It’s a little ironic that the impetus for Art Design Chicago, the hugely ambitious, yearlong celebration of Chicago’s art-making history—from the fire of 1871 to the turn of the 21st century—came from the west coast, as seen through the eyes of an east-coast critic.
Smith wrote that the Los Angeles show had been underwritten by the Getty Center, “to the tune of about $10 million.”
The budget for the program is $7.8 million, $6.5 million of which is coming from Terra, with the Richard H. Driehaus Foundation and others contributing the rest; individual grants ranged from $10,000 to $200,000. Among the projects already completed are an updated Smithsonian archives guide to research repositories in Chicago and a comprehensive history of The Wall of Respect (The Wall of Respect: Public Art and Black Liberation in 1960s Chicago), published by Northwestern University Press last fall. The cornucopia to come includes “Arte Diseno Xicago,” March 23 to August 19 at the National Museum of Mexican Art; “A Home for Surrealism,” June 7 to August 18 at the Arts Club; “Hairy Who?” September 1 to January 6 at the Art Institute; “African American Designers in Chicago,” October 27 to March 3 at the Chicago Cultural Center, and a multi-author history of Chicago art to be published by University of Chicago press in the fall.
Art Design Chicago See the full list of events at artdesignchicago.org.
