forty years or more. In 1978 Illinois eliminated parole, making it one of the six states where all life sentences are imposed without the possibility of parole. Of the people serving life without parole in Illinois, 67% are Black and 53% are 55 years old or older, statistics that underscore the racism and decades-long impact of life sentencing. Yet, every human represented in these numbers is so much more than a statistic. 

Inspired by the popular Humans of New York photography project highlighting stories and photographs of the varied people on the streets of New York, More Beautiful, More Terrible: Humans of Life Row explores the views, hopes, worries, aspirations, and everyday lives of the diverse array of people concealed by the logics and structures of mass incarceration. Through personal narratives, artistic expressions, installations, and poetic verse, this exhibition shines a light on the people who inhabit 'life row.'

The collected works create space for contributing artists, family members, policy makers, public officials, and the wider public to learn more about themselves, each other, society, and the consequences of life sentencing in hopes to inspire alternative forms of justice, accountability, and healing.

P+NAP Think Tank 

This exhibition is part of a broader Humans of Life Row initiative that emerged from the Prison + Neighborhood Arts/Education Project (PNAP) Think Tank at Stateville Prison. The Think Tank is composed of scholars, writers, and artists who seek to transform the material and ideological conditions created by carceral logics through in-depth research, policy analysis and advocacy, alongside creative cultural projects. The Think Tank seeks to make key interventions and offer critical insights to the broader movement to end mass-incarceration from within one of the most brutal geographies of the prison-industrial-complex. As Devon Terrell, an inaugural Think Tank member, put it: “[we] walk into the future by visualizing it today.”

The Prison + Neighborhood Arts/Education Project is a visual arts and education project that connects teaching artists and scholars to incarcerated students at Stateville Prison through classes, workshops, guest lectures, and a think tank. 

Featuring contributions from:

Carlos Barberena, Michael Bell, Reginald BoClair, Stephanie Bonds, Sarah Brannon, Dorothy Burge, Carri Cook, Monica Cosby, Robert Curry, Michelle Daniel Jones, Devon Daniels, Dignidad Rebelde (Jesus Barraza & Melanie Cervantes), Christian Dior Noel, Joseph Dole, Raul Dorado, William Estrada, Darrell W. Fair, Charles Hill, Renaldo Hudson, Candace Hunter, Antonio ‘TK’ Kendrick, Darnell Lane, Lisa Lee & the National Public Housing Museum, Damon Locks, Rodney Love, Lucky Pierre, (Kevin Kaempf, Michael Thomas, & Mary Zerkel), Juan Luna, Breanna Maldonado, Jerel Matthews, Shaneva McReynolds, Pablo Mendoza, Ryan Miller, Lakeshia Murph, Leslie Peace, Daniel Perkins, Maria Pike, Fernanda Ponce, Steven P. Ramirez, Erika Ray, Olivia Mikolai Ridge, Benny Rios DonJuan, Sarah Ross, Carlvosier Smith, Lonnie Smith, James Soto, Michael Simmons, Michael M. Sullivan, Johnny Taylor, Devon Terrell, Chip Thomas, Antwon Tyler, jina valentine & Sylvan Palm Valentine, Connie Vantlin, Angie Varriale, Decedrick Walker, Eric Watkins, Anna Martine Whitehead, Carl Williams, and more

This exhibition is presented by Co-Prosperity, the Prison + Neighborhood Arts/Education Project, and the Center for the Study of Race, Politics & Culture’s Beyond Prisons Initiative at the University of Chicago and is supported in part by Illinois Humanities, Woods Fund Chicago, and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

Special thanks to Antony Ablan and Rebirth of Sound, Victoria Alvarez, Ben Austen, Ahniya Butler, Anaga Dalal, Raphel Jackson,  Noah Karapanagiotidis, Tierra Kilpatrick, S.Y. Lim, Tracye Matthews, Pablo Mendoza, Marilyn Richardson, Arianna Salgado, Gina Samuels, Indigo Wright, and Nick Wylie.

PUBLIC PROGRAMS

Note: Given the legionnaires crisis inside IDOC, the exhibition will serve as a water collection site in collaboration with the Coalition to Decarcerate Illinois. Attendees are invited to bring sealed bottles of water to the collection site to be donated to communities in Stateville.

Opening Reception

Saturday, April 27, 2024, 7:00 PM - 9:00 PM  

Join Prison + Neighborhood Arts/Education Project in celebrating the opening More Beautiful, More Terrible: Humans of Life Row. Exhibition organizers and artists will share reflections and insight on the featured artworks. The program will conclude with a special performance by Anna Martine Whitehead responding to Lonnie Smith’s poem “Am I a Person.”

[There will be a private light reception at 6:00 PM for contributors and family members.]  

Parole Illinois Throughout the Years 

Thursday, May 2, 2024, 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM

Join Parole Illinois for an insightful program that sheds light on the evolution of parole systems in Illinois. Through panel discussions, and fundraising efforts, attendees will be invited into meaningful conversations on parole reform and its impact on communities. Panelists include Jimmy Soto, Kevin Blumenberg (Swack), James Lenoir, Ben Austen, and Shaneva McReynolds moderated by Ashton Hoselton

Chicago Humanities Festival

Saturday, May 4, 2024

11:00 AM | Everyday Objects from the Public Housing to Prison Pipeline 

Join Lisa Lee (Executive Director, National Public Housing Museum), Dorothy Burge (artist and educator) and Colette Payne (Director, Reclamation Project, Women's Justice Institute) in conversation about the Everyday Objects from the Public Housing to Prison Pipeline. After the discussion Aaron Hughes, Exhibition Co-organizer and Co-curator, will lead the gallery walk. 

1:00 PM | Two Tales of (In)Justice: Fighting Death by Incarceration from the Inside Out 

Join James Soto and Renaldo Hudson as they share their stories and pathways to freedom moderated by Alice Kim. Both men survived decades of long-term incarceration. 

Lessons & Learnings from Teaching at Logan

Thursday, May 16, 2024, 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM

Join Prison + Neighborhood Arts/Education Project for a comprehensive report back and update on PNAP’s two-year initiative at Logan Prison. Starting as listening sessions, the Logan Initiative has evolved into various course tracks and reading groups inside. As we continue to shape the initiative, our team is visualizing & dissecting the long term implications of our work at Logan. Members of our team will dive into the various aspects of this work and show a snapshot of our current zine project set to be shared in June.

Power of Art

Tuesday, May 21, 2024, 11:00 AM - 1:00 PM

Join More Beautiful, More Terrible: Humans of Life Row featured artists to discuss the exhibition and the transformative power of art.

Closing Program 

Saturday, June 1, 2024, 2:00 PM - 5:00 PM
Join Prison + Neighborhood Arts/Education Project for a reception to celebrate the closing of More Beautiful, More Terrible: Humans of Life Row. Attendees of all ages will be invited to write letters, make buttons, and screen print designs from the artists at Stateville Prison with William Estrada and Aaron Hughes.

Co-Prosperity is excited to announce the exhibition, Moon Healing Escalation, by Bay Area-based multimedia artist Gericault De La Rose. The exhibition will take place April 26 – June 7 at Co-Prosperity’s window vitrines. Opening reception is April 26th, 7:00 PM - 9:00 PM. This will be De La Rose’s first solo exhibition in Chicago.

Adorning the window vitrines with lustrous satin, rhinestones, sequins, and glitters, Moon Healing Escalation, composed of both previous work and new creations, is a ritualistic triptych that unfolds as a passage that bridges the past and the present through magical and spiritual transcendence. The window exhibition invites the viewers into a celebration of love and friendship, a liminal space where beautiful metamorphosis is constantly being materialized. It is nonetheless also a deeply personal installation for De La Rose to look back at her life, ingest her past trauma as a trans woman surviving in this world, and trace the journey of her healing imbued with support and compassion from her community.

The first work is a mark of history, of something old. Severance includes two larger-than-life tapestries the artist made for a previous performance. Loosely draped from the wall by the top corners, the jacquard-loom-woven fabrics are soft photographs that show the exposed bellies of De La Rose’s parents: Her mom’s stretched marks from her pregnancies juxtaposed to her dad’s scar from an operation. In De La Rose’s previous performance, the artist wore a jacquard overall that showed an image of her own scarred body. She pulled on the threads to unravel the hanging tapestries, creating wrinkles, folds, but also irreversible damage to the laboriously made weaves. These ruptures are visible in the display and the suit will also be shown in the installation.

Scars should be celebrated as the body’s history, its perseverance and resilience, time-marked by vitality. Scars, of which the past tense is wounds, visible and invisible, literal and metaphorical, thread through this exhibition that endorses them as portals to possibilities and openings for umbilical cords to form new and strong bonds. Reveal, the centerpiece, is a new ambitious performance that draws the connection between magical girl transformations, drag, and transition. The performance is inspired by Sailor Moon, the Japanese manga series and anime that has enraptured the hearts and imaginations of fans around the world with its embodiment of courage, compassion, and camaraderie. One of the most memorable moments in this anime is undoubtedly the magical girl transformations, where the adventurous protagonists go through spectacular bodily upgrades from daring middle-schoolers to powerful guardians of the Earth. Reveal considers these liminal moments and reframes them as rituals of passage in a queer context. Shrouded by glittering embellishments, ornaments, wig hair, and radiant fabric, De La Rose will perform drag to high-energy hyperpop music, enacting the moment of phenomenal rebirth like how a butterfly leaves its cocoon.

The final panel of the triptych consists of a brand-new tapestry and prints the artist makes for this exhibition. A panel dedicated to found and chosen family, Tethered is a piece of weaving—made in a similar process as that of Severance—with images of the artist’s and her friends’ hands, nodding to the hand signs prominently featured in Sailor Moon’s magical girl transformations. The tapestry is framed by colorful prints produced by De La Rose’s signature dermatographia skin stamping technique. Dermatographia is a skin condition for which the skin is prone to pressure and will produce a welt in the shape of the applied external force. Creatively turning this condition to her advantage, De La Rose uses her skin as a canvas and printing surface. In Tangled, she invites her friends to each describe their friendships or their first encounters and to write these words with fingertips directly onto her skin. After Time does her magic, the slightly elevated skin surface becomes a printing block that can yield a few prints before the swelling clears out. Conversing with the permanent scars recorded and commemorated in Severance, dermatographic prints evoke temporary scars that are themselves expressions of love and acceptance. Like temporary tattoos but only in reverse, De La Rose uses this body print technique as a poetic vehicle to mark “tattoos” as proofs of touch and intimacy, of her presence in relation to others, and of her body—a body that has suffered and will suffer but chooses to only suffer fabulously. - Nicky Ni

Gericault De La Rose is a queer trans Filipinx, multidisciplinary artist, and educator. While developing her art practice, she worked as a Co-curator of Philippine Objects at the Field Museum of Natural History where she organized a series of monthly events called Pamanang Pinoy using the objects within the collection as conduits for community discussion. After graduating with a BFA with an emphasis in Art History from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, she formed an artist collective, Export Quality, together with other Queer Filipinx alumni. De La Rose has also showcased her work in group shows in cities like Chicago, Los Angeles, Johnson City, New York, Toronto, and Oakland. De La Rose attended the ACRE residency in Steuben, Wisconsin and the HATCH artist residency for the Chicago Artist Coalition in 2020. Most recently in 2022, she received the San Francisco Foundation’s Jack K. and Gertrude Murphy Award and received her MFA from UC Berkeley in 2023. 

Co-Prosperity is thrilled to present Men I Have Ever Met, a group exhibition anchored on 100+ written encounters revisiting Sungjae Lee's queer journey navigating interpersonal relationships. Lee invited 5 queer Asian artists, Club Chow, Eugene I-Peng Tang, Jay Carlon, Jinu Hong, and Vincent Chong who are based in Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York to present creative responses to Lee’s stories. Please join the opening reception on Friday, March 8th from 7:00 to 9:00 PM (Live drawing by Vincent Chong from 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM and music by Club Chow from 8:00 PM to 8:45 PM).

Click here to view a map of the exhibition.

What started as a solo exhibition for Sungjae (SJ) Lee turned into a collaborative fruition between himself and five other queer Asian artists. Lee’s Men I have Ever Met, is an ongoing project that describes his queer journey of navigating interpersonal relationships. These range from dating to one night stands since 2008, which have been documented here in written, redacted responses. This documentation begins in 2008 when Lee came out publicly in Seoul, until present day in Chicago. Aside from written responses, Lee has used performance, and installation as a means of activating the many encounters. In the past, he used ASMR (Autonomous Sensorial Meridian Response) podcast readings as a way to explore how audience members can digest his work outside of just reading through the texts. 

By using redactions in his work, Lee is keeping certain elements of his life confidential. As he is restricting himself, simultaneously, he is making space for the artists involved to fill in the holes. The five artists being extended an invitation to do so are Vincent Chong, Eugene I-Peng Tang, Jay Carlon, Jinu Hong, and Club Chow. By randomly selecting episodes, which is what Lee calls individual encounters, the artists are asked to translate the episodes into their own mediums. Chong paints queer and trans chosen family but also mixes this medium with traditional art, which includes calligraphy and performance. Tang uses photography much like Lee to capture intimate encounters. Carlon uses performance and sculpture to explore ideas of decolonization, resistance and pleasure embedded within his queer and Filipinx experience. Hong uses his graphic design background to challenge standard guidelines of printing. Club Chow uses music and mixing skills which will be used during the opening to activate words from the episodes. 

Though all the artists share similar identities, each one will expand on their lived experience, and overall shine a light on what futures can be dreamt up by bringing these individual and collective narratives to the foreground.

- Cristobal Alday, 2024

Lumpen Radio Special Series:

Men I Have Ever Met with host Sungjae Lee & Club Chow

Airs Fridays, 11PM - Midnight 

The radio show Men I Have Ever Met is a program in relation to the group exhibition with the same title at Co-Prosperity, presenting 6 queer Asian artists: Sungjae Lee, Club Chow, Eugene I-Peng Tang, Jay Carlon, Jinu Hong, and Vincent Chong. Responding to Lee’s redacted text installation, DJ Club Chow creates music employing words or sentences from the text as musical elements. Tune in to listen to the full context of the text in an ASMR style and queer Asian themed music! Every Friday, from March 15 to April 12, 11pm – 12am. An hour-long episode is composed of 4 or 5 stories and music in between.

About the Artists