Laura Washington: Expo Chicago is a petri dish for the arts

Chicago Tribune

23-04-2025

Expo Chicago rolls around once again, kicking off Thursday at Navy Pier. The annual confab, Chicago's biggest arts gathering, arrives at the right time to take the temperature of our challenging arts landscape.
When it comes to the visual arts, Chicago must resist second-fiddle status. When it comes to showing and buying modern and contemporary art, some aficionados consider Chicago a secondary art market, eclipsed by the coastal cities of New York and Los Angeles.
Forget that. Expo Chicago is far more accessible. Its vibrancy points to prosperity and progress. Expo Chicago is a petri dish for the arts.
In this treacherous political and social era, the arts can be a respite, hope and barometer for the health of our city, state and nation.
We need some high signs. The city's arts scene is experiencing a once-in-a-lifetime shock. Mired in the aftermath of the pandemic. Hit by the tribulations of a president whose interest in the arts is nonexistent at best and hostile at worst. Bedeviled by inflation, diminishing public funding, crime and lagging attendance.
Ever more perils, as President Donald Trump has taken control of the Kennedy Center, the revered Washington-based institution. Trump replaced its bipartisan board with his political allies and slashed its staff.
His administration has eliminated most National Endowment for the Humanities grant programs. It started putting staff on administrative leave and plans to redirect the institution's resources to support 'patriotic programming,' The New York Times reports. Arts and humanities nonprofits in Chicago and Illinois will lose significant federal support.
For this moment, Expo Chicago is just what the doctor should order.
This collaboration of arts groups, galleries, nonprofits, artists and arts mavens come together every April to showcase the visual arts. The cross-fertilization between local and out-of-town galleries, arts patrons, local painters, sculptors, presenters and visionaries generates heat.
The main show is massive. This edition will host offerings from 170 galleries, representing 36 countries and 93 cities.
Over its 45-year-plus history, Expo Chicago and its predecessors have survived body blows, but always bounced back. The expo has resided at Navy Pier since 2012.
Today, the expo is the Lollapalooza of Chicago's art scene, bringing together heavy-hitters in the local arts along with patrons and arts lovers from around the world, all who help fertilize Chicago's arts garden.
The event runs Thursday through Sunday. Last year, more than 35,000 visitors attended, a hefty turnout for an exhibition that features esoteric fare.
At the show, there's a lot of complex signaling going on. These days, contemporary art does not pander to the masses. The show's vibe can be snobby, slightly obstreperous. As a matter of fact, much like the dialogue we see in politics these days. The philosophy of going along to get along is not the flavor of the day.
Yet, many of the show's offerings are in your face and dig into gender, politics and diversity. Those can be treacherous places to be these days, given recent assaults on arts funding, autonomy and criticism of diversity, equity and inclusion.
That's not stopping Chicago. This year, for example, the expo is mounting a collaboration with the Galleries Association of Korea, presenting 20 leading Korean galleries in the fair's main galleries section.
The expo has also branched out to the neighborhoods, hosting shows and performances, and inspired other voices. On Saturday, entrepreneur-artist Theaster Gates and his Rebuild Foundation will host 'A Clay Sermon,' a 12-hour experimental and improvisational performance, at his Stony Island Arts Bank on the city's South Side. The show 'transports his clay studio to the atrium of the Arts Bank, transforming the space into an active ceramics workshop, demonstrating the craft and performance of clay through a series of improvisational sonic responses and sermonic vignettes,' according to the preview.
'Expo Chicago remains committed to fostering diversity, dialogue and collaboration across the arts community on a local and international scale,' Expo Chicago President and Director Tony Karman said.
During Expo Chicago week, the artwork reflects the deeply held need to be seen and heard.
It is impossible to take it all in on just one visit. Still, opening night is not to be missed. The crowds are intense, diverse and a delight to watch.
I will be eyeing the art school students who dash up and down the aisles, notebooks in hand, and the gray-haired couples who stroll, Champagne in hand, and the hipsters sporting body piercings along with smartly attired fashion devotees.
Our arts garden must remain bold and fearless and grow.