The prolific Gay demonstrates her exceptional talent with 2014’s bracing, harrowing account of Mireille Duval Jameson, a wealthy Haitian American who gets kidnapped by a band of mercenaries while on vacation in the Caribbean. It’s not easy reading by any means, but Gay’s ability to write humanely about the complicated web of economic privilege, racism, … Read more
Holter broke out with 2012’s Hit the Wall. But the follow-up to his kinetic take on the Stonewall riots shows that the Minneapolis native is a blaze, not a flare. With Exit Strategy—produced earlier this year at Jackalope Theatre—he brought white-knuckle intensity to the emotional and politically incendiary topic of the public school closings in Chicago. Watching … Read more
The 25-year-old Logan Square resident delights in peppering the Twittersphere (@iantherage) with droll one-liners such as “I tried to get my checking account to check on my savings, but it didn’t have any interest.” The regular on the standup scene has lately been running around town staging madcap pranks. In one, he put a comedian … Read more
Soon after the MCA settled into its home behind Water Tower Place in 1996, monumental sculptures began popping up, adding a dash of the surreal to the museum’s entrance plaza. So far, a dozen artists have been showcased there. In 2005, a car and its camper seemed to crash through the pavement from below in … Read more
This centenarian monthly has long engaged local writers, but a recent redesign claimed the magazine’s cover for contemporary artists. “Our heart is in Chicago, and lately we’ve been wearing it on our sleeve,” says Poetry’s art director, Fred Sasaki. This year, works by Rebecca Shore, Jessie Mott, Lilli Carré, and Kate McQuillen have graced the … Read more
The Roscoe Village–based artists Nick Butcher, 34, and Nadine Nakanishi, 38, who formed Sonnenzimmer (“sunroom” in German), were mentored by Jay Ryan, Chicago’s concert poster king. And over the past decade, they have churned out brilliant designs for scores of local and touring acts—including Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, Kraftwerk, the Sea and Cake, … Read more
This Gurnee native’s career has moved steadily forward, almost always on Chicago steppingstones—Northwestern University undergrad, the Lyric Opera’s Ryan Opera Center, a starring role in Chicago Opera Theater’s La Clemenza de Tito. In 2010, Majeski grabbed some early limelight in the big hall when she substituted for a bronchitis-stricken Anne Schwanewilms in the Lyric’s The Marriage … Read more
Eight Chicago creatives whose feeds deserve your follow
Why not turn your front room into a white-cube art gallery, host events for the best local emerging artists, and sell their work to forward-thinking collectors? This living-working situation is practically a Chicago tradition and has been good to Bill Gross, who started 65Grand in 2005 in his West Town apartment. Now operating in a space … Read more
Until last year, the gig situation for contemporary classical music—an emerging form called new music by its practitioners—had groups renting space and lugging their equipment to concerts. But Peter Margasak’s new- and experimental-music series Frequency, started in May 2013 at the Roscoe Village club Constellation, eased logistics and created a gathering place in the process. … Read more
