museum of contemporary art chicago

December 3, 2018 by Andrea Kirsh

In Part 2 of Andrea Kirsh’s annual roundup of the best in art books, there is something for everyone on your holiday gift list from lovers of figurative painting to abstract sculpture fans. There’s also something for everyone to learn, whether it’s about a previously under-appreciated regional artist or the most famous self-promoter in the history of Modern Art.

June 10, 2018 by Andrea Kirsh

Books on Powerful Art by African American Women, part 1

The bibliography of politically-committed art by African American women has gotten considerably richer with the publication of several exhibition catalogs, all of which are essential resources on their subjects. Here, in part 1 of a two-part series, Andrea Kirsh reviews the catalogs for “Howardena Pindell: What Remains to Be Seen” at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago and “Joyce J. Scott: Harriet Tubman and Other Truths” at Grounds for Sculpture.

June 6, 2018 by Andrea Kirsh

“Howardena Pindell: What Remains to be Seen” at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago

Andrea Kirsh takes a trip to Chicago and shares her experience of the Museum of Contemporary Art’s recent Howardena Pindell retrospective. Across an impressive range of media and techniques, Pindell’s work tackles race, labor and the technologies that bind. This long-overdue exhibition, which was on view at the MCA from February 24 through May 20, will travel to the Virginia Museum of Fine Art later this year before showing at Brandeis University’s Rose Art Museum in early 2019.

October 13, 2016 by Andrea Kirsh

Chicago Shine – The Freedom Principle at the ICA

Over the past couple of decades, almost all American art museums have claimed a mission to reach out to “underserved communities,” yet none of them have acknowledged that these communities have their own well-developed aesthetics of art and material culture. They differ from the mainstream, and the institutions have not been willing to embrace aesthetic values beyond their own. The first part of “The Freedom Principle” is remarkable for doing just that: exhibiting art–and music–that was selected by a group of artists largely excluded from the mainstream of their period, who developed a different set of aesthetic aspirations and standards.