Get daily culture news sent to your inbox every weekday morning. Subscribe to Newcity Today here.
ART
Dorothy Carlos Named Alba Artist-In-Residence
Dorothy Carlos (MFA, 2023) is the 2023 Alba Sonic Arts Artist-in-Residence at Experimental Sound Studio. The Alba Residency makes all of ESS’s resources and platforms available to a graduating MFA student from the Sound Department of the School of the Art Institute, with the goal of creating an immediate outlet for the skills and ideas the student has developed at SAIC, and helping to launch them into the next phase of their artistic career. It is the only post-graduate sonic arts residency of its kind in the United States. More here.
Governor Appoints State Museum Board Member
Nikhil Trivedi will continue to serve as a member of the Illinois State Museum Board. Trivedi works as the director of engineering at the Art Institute of Chicago, overseeing the development of interactive applications for web, mobile and in-gallery experiences, and is a regular contributor at The Incluseum blog. His writing has been featured in Model View Culture, Fwd: Museums, and the Journal of Museum Education. Trivedi is also a co-creator of the Visitors of Color blog, where they document the experiences of people from marginalized communities who visit—and don’t visit—museums. He earned his Bachelor of Science from DePaul University in Human Computer Interaction.
DESIGN
Ford Restores AM Radios
“Ford CEO Jim Farley wrote in social media postings that the company is reversing a decision to drop AM radio after speaking with government policy leaders,” reports the Sun-Times. “Owners of new Ford vehicles will be able to tune in to AM radio in their cars, trucks and SUVs after all.”
DINING & DRINKING
Yellow Banana Trouble: Save A Lot In Washington Park Shuts Down; Another In Woodlawn Closed For Now
Two weeks after opening its Englewood store where a Whole Foods vacated the premises, a Save A Lot store “has closed indefinitely after a break-in left property damage,” reports the Sun-Times. “Yellow Banana, the Ohio-based owner of seven Chicago Save A Lot stores, made the decision to close its Washington Park store because of a break-in over the weekend that led to ‘significant property damage.'” Meanwhile, a Save A Lot in Woodlawn closed without warning and is boarded up, reports CBS 2. “A company spokesperson said the white handwritten sign should say ‘indefinitely’ rather than ‘permanently.’ It’s still not clear how long or what that means.”
FILM & TELEVISION
Contemplating The Six-Month Hollywood Strike Scenario
In the Ankler newsletter, Richard Rushfield doesn’t see a ready end to labor action. “Anything can happen. And in theory, anything can happen in any amount of time. Which isn’t to say who will come out on top in all this, just that whatever the outcome, likely it’s not coming soon. But consider where this is headed. Chatting with people around town… one gets a clear sense that the various tectonic plates of the… parties are shifting away from a settlement, rather than towards one…What are the chances DGA and SAG will make deals? That I won’t guess, except to say the directors have been talking for a couple weeks now, leaks-free, which suggests things are moving productively forward to some point so far… It’s still hard to picture a walkout by the 160,000 members of SAG-AFTRA — very few of whom earn anything close to even a middle-class wage from their acting. The flip side of that, of course, is that the tens of thousands of members who are barely employed have little to lose in a walkout. These are extraordinary times, so who knows? If they can join up with other Guilds, it’s a chance for them to wrest concessions they haven’t been able to get on their own, so maybe this is their one and only moment to take the leap.”
Latest Film Studio Being Built On Northwest Side
Even as streaming services radically condense their output, another studio is opening on the Northwest side, in a former Marshall Field’s warehouse, reports the Trib. “Knickpoint Ventures held a topping-off ceremony for The Fields Studios, what the company bills as Chicago’s first purpose-built film studio, at the former Marshall Field’s warehouse campus on the Northwest Side. The developer bought the site in 2018 and plans to complete construction and open nine soundstages, along with creative and production offices, by early next year. Zain Koita, the company’s founder and managing partner, said the twenty-one-acre site at 4000 West Diversey in Avondale, built in 1928 but closed by Macy’s in 2008, will once again provide thousands of high-paying jobs.”
MEDIA
Trump-Appointed Voice Of America CEO Abused Power?
Within two days of his confirmation as head of the Voice Of America, Michael Pack, reports NPR, “was examining ways to remove suspect staffers, a new federal investigation found. The executives he sidelined were later reinstated and exonerated by the inspector general’s office of the U.S. State Department. Pack ultimately turned his attention to agency executives, network chiefs, and journalists themselves. The report, sent to the White House and Congressional leaders earlier this month, found that the Trump appointee repeatedly abused the powers of his office, broke laws and regulations, and engaged in gross mismanagement.”
STAGE
Lyric Launches Film Of “The Factotum”
Lyric has commissioned Chicago filmmaker Raphael Nash to create a new film of their opera from February of this year, “The Factotum.” Beyond capturing the sold-out stage performances with the original cast, the 135-minute film features behind-the-scenes glimpses on the opera’s journey from page to stage with never-before-seen cast and creative team interviews and footage. The film is available starting today, Wednesday, May 24, here.
Changes At Chicago Dance History Project
“After eight years of researching and creating the digital archive that Chicago Dance History Project has become, I will be moving on to a new role at the end of this month,” relays Jenai Cutcher. “As the first executive director for GroundWorks DanceTheater, I look forward to being more closely involved with making dance for our present moment–or what I like to call history in the making. In the past eight years, I have listened first-hand to over 350 oral histories shared in interviews or group discussions; collaborated with Chicago dance companies, institutions, and venues to create and sustain a community of interpreters through over fifty public events; and climbed through storage units and coordinated archival rescue missions in order to digitize photographs, programs, slides, DVDs, VHS tapes, cassette tapes, PR materials, dance shoes, costumes, and class notes. I outline these activities to underscore the richness and depth of Chicago dance history that I have come to discover in my time with all of you. CDHP is the only community dance archive of its kind in the nation and it exists because of your work, support, and participation.” More here.
Inicios Names First Winning Playwrights
CLATA has announced the first playwrights of INICIOS: Chicago Latine Playwright Festival. Each of the three winning playwrights receives a $1,000 stipend, plus the experience of being paired with an artistic director at a Chicago Latine theater company, participating in a one-week workshop process, seeing their work read aloud by top professional Latine actors in front of a live audience, and gathering feedback from the audience during the post-show Q&A. INICIOS runs June 2-4; plays and playwrights are here.
Firebird Dance Pop-Ups Return To Chicago Parks
As part of Chicago Park District’s Night Out in the Parks series, 2023 Guggenheim fellow in choreography Nejla Yatkin (Newcity Players) will surprise visitors in parks around Chicago with pop-up performances of her interactive “Firebird” dances. Accompanied by live music, “the meditative dances will be created in a sustainable relationship with nature.” For four weeks starting on Thursday, June 8, “Yatkin will perform sixteen dance meditations that spark hope and deepen connections between people and their surroundings. At the end of each dance, park visitors of all ages will be invited to join in a collective bird movement meditation guided by Yatkin to prepare for the final Firebird Parade on Saturday, July 8.” The full schedule and locations are here.
ARTS & CULTURE & ETC.
Current Bird Flu Outbreak Strikes Twenty-Five Types Of Mammals
“About twenty-five types of mammals have died in the latest bird flu outbreak, a larger number than in previous ones,” reports Reuters, “increasing the risk of the virus turning into a pandemic, the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) said. Cases of the disease, officially called highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), have been detected in mammals in fourteen countries since the outbreak began in October 2021.” The Reuters list of species is “in addition to the hundreds of wild and captive bird species also infected by the virus.”
Illinois Catholic Sexual Abuse Much Wider Than Previously Known
Nineteen-hundred abused children; 450 credibly accused abusers, reports The New York Times. “More than 450 credibly accused child sex abusers have ministered in the Catholic Church in Illinois over almost seven decades, the office of the state’s attorney general, Kwame Raoul, said Tuesday in an investigative report. That is more than four times the number that the church had publicly disclosed before 2018, when the state began its investigation. The 696-page report found that clergy members and lay religious brothers had abused at least 1,997 children since 1950 in the state’s six dioceses, including the prominent Archdiocese of Chicago. The report adds 149 names to lists of child sex abusers whom the dioceses themselves had publicly identified before or during the investigation. That brings the total number of identified abusers to 451.”
Lesbian Activist Marge Summit Was Eighty-Seven
“The longtime activist and beloved lesbian activist Marge Summit died May 16 at eighty-seven after a stroke,” reports Block Club. “Summit’s legacy lives on as LGBTQ+ Chicagoans enjoy the rights and freedoms she helped fight for, said her friend, Owen Keehnen, an LGBTQ+ historian. ‘The way I see it, we wouldn’t be where we are today if she hadn’t been around. It’s that simple… She always stood her ground, and she loved the LGBTQ+ community. If you messed with the LGBTQ+ community, you were messing with Marge.'”
