Indigo Girl

A new book by Chicago author Rachel Louis Snyder explores the complexities of the global marketplace by trailing a quintessential product: jeans.

Under Surveillance

Step inside the box. For the next hour, everything you do will be recorded by 24 video cameras positioned at every possible angle. Sound freaky? It didn’t to Metro owner Joe Shanahan, pictured here, one of several local cultural luminaries who were filmed for an hour in a cube designed by Streeterville artist Lincoln Schatz. (Asked to do something that represents who he is, Shanahan, an avid record collector, spun vinyl; other invitees painted and lifted weights.) For a show at Art Basel Miami in December, computers will slice and dice the images, and segue them into one another in no apparent order, a style reminiscent of another Schatz video—this one in the lobby of the brand-new Spertus Museum—that jumbles scenes of the building’s construction.

A First Brush with Moviemaking!

Here at Chicago magazine, we’re trying something new. Consider it a little “experiment,” if you will. We’ve decided to take a traditional story—a profile of the supercool DJ Colette, by the music writer Mark Guarino—and turn it into a short documentary film. Five years ago, this wasn’t the business of magazines. But today, magazines have two audiences: one for the print version, and one of for the Web. And for you Web folks, every sort of storytelling device—from podcasts to short films to blogs—is fair game…