January 14, 2015 by South Side Weekly

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JA N U A R Y 1 4 , 2 0 1 5

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IN CHICAGO

SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY The South Side Weekly is a nonprofit newsprint magazine written for and about neighborhoods on the South Side of Chicago. We publish in-depth coverage of the arts and issues of public interest alongside oral histories, poetry, fiction, interviews, and artwork from local photographers and illustrators. Started as a student paper at the University of Chicago, the South Side Weekly is now an independent nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting cultural and civic engagement on the South Side, and to providing educational opportunities for developing journalists, writers, and artists. Editor-in-Chief Bea Malsky Managing Editor Hannah Nyhart Deputy Editors John Gamino, Meaghan Murphy Politics Editors Osita Nwanevu, Rachel Schastok Music Editor Jake Bittle Stage & Screen Olivia Stovicek Editor Visual Arts Editor Lauren Gurley, Robert Sorrell Editor-at-Large Bess Cohen Contributing Editors Maha Ahmed, Lucia Ahrensdorf, Christian Belanger, Mari Cohen, Emma Collins Social Media Editor Emily Lipstein Web Editor Sarah Claypoole Photo Editor Illustration Editor Layout Editors

Luke White Ellie Mejia Adam Thorp, Baci Weiler

Senior Writers Jack Nuelle, Stephen Urchick Staff Writers Olivia Adams, Christian Belanger, Austin Brown, Amelia Dmowska, Mark Hassenfratz, Maira Khwaja, Emily Lipstein, Jamison Pfeifer, Kari Wei, Arman Sayani Staff Photographers Camden Bauchner, Juliet Eldred, Kiran Misra, Staff Illustrators Lexi Drexelius, Wei Yi Ow, Hanna Petroski, Amber Sollenberger Editorial Intern

Clyde Schwab

Webmaster Business Manager

Shuwen Qian Harry Backlund

The paper is produced by an all-volunteer editorial staff and seeks contributions from across the city. We distribute each Wednesday in the fall, winter, and spring, with breaks during April and December. Over the summer we publish monthly. Send submissions, story ideas, comments, or questions to editor@southsideweekly.com or mail to: South Side Weekly 1212 E. 59th Street Ida Noyes Hall #030 Chicago, IL 60637 For advertising inquiries, contact: (773)234-5388 or advertising@southsideweekly Read our stories online at southsideweekly.com

Cover art by Ellie Mejia.

A week’s worth of developing stories, odd events, and signs of the times, culled from the desks, inboxes and wandering eyes of the editors

Saturday in the Park After more than a year spent painstakingly writing ambiguous ad copy and gobbling up private lots in Washington Park and Woodlawn, the UofC has finally revealed its blockbuster plan(s) for an Obama Presidential Library that will “create a global destination for learning and engagement” not only on the University’s huge stash of private land, but also on public park land that—uh, how to put this?—does not actually belong to the UofC. Seemingly more important to the UofC than this “collaborative” learning center, however, are the “improvements to the area’s infrastructure” that the library would bring. The promotional art for the bid features high rises, chain stores, bike lanes, restaurants, a baby riding its father’s shoulders, a copy of Chicago magazine, and the “Potential of Garfield Boulevard,” but not, apparently, a library. Let’s hope President Obama thinks long and hard about this one. Change, sure, but hope? Not so much. Bright Spot Most Chicagoans with a television know that Rahm Emanuel has a lot to be proud of right now. Under his tenure, activists have won a ten-year fight to close coal-fired plants in Pilsen and Little Village, City Colleges have boosted their graduation rates by giving “personal enrichment” students degrees, and just about everyone

has come to agree on a $13 (or more) minimum wage. On Monday, Rahm dropped another half-minute spot touting his latest credential. Donning a crisp suit, on a stroll in a sunny Millennium Park, he looks up at the camera and says that he is “very excited to continue his dialogue directly with Chicagoans.” That is why he is pleased to announce that he has just agreed to five debates with his mayoral challengers. He says the time has come for politicians who are accessible to voters. He smiles, continues walking, and reminds voters that his campaign theme is “Chicago Together.” Cleaning House Last Friday, City Council took the landlords of twenty properties to emergency heat court following a barrage of heat-related complaints from chilly renters. As a result of the hearing, Rahm Emanuel is implementing a plan to identify landlords who have repeatedly failed to provide important services to their tenants, like heat. These landlords will be publicly shamed on the Internet via a “bad landlords list,” slated to emerge in the next few weeks. New York has established a similar website called the Landlord Watchlist. The new website will also help Chicagoans exact revenge for having to wear three pairs of socks to bed. The site will allow the city to deny offending landlords privileges like obtaining city land, business licenses, and building permits.

IN THIS ISSUE there is no shadow here a biography in reverse

James did not step into these people’s lives and their work; they stepped into his. julia aizuss...4 united in cultura

“People in the community know that this is a space where the arts are highlighted, where non-mainstream cultural activity can have a home.” mari cohen...6

The latter paintings have busier foregrounds—more yonic, more aquatic than galactic, and entirely unafraid of pink. stephen urchick...7

profiles in progress

The reclamation of power often begins as heavy community involvement. lois chen...11

citizens for a less polluted la villita

In anticipation of Emanuel’s appearance, a group calling themselves the “The Oh Heeeeellz Naaaaaaaaaa Coalition” organized an event. rachel schastok...8 thirty years of music

truffles with a tang

The Turmeric Ginger truffle is like hanging out with your peppy aunt who never sits still. jeanne lieberman...12

I realized that I’d interrupted a family jam session. chloe hadavas...10 JANUARY 14, 2015 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 3

michael gaylord james

A Biography in Reverse “People at Work” at URI-EICHEN BY JULIA AIZUSS

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ichael Gaylord James leans against the window, legs crossed and one black boot perched on the other, the two “Jesus Garcia for Mayor” buttons on his chest standing out against his sensible winter fleeces. His black-andwhite reflection in the window seems like it belongs among the photographs lining the wall next to him: an artist at work, seventy or so years old, surveying his output. “I walked a fine line between which side of the camera I was on,” he had told me earlier. Now, no camera sits in his hands, so there are no sides to worry about. James is at URI-EICHEN Gallery to talk at the opening reception of “People at Work,” a show of thirty-two photos he and his son selected from his upcoming collection, “Pictures From the Long Haul.” The haul is indeed long: James has been documenting his travels in black and white since he road-tripped to Mexico City as a college student in 1962. The shot he snapped there of John F. Kennedy and then-president of Mexico Adolfo López Mateos zipping by in a Mercedes hangs above the newest photo in the show, which shows unionizers at the 2012 Illinois State Fair demonstrating against then-governor Pat Quinn. Other than the photos of Mexico, which predominate, between the bookends of James’s career lies a miscellany of moments: nightclub dancers in Russia, a still-black-haired Obama campaigning for Senate, a barber in El Paso. James traces fragments of his own story, from bourgeois Westport, Connecticut, through his time at Lake Forest College and later in several social justice organizations. Though his work as a community organizer taught him the importance of documentation, that’s not quite the reason for his ceaseless snapping; nor, it seems, was his upbringing among artistic types in Westport. “I don’t quite know what moves me to take the pictures,” James says, a bemused sentiment he likes to repeat. “I just did.” For James, the work of photography is intuitive. It’s thanks to his son, David Libman, that James even bothered to develop many of his thousands of negatives. When Libman was working at a photo lab in the late nineties, James gave him the JFK negative. “I think you have a show here,” Libman told James when he saw the resulting print. Although James’s artistic ambitions have grown since that moment of valida-

VISUAL ARTS tion—he expressed confidence in an imminent public breakthrough, as well as a desire to make movies—his artistic pretensions haven’t. He remains proud of his photographic ignorance: “I know you got light and all that stuff. Four hundred film and you shoot it such-and-such.” If he knows some of the photos on view are overexposed, he doesn’t show it. Libman, who studied photography in college, has no complaints. In fact, he says he’s learned from James’s honesty-as-art method. “To me it’s a different experience,” Libman said, hands in his coat pockets, having arrived too late to snag a folding chair. “It’s not a photographer who has these high ideals about composition and making a statement. This is a reflection of his travels and the people he meets. He pops a shot. A lot of his shots are sideways.” So aesthetic concern is secondary. Fair enough; “People at Work” suggests a focus on political content anyway, and James chose this theme because URI-EICHEN’s owner is a labor organizer. Decorations on a corkboard near the entryway include an Occupy Wall Street poster and an anti-gun illustration. URI-EICHEN often exhibits shows with a left-wing activist bent, dealing with subjects like migrant labor and drones, and has served as a meeting space for union activists. Somewhat disappointingly, there is little depth to the portrayal of labor in the photos. Libman called James’s enormous collection of prints and negatives “an archive of his life experiences,” which is exactly correct. James’s photos of people at work are often not photos of the people so much as they are photos of his experience shooting them. In one photo, a Nicaraguan daycare worker’s smile hovers between irritation and charm, an effect of James’s gregariousness, as does the expression of a worker at a Chicago street market in another. The captions below the photos are characteristically loquacious tangents that center more on James’s experiences than on what’s in the frames. James did not step into these people’s lives and their work; they stepped into his. What results is a biography in reverse, of the person at work on the other side of the lens; a fine line indeed. Perhaps it’s misguided to expect a more rigorous exploration from photos that were shot without sophisticated intention. Although most merely happen to depict people working, sometimes the focus is

more than nominal. While Libman explained that each photo was an experience from James’s life, he stood in front of a 1962 shot of blues musicians, Muddy Waters and James Cotton, performing in Chicago. This photo is the show’s best, a joyful blur of cheeks and crooning mouths that emerge from complete darkness while their suits melt into it. Unlike the other photos, it’s an experience from the subjects’ lives, one that James captured fully while omitting his own presence. It says, simply: this is our work, this is what we do, and we love it. James probably understood such joy. In the boundless rambling stories he and his friends told at the opening, negativity was notably absent. James’s work—the art, the activism, the occasional acting, the radio show, the café, the books-in-progress— seems anything but a burden to him, despite its volume. Still, James was reminiscing about the civil rights movement when he suddenly added, “I never did as much as I thought I should’ve.” Later, with the audience, his outlook brightened. He described his idea for a new story, of “an old guy” who ventures into the

michael gaylord james

prairie in 2016 with a camera and an old car he’s tuned up. “I think there are a lot of ideas in his head,” James said, as his friends in the front chuckled approval. The work continues.

URI-EICHEN Gallery, 2101 S. Halsted St. Closing reception Friday, February 6, 6pm9pm. Hours by appointment. (312)852-7717. uri-eichen.com

JANUARY 14, 2015 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 5

lexi drexelius

United in Cultura Contratiempo and Gozamos join forces in Pilsen BY MARI COHEN

hen I entered Cultura, an arts and community space on the corner of 19th and Carpenter in Pilsen, it was a quiet Friday afternoon. Just a block from Pilsen’s busy 18th Street, the snowy intersection was mostly devoid of cars and pedestrians. Inside, Cultura’s main room was also calm. The black stage against the front window was empty, and the white walls of the room were dotted with only a few works of art. But after my talk with Cultura co-managers Luz Chavez and Moira Pujols, it wasn’t hard to imagine the space packed with people at one of their many public events, which have included concerts by Latino artists, a holiday-themed art bazaar, and writing workshops by noteworthy Latino writers. Chavez and Pujols have a clear vision for their project: a hybrid of art and activism that aims to engage the Pilsen community, offer a space for various organizations and events, feature both local Chicago artists and artists from Latin America, and create a dialogue about what it means to be part of Chicago’s Latino community. Cultura was formed as a partnership between two organizations: Contratiempo, a Chicago-based organization that aims to present the cultural offerings of the Spanish speaking population of the U.S. and publishes a magazine with cultural commentary and literary submissions, and Gozamos, an online magazine directed towards young Chicago Latinos that publish6 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY

es articles on arts and culture in English. In 2013, Contratiempo and Gozamos, having already collaborated on previous projects and both looking for a new space that would allow for more community engagement, decided to come together and create Cultura. The property had already been used as a space for art and activism, most recently under Calles y Sueños, another organization focused on arts and community. “People in the community know that this is a space where the arts are highlighted, where non-mainstream cultural activity can have a home, where people can be listened to and can express themselves, both as activists and as artists,” said Pujols, who in addition to managing Cultura, is executive director of Contratiempo. Pilsen may be known for its art scene, but Pujols said this scene includes mostly galleries and studios. Cultura plans to host curated art exhibits too, but fills a void by also offering a space for performance and collaboration. In 2015, Cultura plans to add an open mic space to Pilsen’s monthly second Fridays Gallery Event. Behind Cultura’s event space there is also an office area, shared by founding organizations Contratiempo and Gozamos, which continue to operate independently, in addition to working together on events at Cultura. Several organizations-in-residence with diverse missions are also housed in this space. The Chicago Latino Writers Initiative, a joint project of Gozamos and Proyecto Latina, highlights talented

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Latino writers from all over Chicago and also hosts workshops. There’s also Chicago Community and Workers Rights, which holds educational workshops for immigrants on their legal rights, and FMEL, a Latino electronic music company. A newly formed initiative called Latino Techies plans to host low-cost workshops on coding and web design in the coming months. According to Pujols and Chavez, part of the reason that Contratiempo and Gozamos work well as partners is that their audiences are generally different, and that together they can reach a broad cross-section of the Latino community. Part of Contratiempo’s mission is to provide a cultural space for immigrants. Their audience is comprised mostly of immigrants (as is their staff), and their programming is conducted either only in Spanish or in Spanish and English. “I think very often immigrants are condescendingly addressed, in a very basic manner as if they were not capable of any sort of complex and sophisticated process of absorbing art, and we just feel really, really proud to offer that,” said Pujols, who is from the Dominican Republic but has spent most of her life in Chicago. Though Gozamos also has a pro-immigrant, pro-immigration message, its focus is slightly different. Gozamos is an English-language publication and has a staff and audience that’s mostly second- and third-generation Latino-American. “We know Spanish, but we communi-

cate in English,” said Chavez. “As adults, that tends to be the dominant language, even if Spanish, like in my case, was my first language.” The two organizations demonstrate the complexity of Latino identity and challenge the notion that it could be addressed as a homogenous identity. Chavez and Pujols hope the Cultura project can present an opportunity for dialogue about these types of issues without dividing the community. “There’s just that constant conversation that needs to happen,” said Pujols. “We have it literally, we want to have it as part of the space in what we represent and present.” Cultura aims to open dialogue about other issues as well, including LGBT rights (“particularly the T, which tends to get dropped off when you talk about LGBT rights,” noted Chavez). Several LGBT related events have been held in the space. In June, Contratiempo published an edition of the magazine centered around Latino trans issues. Gozamos helped sponsor and livestream a panel on the same theme, put on by the organization RAICES. The panel took place at Cultura and featured trans activist Bamby Salcedo, as well as some of the authors who had been published in the Contratiempo issue. “It was packed, it was moving, it was illuminating, it was educational,” said Chavez emphatically. “When you have that kind of event, you feel like this is exactly the reason that we want to have this space.”

VISUAL ARTS

There is No Shadow Here

stephen urchick

“Air Affair” at BLUE1647 BY STEPHEN URCHICK

n 1951, Robert Rauschenberg exhibited a series of canvasses painted white all over, in part to test how we might think about the simple play of gallery lights and shadow on a surface. Roberto Adrian Rodriguez, in his recent solo show “Air Affair” at BLUE1647 in Pilsen, took that same historical interest in the insubstantial qualities of a painting, smashed it together with extensive 3-D graffiti practice, piped it through an airbrush, and mixed it with some actual grit. Over long sessions with each of his canvasses, between repeated applications of thin washes of paint, he blended in sparkling powders and mineral dusts, adjusting both the paint and its basic material qualities as it dried. “Air Affair” produces images that resemble the ethereal fogs seen through a Hubble Space Telescope by tinkering with optics itself. Separating a painting like “Ephemerality of Euphoria” from any of number of Rodriguez’s other paintings is something of a technical problem from a writerly standpoint: one painting’s description sounds a lot like the next. “Euphoria” is set on a black field flecked with lighter paint—resembling stars—with a central explosion of matter in its foreground. Some of that paint fans out, nebulae-like. Other paint has been layered with opaque metal powders, creating Rorschach-style blots. There are no legible strokes; the painter’s typical “fingerprint” has been suppressed by his preference for the airbrush. The mineral powder has even fused each individual layer of paint into one surface. The painting looks something like a print, while still being rough and varied and deliciously tactile up close. This is true for “Ephemerality,” but also for the horizontal canvas stretched to its left, the round canvas to the right. The series of six coupled canvasses hung in succession along the room’s far wall. Granted, the latter paintings, for example, have busier foregrounds—more yonic, more aquatic than galactic, and entirely unafraid of pink. Some of his paintings leverage thick, heavy acrylic impasto. Some smaller canvasses have spray-can motifs that would be perfectly comfortable chilling out on a streetside mural. But, for the most part, the same compositional principles apply across his show. This isn’t to say that Rodriguez is interested in getting rid of his presence as an author, by abandoning the intimate identifying mark made between the painter’s hand and his brush. “Euphoria,” by his own

confession, is a rigorously coded meditation on a former relationship. Rather, it’s worth taking his appeal to abstraction, his seriality, or his seeming decision to forgo token informative labels on opening night as a bid to refocus attention onto his technique and not his psychology. It was more fun to watch Rodriguez walk through a sheaf of his formative, experimental test-runs, than attempt to diagnose each painting’s explicit content through some kind of pseudoscience. Much of Rodriguez’s technique hinges on the careful management of chance. He has to minimalize it, in some cases: taking extensive pains to track the thicknesses of his paints, lest they clog and disable his tools as he’s working. His paint, as it exits the airbrush as a vapor, is subject to physical, gaseous probabilities. Each stroke is mediated by a level of air, as it descends to the surface, which will literally diffuse his ideas. Whenever he applies granular materials like mica, each shake or toss he makes will disperse the substance in a predictable but imprecise pattern. He can tolerably calculate the result he’ll achieve, but never find himself certain as to how the sheer stuff will behave. Rodriguez lit his works with raking, offblue lamps and posed the question of air’s intervening quality not just to himself, as the creator, but also to the viewer. In something of a paradox, the blue light activates Rodriguez’s earthly minerals, mobilizing the painting and causing it to shimmer fluidly and airily. The reflective properties of the elements he blended into and laid over the paint allow the painting to take on a hundred different aspects, since glints of light will appear at many new and different points while traversing the 180 degrees of vision the canvas accommodates. Take away all the light, and the painting becomes a technology for moving beyond ordinary vision in a gallery; among Rodriguez’s mineral media are phosphorescent compounds that glow in the dark. The phosphorescent elements in his painting assert a kind of independence beyond the beholder: they will faintly glow, and actively make themselves visible to us, where the human eye is otherwise powerless to perceive fine shapes, color, and forms. The likeness of Rodriguez’s paintings to the births of stars or deaths of galaxies is not a coincidence. Science exploits physical tricks and quirks to bring those vistas back through the black to Earth, just as “Air Affair’s” unique methodologies threaten to defy lightlessness itself.

JANUARY 14, 2015 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 7

Citizens for an Unpolluted La Villita

Little Village’s fight for environmental justice BY RACHEL SCHASTOK

n December 14, Mayor Rahm Emanuel spent the day in Little Village. He was the center of a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the newly completed Park 553, dubbed “La Villita” by residents and journalists, where he touted the twenty-two-acre site as one of several new green spaces opened during his time in office and a major victory for the park-starved neighborhood. In anticipation of Emanuel’s appearance, a group calling themselves the “The Oh Heeeeellz Naaaaaaaaaa Coalition” organized a Facebook event entitled “Oh Heeeelllzz Naaaaa Rahm is coming to La Villita,” a protest to interrupt May8 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY

or Emanuel’s scheduled public event at the nearby Dulcelandia candy shop. The group’s main objection to Emanuel’s presence was what they saw as his appropriation of the decades-long fight that made the park possible. To the Coalition, Emanuel’s policies have neglected the needs of South Side neighborhoods, and his day spent in Little Village last month was a disingenuous attempt to claim allegiance with, and credit for, the work done by groups like the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (LVEJO). LVEJO unites a wide scope of issues in its campaigns to correct what Executive Director Antonio Lopez calls

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some of the “best examples of environmental injustice in the city of Chicago.” Little Village resident and mayoral candidate Jesus “Chuy” Garcia has seen the grassroots efforts of local environmentalists first-hand, and is similarly critical of Emanuel. “The mayor’s entry into the picture was eleventh-hour,” Garcia said. “As was the fight for shutting down the coal-burning plants. That was a ten-year effort. Neighborhood residents engaged in that. He came in and said, ‘I’m the hero, look what I did. I closed them down.’” In reality, efforts to close down polluting coal-fired power plants and other

industrial sites in Pilsen and Little Village have been spearheaded for years by LVEJO, which was founded by neighborhood parents in 1994 in response to concerns about the exposure of local children to harmful particles. Since then, the group’s organizers and youth team have collaborated—through picketing, petitions, meetings with aldermen, and other measures— to push for environmental protection and remediation from the city, CTA, and private corporations. LVEJO’s activist work is not limited to the cleanup of brownfields, however. The organization considers access to public transit part of the fight to correct injustices in the neighborhood. The bulk of Little Village lies within the roughly triangular space formed by the Pink Line, the south branch of the Chicago River, and the city’s western border. This area was once served by CTA bus route #32, which ran along a limited western section of 31st Street before crossing the river, a route that provided no direct connection between Little Village and the city to its east. The #32 was discontinued in 1997 due to low ridership. LVEJO promptly fought back, calling for even more extensive service. In 2012, the CTA granted that request in a sixmonth experiment. After the six months, the CTA recommended in their 31st Street Corridor Analysis that both portions be made permanent. Today, CTA route #35 runs as a single route across Little Village, with a summertime extension to the beach, providing what the report calls “service coverage for a densely populated area of the city that lacks a true east-west bus connection to the rest of the system.” In its first year of operation, the route’s average daily ridership has increased by 14.7 percent, according to CTA ridership statistics. One of LVEJO’s most significant recent triumphs came when two coal-fired power plants, Pilsen’s Fisk Station and Little Village’s Crawford Station, shut down for good. Coal-fired facilities like Fisk and Crawford generate electricity using high-pressure steam that powers a generator. But to heat water and create that steam, they burn thousands of tons of coal per day. A 2001 Harvard School of Public Health report found that the two plants—and other coal-fired plants across Illinois—were significant sources of harmful particulate matter, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen dioxide, which put nearby residents at greater risk of respiratory problems and premature death. According to the report, both Fisk and Crawford remained exempt from the emission standards prescribed by the Clean

POLITICS Air Act because they predated the legislation. After years of campaigning by LVEJO and others, the plants were finally closed in 2012. An Environmental Protection Agency inspection four months later found that dust levels in the surrounding area were back within normal parameters; however, the removal of contaminated soil from the sites continued into 2014. a Villita Park has its origins in a similar effort. At the same time that LVEJO was working to have Fisk and Crawford closed, they had their eye on a vacant former industrial site in the neighborhood: the land once occupied by the Celotex asphalt factory. Lying immediately west of the Cook County Jail complex at 26th and California, the factory had also been fired by coal.

to better fit community preferences. These requests were granted, including the replacement of proposed baseball fields with more facilities for soccer and basketball. Now, while the Coalition has questioned the authenticity of Emanuel’s relationship with the park and LVEJO’s efforts, a statement published on Facebook stresses that they “[applaud] the development of the park: it’s the result of grassroots neighborhood organizing—the youth and community who made the park happen deserve all the credit.” The fight for the cleanup of polluted brownfield sites has clear ties to environmentalist work, but LVEJO’s work to improve the neighborhood’s public transit stems from the organization’s belief that struggles for environmental justice and neighborhood empowerment have important ties. As far as concerns about mayoral

“People have expressed concern about the mayor taking credit. The reality is, a lot of people know these are community victories.” Antonio Lopez, executive director of the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization

According to an EPA report published in English and Spanish, the agency had received pollution complaints regarding the site as early as 1989. By 1993, Celotex had removed all buildings from the site, which nonetheless remained polluted as a result of the coal tar distillation Celotex had used to produce coal tar paints, pipe coating, driveway sealer, and other products. Celotex covered the site with soil, but thorough cleanup efforts were not completed until 2009. Lopez notes that LVEJO was responsible for pressuring site owner Honeywell to clean up residential yards surrounding the factory land, in addition to the site itself. Though Emanuel issued a proposal for a park on the site in 2012, LVEJO pushed back on the initial proposal, calling for modifications in the types of sport facilities

sugarcoating go, Lopez isn’t too worried. “The reality is, a lot of people know these are community victories,” he says. “It’s more about how people think about social change, whether it comes from policymakers or from the grassroots.” Indeed, Little Village activists have thought hard about the connections between environmentalism and transit access; at the core, both are issues that center on the neighborhood’s visibility in politics and policy. With greater visibility, their work shows, traditionally underserved and underrepresented communities can be transformed, one lot at a time. Osita Nwanevu contributed reporting for this article.

JANUARY 14, 2015 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 9

MUSIC

Thirty Years of Music Inside Little Village’s Clave Azul music school BY CHLOE HADAVAS addie barron

ith posters and signage plastering almost every window and door, it’s easy to miss the entrance to Clave Azul, a Little Village music school housed on the second f loor of an unassuming brick corner building. When I first visited, owner Antonio Avila led me into the main music room, where his two sons, Josh and Pablo, sat holding their instruments. I realized that I’d interrupted a family jam session. All three Avilas were soft-spoken. Antonio didn’t proffer any information unless asked, but as we spoke he gradually expanded on his experiences in music and the history of Clave Azul. Antonio Avila, now fifty-six years old, said that the school originated with a childhood notion of what role music would play in his life. “It was an idea I had a long, long time ago,” he said. “Since I was twelve years old, even before that age, I knew music was my life.” Before Clave Azul opened its doors, Avila went to his students’ homes to teach. He started the school in 1985 and moved it to its 10 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY

current location on 26th Street in 2007. Clave Azul offers lessons in an array of different instruments: piano, trumpet, saxophone, drums, guitar, and voice. Avila is also open to teaching many kinds of music, “from Latin music to rock to jazz to blues.” The school draws students from near and far. In fact, only about half of the students live in the city. As for the rest? “They come from different places,” said Avila. “We’ve got some guys coming from Indiana, some from Cicero, Bolingbrook, Joliet.” Some pupils even make the long drive from Rockford or Wisconsin to study under Avila. The majority of the lessons are taught by Avila himself, but his sons now assist him with the business part-time. “We grew up around music a lot when we were kids,” said Josh. “[Our dad] was teaching most of the time, and we had instruments all around.” Antonio, however, does not expect his two sons to stay with him and his school forever. “I don’t know what they’ll do later,” he told me. “Maybe open their own studio.” At least for now, though, the broth-

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ers seem invested in the family business. Josh, a student majoring in audio arts at Columbia College, is in charge of the new recording studio attached to the school. “I initially wanted to do music full-time, get a bachelor’s in music,” he said, “but I opted to do recording instead. I figured it would be easier to get a job or have more options—to be able to teach and also record.” The recording studio is not yet finished, but it has already been used by a couple musicians. Josh plans to devote more time to it when he graduates in the spring. Although Avila and his sons made an album a few years ago, the three prefer to perform at local parties and events when not teaching. Clave Azul’s success and outreach are something of an anomaly, considering how few music schools exist on the South Side. One might wonder how this particular one has survived. As an explanation of his success, Avila cites the many years he has spent playing and teaching music in the area. “A lot of people know me because I’ve

been here a long time,” he said. “It’s basically mouth to mouth, you know, people talk about the school.” But the main reason for Clave Azul’s thirty-year success, he claims, is his own passion for teaching. “I put my heart into my work, and with any student, any kind of music they want to play, I just want to do it right,” said Avila. “Even when I don’t like some styles of music, I do my best. Especially when they are kids and they come with their parents. The thing about their parents, you know, they take their time to come over and bring their children from school. So I want to do the best I can do. I think that’s why I’m still running.” Before I left Clave Azul, I asked the Avilas to pick up where they had left off when I arrived. They chose a midcentury Spanish tune. With Antonio singing and playing guitar, Josh on a second guitar, and Pablo on bass, the three filled the small room with a colorful and lively melody, with an understanding that could only be the product of years spent playing with one other.

BOOKS

Profiles in Progress A review of Jeffrey Helgeson’s Crucibles of Black Empowerment

BY LOIS CHEN

rucibles of Black Empowerment tracks the “unique political cultures” of black Chicagoan communities from the Depression onward. It’s the story of the social-turned-political devices that people, particularly women, relied on to instigate change. Jeffrey Helgeson, a historian at Texas State University, presents various stories of community leaders who used the institutions at their disposal. For example, Helgeson shows how Addie Wyatt, an activist, “did what thousands of women and men like her have done for generations” and “built independent, ‘parallel’ black institutions that sought to improve the quality of life in their communities and to construct a base for greater economic and political power.” Her story, and many others like it, shows that when the governing body fails to support its citizens, those citizens respond with strategic voracity. The reclamation of power often begins as heavy community involvement, accruing political influence through collective expansion that nonetheless contains identifiable leaders. These leaders—community organizers—came to the forefront of social justice and activism during the 1930s, backed by popular institutions: the church, the union, the neighborhood. As Crucibles treads this past through five decades, it gives a glimpse of the people who make up Chicago’s unsettling racial history. Crucibles puts forth the idea that the pursuit of justice is a dichotomous arrangement—the personal intersecting with the political. Helgeson observes that “black activists saw the connections between work and community, politics and everyday life, and individual opportunity and collective

well-being.” Institutions whose services are intended for individual experience or fulfillment are also those in which the means of socio-political power presents themselves. For instance, Georgia Lawson used the political clout of Olivet Baptist Church in Bronzeville to address the housing and food issues families like hers faced during the Depression. Her efforts made her a delegate to Governor Henry Horner, whom she pressured into addressing the South Side Merchants Cooperative, which, peddling misinformation, sought to persuade city officials to end poverty relief programs with cash benefits. The “broad black freedom struggle,” as Helgeson terms it, is not a linear improvement. We come to see progress as a series of hills and valleys: from pre-Depressio to post-Depression, pre-World War to postWorld War II. Helgeson describes in encyclopedic detail the trends of employment and how they oscillate. However, his study is as much about the specificity of individual circumstance as it is about the sweeping issues they prove; social activism—its methods, audience, and trajectory—is as unique to local situations as the systemic issues it pushes back against are generalized. The idea of fighting for one’s community becomes a test of how well political connections can be used on behalf of working people. Helgeson is clear that the government during this time was particularly unfair and deaf to black communities. He does not romanticize the response of black people and black leaders but instead details the various, though limited, connections and makeshift routes they formed in the place of social and federal establishments—es-

tablishments such as the United States Employment Service (USES), responsible for issuing Certificates of Availability, which “generally reinforced racial discrimination in the labor market.” In regard to the book’s narrative, it felt more like an exercise in the sheer quantity of experiences accounted for than an analysis of power dynamics in Chicago. We get a comprehensive account of Chicago’s changing racial landscape, but we don’t hear much of Helgeson’s voice outside of his research. Though Helgeson insists on the importance of the individual in racial progress, exceptional cases do not equate to many opportunities for the masses. The political accomplishments of activists like Addie Wyatt

are lined up against Helgeson’s conclusion that inequality cannot be completely remedied by “individual action and procedural reform,” but such challenges risk being overlooked as the activists are given his exhaustive focus. What the compromises leaders made in accord with structures of race, status, and gender yielded, he writes, were more “radical visions of the global struggle against imperialism and inequality.” Progress is not a synonym for equality, but Helgeson celebrates it as if it were just as impressive, considering the obstacles. Jeffrey Helgeson, Crucibles of Black Empowerment, University of Chicago Press. 368 pages.

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FOOD

Truffles with a Tang Mindful Indulgences makes chocolates worth chewing on

BY JEANNE LIEBERMAN

sonia chou

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he Mindful Indulgences chocolate truffles flavor list—balsamic beet, cayenne cashew, curry coconut— doesn’t read like a typical dessert menu. Nicole Davis, who designs and makes the chocolates, wants to “infuse real food into sweets.” Since her South Shore company’s March inception, Davis has been incorporating nutrient-dense spices and natural flavorings into almost all of her organic, vegan, gluten-free, and soy-free truffles. The results are truffles with taste and texture that are satisfying and decadent, though very different from conventional truffles. The flavors are more pronounced than most chocolate connoisseurs might be used to, but subtle enough to not overpower the rich, quality cocoa. With a texture almost like a perfectly crafted cake pop, these chocolates don’t melt onto your fingers, and the filling doesn’t ooze out once you’ve taken a bite. They are designed to be eaten slowly and, well, mindfully. As all good chocolate should, Mindful Indulgences truffles satisfy for more reasons than one, with flavors that range from comforting to energizing. Eating the mint mocha truffle is like getting a visit from a reliable old friend, while the turmeric ginger truffle is like hanging out with your peppy aunt who never sits still. Each chocolate is individually wrapped with clear plastic and ribbon, and customers receive their order in a handsome plum-colored box. Davis’s close attention to the details of presentation and texture stems from her training as an artist. “The different stages that [the ganache] goes through when I temper it and infuse different ingredients and then hand-craft the spheres, it’s very similar to my practice as a sculptor with making molds, pouring molds, and figure modeling with clay,” she says. A 2013 Rebuild Foundation culinary internship helped Davis connect her fine arts training to her interest in food and food justice, and introduced her to Ca-

tering Out of the Box Kitchen in Pilsen, where she still makes her chocolates. Soon after the internship ended, she began to experiment with making truffles. Spurred by her friends’ enthusiastic reactions and requests for more, she decided to launch a business. Though the majority of sales still come through word of mouth, Mindful Indulgences now offers events catering and regularly sets up shop at the weekly Healthy Food Hub market at Harvard Elementary School at 75th and Harvard. Davis has no ambitions to set up a permanent storefront, but she does have a Big Cartel online shop and plans to expand her range of desserts this year to include gelatos and sorbets. Davis sees herself as part of an increasingly visible group of creative entrepreneurs who are fusing their artistic lenses with new business practices on the South Side. She also sees consciously sourced and shared food as way to help communities of color thrive. “Food is very political,” she says. “If one is very intentional about what they consume, there is power and agency in that.” Mindful Indulgences was founded on this concept, one that ties nutrition to a larger vision of social justice. “Of the different ways that people are systematically oppressed and disenfranchised, food is humongous,” Davis says. “It’s so key to developing wellness, just internally for oneself. And also, breaking bread with people, sharing meals with people—there’s nothing like it,” she adds, pointing to the community-building function of food. To this end, Davis specifically seeks vending opportunities at smaller events and markets. At these, she is be able to talk to her customers about the health benefits and origins of her chocolates’ peculiar ingredients, and—just maybe—introduce them to the charms of a paprika pistachio truffle.

CALENDAR BULLETIN Redistricting, Voting Rights, and Community Power The districts for Illinois’s legislature stretch and contort themselves: the long arm of State Senate District 17, for instance, reaches from farmland in Kankakee County to the South Side of Chicago. The divisions are set in a closed process and frankly a political one, given that the political party in power can craft districts to their advantage. This debate, hosted at the Chicago Urban League, will weigh the disadvantages of smoky-room redistricting with the increased representation it has sometimes given to African Americans. Maze Jackson, executive director of the Illinois Legislative Black Caucus, and several other Illinois political figures will take sides in the debate. Chicago Urban League, 4510 S. Michigan Ave. Thursday, January 15, 6pm-8pm. (773)285-5800. thechicagourbanleague.org (Adam Thorp)

Reclaim MLK Day In the years since MLK’s 1964 assassination, images of him as a radical civil rights activist have been watered down with a simpler portrait of the man as a pacifist pastor. In honor of MLK Day, over 1,000 Chicagoans led by young people of color will march to restore his radical legacy. The action, set to address mass incarceration and police brutality, will begin at 1001 W. Roosevelt Road and end, fittingly, at the Cook County Temporary Juvenile Detention Center. Event planners suggest that community members organize their own daytime actions before rallying for Thursday evening’s march. March begins at 1001 W. Roosevelt Rd. Thursday, January 15, 6pm. (Lauren Gurley)

MLK Celebration and Public Meeting SOUL and Reclaim Chicago, two of the South Side’s most active social justice groups, are throwing their annual MLK Day celebration on January 17. Perhaps best described as a cross between a political rally, a public assembly, and a gospel concert, this event is a joyful and productive day of action. Admittance is free and attendees should expect music, speakers, an introduction to a slate of progressive Chicago City Council candidates, and an afternoon of canvassing and phone-banking. Participants should RSVP online and make their way to the Grand Ballroom (on the corner of 63rd and Cottage Grove) at 9:30am, ready to ring in a new year of action and resistance with fellow activists and community organizers from across the city. The Grand Ballroom, 6351 S. Cottage Grove Ave. January 17, 9:30am. Free. mlkchicago. com (Colette Robicheaux)

MLK 4 Mile March 4 Mile Marches, promoted by the Coalition Against Police Violence, are planned for MLK weekend in over twenty cities across the country. The march in Chicago, which is being organized by Total Blackout for Reform, will start from the City Gallery in the Historic Water Tower Place and will include several four-minute die-ins to remember the four hours Ferguson teenager Mike Brown was left lying in the street after being fatally shot by a police officer this August. 4 Mile Marches are primarily meant to achieve two goals: to call attention to police brutality and racial profiling, and to remember the victims of police violence. The organizers ask participants to bring a pocket-sized picture of one of the 1,038 people killed since the start of last year or an index card with the victim’s name written on it. City Gallery of the Historic Water Tower Place, 806 N. Michigan Ave. January 19, noon. 4milemarch.org (Zoe Makoul)

Watching the Watchers In order to aid protests and action that address police violence and create a base of motivated citizens, the organizations We Charge Genocide and Project NIA have organized a day of workshops and discussions titled “Watching the Watchers: Strategies to End Police Violence.” Topics include reparations for victims, sustainable

jail support, local rotating bail, the role of art in protests, youth involvement, and the impact of police violence on women and trans people. This program is part of a grassroots campaign advocating the end of oppressive policing, and is intended to be both an informational event and a call to action. Roosevelt University, 430 S. Michigan Ave. January 24, 9am-6pm. wechargegenocide.org (Akanksha Shah)

11th Ward Aldermanic Town Hall Forum Here in Chicago, the new year could bring major changes: a new mayor, new speed limits, and even the resurrection of the Daley dynasty. A historic stronghold of the Daley political machine, the 11th Ward is set for a tight aldermanic race between community activist Maureen Sullivan, law student John Kozlar, and Patrick Daley Thompson, grandson of former Mayor Richard J. Daley. On January 25 the ward will host a town hall forum where candidates will assemble for a Q&A, and perhaps duke things out among themselves. The forum will allot equal speaking times for each candidate. Spanish and Chinese translations will be available. First Lutheran Church of the Trinity, 643 W. 31st St. January 25, 3pm. (Lauren Gurley)

STAGE & SCREEN The Black West This lecture, hosted by the DuSable Museum and given by critically acclaimed author Art T. Burton, will delve into the rich and storied history of African-Americans in the Old West—a history long ignored in popular culture and academia alike. Burton has written three books on the subject, which tell the stories of great generals, scouts, soldiers, and other adventurous black men each of whom made his own way through the wild American West. On January 15, you can hear these stories from Burton himself as he opens up the world of African-American pioneers living, fighting, and exploring during one of the most romanticized periods in American history. The DuSable Museum, 740 E. 56th Pl. Thursday, January 15. 6:30pm-8pm. Free. (773)947-0600. dusablemuseum.org (Colette Robicheaux)

Waiting for Godot This season, Court Theatre will take on absurdist play Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot. The story follows two moody vagrant men, who are (you guessed it) waiting for a mysterious Godot. The tragicomedy has been interpreted in countless ways since its 1953 premiere. Court’s interpretation comes from accomplished director Ron OJ Parson, and the cast includes regulars A.C. Smith, Allen Gilmore, and Alfred Wilson. After Parson’s work on Seven Guitars in 2013, audiences waiting to see his returning direction at Court, whether or not Godot shows up in the end. Court Theatre, 5535 S. Ellis Ave. January 15 through February 15. $35–$65. Discounts available for seniors and students. (773)753-4472. courttheatre.org (Sammie Spector)

BAC Student Film Festival As a student, having your work displayed in front of a large audience can be the difference between an artistic career and a day job. Twenty-six student filmmakers will have this chance at the Beverly Art Center’s Student Film Festival. As a festivalgoer, you will have the chance to become a film student for the weekend at the festival’s workshops and panel discussions on screenwriting, stop animation, directing, and genre filmmaking, as well as “other aspects of the creative process.” Spanning three days, from January 16 to January 18, the workshops and panel discussions will occupy the afternoons and the student films themselves will be screened in the evenings. Audience members will also have the chance to fill the role of film critic through Audience Choice awards that will provide funding for the winners’ future film endeavors. And in the true spirit of a student-centered event, students can attend the festival free of cost with ID. Beverly Art Center, 2407 W. 111th St. January 16 -18. Friday, 7pm; Saturday and Sunday, all day. $6

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daily passes, $15 weekend passes. BAC member discount and students free with ID. (773)445-3838. beverlyartcenter.org (Maha Ahmed)

(Akanksha Shah)

The Peasant and the Priest

A beautifully written, directed, and acted film, Ian Sachs’s 2014 dramatic comedy Love is Strange explores the relationship of a post-middle aged couple, Ben (John Lithgow) and George (Alfred Molina), as they overcome the years-long hurdle of obtaining a marriage license. As they enter their newlywed status, they are forced to cope with the struggles of separation caused by economic hardship. Taking a unique intergenerational perspective, Ira Sachs and Mauricio Zacharias’s script takes on a new life onscreen at the Beverly Arts Center. Beverly Arts Center, 2401 W. 111th St. Saturday, January 21, 7:30 pm. $7.50, $5.50 for members. R-rated. (773)445-3838. beverlyartcenter.org (Itzel Blancas)

Beyond the idealist’s vision of Tuscany—lush family-owned vineyards and olive groves, magnificent hilltop villas—there lie unsettling and oft-overlooked manifestations of globalization and corruption. Esther Podemski, acclaimed visual artist and filmmaker, provides the realist’s vision in her film The Peasant and the Priest. She profiles two Tuscan men who, paths never crossing, stand firmly with tradition in the face of changes that threaten to transform their home region and country, perhaps irreparably. The “peasant,” the last of his area’s sharecroppers, refuses to give up his practice of traditional farming in favor of the profit and efficiency promised by corporate agriculture; the priest is devoted to the fight against the rampant problem of human trafficking within Tuscany. The Film Studies Center brings this insightful film, its director, and UofC Professor Emerita Rebecca West together at the Logan Center for a screening with discussion to follow. Logan Center for the Arts, 915 E. 60th St.. Saturday, January 17, 7pm. Free. (773)702-2787. arts. uchicago.edu (Emeline Posner)

Story Club South Side At this point in time, you may as well be living under a rock if you’ve never heard of a poetry slam. But you’re wrong if you think the emotion and enunciation found at these events is reserved just for verse. Story Club Chicago, which considers itself part of the “live lit community” and holds monthly events on the South Side, makes a show out of nonfiction storytelling. The nights feature paid storytelling performers as well as an open-mic component—the four featured performers for the January show are all South Siders, and there will be two open mic spots. If you’re game to spin your own yarn, head down to Co-Prosperity, where Story Club will provide you with a mic, a music stand, a stool, and a timer that will stop you after eight minutes. The rest is up to you.Co-Prosperity Sphere, 3219 S. Morgan St. Tuesday, January 20 (every third Tuesday of the month). 7:30pm doors and open mic sign up, show at 8pm. $10 suggested donation. BYOB. (773)696-9731. storyclubchicago.com (Mari Cohen)

Chicago Filmmakers’ Dyke Delicious Series Presents: Sex(Ed) Writer and director Brenda Goodman does not shy away from taboo subject matter in her film Sex(Ed): The Movie. Using clips from outdated informational films explaining the facts of life, she unabashedly addresses a topic that has kept parents squirming and kids in classrooms giggling: “the birds and the bees.” Goodman’s documentary covers the groan-worthy misinformation and heteronormative assumptions that have historically been a part of much sex ed, so that we can better get at the truth and witness the evolution in our societal attitudes toward sexuality. While entertaining and humorous, this film is honest and, at its root, educational. Who knows, you might even learn a thing or two about, you know, sex. Max Palevsky Cinema, Ida Noyes Hall, 1212 E. 59th St. Saturday, January 17, 4pm. $5. (773)702-8574. docfilms. uchicago.edu (Julia Tomasson)

Love Is Strange

Critical Historical Studies Launch Party Step into any college library and one might encounter hundreds of theories of yore, kept on life support by the many students breathing renewed life (often unwillingly) into the antiquated ideas of dead writers. These, however, are sometimes seen as stale. For detractors of those traditions, critical theory is an alternative: a grounded—albeit broad—way of keeping one’s ear to the floor and looking ahead, configured through the lens of the social sciences and humanities. Come to Seminary Co-op Bookstore as it joins the Chicago Center for Contemporary Theory (3CT) for the release party of its first two issues of Critical Historical Studies, a new journal seeking to contextualize recent changes in global capitalist society. A member of the University of Chicago Press will speak on the significance of print media in the age of digital information, and editors William Sewell and Moishe Postone will brief you on what’s so cool about critical theory while you inconspicuously try to stuff your face with refreshments and light hors d’oeuvres. Seminary Co-op, 5751 S. Woodlawn Ave. Wednesday, January 21, 6pm. Free. (773)752-4381. semcoop.com (James Kogan)

Global Voices Author Night with Eric Posner & Geoffrey Stone Human rights law is in a golden age of hypocrisy. Saudi Arabia, which brutally suppresses free speech, and Sudan, notorious for war crimes and ethnic cleansing, have sat on the UN Council on Human Rights. At the same time, the nations that most vocally champion human rights laws flagrantly violate them. Slavery survives in democracies including India and much of Eastern Europe, and even the United States is not above torture. On January 27, legal scholars Eric Posner and Geoffrey Stone will examine this state of affairs, discussing Stone’s recently published book, The Twilight of International Human Rights Law. Stone addresses a wide range of relevant topics including the flawed role of international treaties, potential solutions to the current system, and related current events and controversies. Presented by the Seminary Co-op Bookstore in partnership with International House, the dialogue promises a healthy dose of righteous anger tempered with thoughtful analysis. Assembly Hall, International House, 1414 E. 59th St. Tuesday, January 27. 6pm-7:30pm. Free. (773)753-2270. ihouse.uchicago.edu (Kevin Gislason)

DuSable Museum’s King Day 2015 Over fifty years after Martin Luther King’s famous “I Have A Dream” speech, the fight for justice continues. The DuSable Museum’s King Day programming, called “Reflecting On The Dream,” provides an opportunity to explore both the struggles of the past and the conflicts of today. Interactive programs include the King Day Read On, where community leaders will read moving civil rights passages, as well as a musical about Dr. King and his legacy, and family-oriented art, film, and literature events. In the afternoon, the Rev. Al Sampson will speak about lessons learned from his relationship with Dr. King, followed by a discussion with students from Chicago colleges and universities about #BlackLivesMatter, race, and non-violence. Come to the Museum’s King Day celebrations to both honor the work of Dr. King and explore the implications of his legacy. DuSable Museum, 740 E. 56th Pl. Monday, January 19, 10am5pm. $10 admission. (773)947-0600. dusablemuseum.org

14 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY

Missing Pages Lecture Series Over the course of our lives, we have often been under the impression that we were presented with the whole story—after all, our high-school history textbooks must have covered everything we needed to know, right? The DuSable Museum doesn’t think so. Aiming to reveal the people, places, and events that haven’t gotten proper credit for shaping history, the lecture series Missing Pages, starting November 20 and running through March, is designed to address larger themes of politics, culture, race relations, and personal identity. The largely unknown figures and topics will be presented and discussed by nationally known speakers, and while their subjects never received much recognition in common memory or the media, now they take center stage. All this series asks of its audience members is that they remain open to what they might not have known and be willing to pick up a pencil and fill in history’s forgotten pages. DuSable

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Museum, 740 E. 56th Pl. Various Thursdays, through March, 6:30pm. $5. dusablemuseum.org (Emiliano Burr di Mauro)

VISUAL ARTS People at Work Who ever thought that everyday jobs could be interesting? Nobody, really, except Michael Gaylord James, who has captured the workday tasks of people around the world in photographs taken over the course of fifty years. Beginning in Chicago, James carried his camera everywhere from Cuba to Ireland to the late USSR, snapping pictures of the glamorous and the not-so-glamorous on the daily grind. Though this might seem like a mundane topic, beware of underestimating the intrigue of this show, for these aren’t your typical nine-to-fives. In photos selected from a larger collection, you will see President Kennedy in a motorcade, the unseen kitchen hands of Chicago, Muddy Waters and James Cotton playing music, dancers, mechanics, and many others on the job, all frozen in an almost eerie moment of monotonous movement. Take a break from your own job and visit “People at Work” to witness first-hand how beautiful everyday life can be. Uri-Eichen Gallery, 2101 S. Halsted St. January 9 through February 6. Opening and closing receptions 6-9pm. Additional hours by appointment. (312)852-7717. uri-eichen.com (Dagny Vaughn)

Mathias Poledna The Renaissance Society is currently celebrating its hundredth anniversary. Their most recent showcase, the finale to this first century, not only celebrates the past decades of audiences and artists galore, but also considers, and dismantles, the very structure of the Renaissance Society’s gallery. Literally. Los Angeles-based Viennese artist Mathias Poledna has removed the gallery’s steel truss-gridded ceiling, an emblem (and tool) of the space since 1967. He is the first artist to physically alter the gallery, asking viewers to consider both iconoclasm and the nature of material property. This altering of the gallery will be supported by a 35mm film installation. The Renaissance Society’s invitation to Poledna to demolish the iconic grates, as well as the co-production of his film, stems from their readiness to enter their second century as a leading modern art gallery. Poledna’s work—highly concentrated film stills and their contextual contemplations—creates a dialogue between the historical legacy of the Renaissance Society and the avant-garde artworks within it. The Renaissance Society, 5811 S. Ellis Ave., Cobb Hall 418. Through February 8. Tuesday-Friday, 10am-5pm; Saturday-Sunday, 12pm-5pm. Free. (773)702-8670. renaissancesociety.org (Sammie Spector)

Ground Floor Marking the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Hyde Park Art Center, “Ground Floor” features artworks from prominent Chicago MFA programs, creating a biennial showcase of emerging talents so new they haven’t even begun their careers yet. The twenty artists, selected from over one hundred nominations, represent a wide range of mediums, forms, and universities: Columbia College, Northwestern, SAIC, UofC, and UIC. These artists have also had the chance to exhibit at September’s EXPO Chicago in HPAC’s booth. This unique program, showcased throughout the entirety of HPAC’s ground floor gallery space, offers the chosen artists a helpful push toward a career in the art world; “Ground Floor” alumni include two artists who have recently displayed artwork at the Whitney Biennial. Hyde Park Art Center, 5020 S. Cornell Ave. Through March 22. Monday-Thursday, 9am8pm; Friday-Saturday, 9am-5pm; Sunday, 12pm-5pm. Free. (773)324-5520. hydeparkart.org (Sammie Spector)

Lands End Walk to the Point, to the edge of the rocks, where Lake Michigan meets your toes. “Lands end. They all do,” claims a new exhibition, curated by UofC alumna Katherine Harvath and faculty member Zachary Cahill. Starting this Friday, the Logan Center gallery will feature the work of thirteen sculptors, painters, and performance and installation artists from lands across the world, contemplating the role of landscape in contemporary life. Spectators will have a chance to ponder with

five of them in person at speaker events throughout the exhibition’s run: on opening day, Canadian artist Gillian Dykeman will lead a guided tour and performance with Mountain Valley Mountain Tours. Norwegian painter Andreas Siqueland will give a talk the Monday following the opening, and on February 16, Logan will host a panel discussion with Brian Holmes, Claire Pentecost, and Dan Peterman, all featured in the exhibition. Come explore old lands through new eyes. Logan Center for the Arts, 915 E. 60th St. January 9 through March 15, Tuesday-Saturday, 9am-8pm; Sunday, 11am-8pm. Opening reception Friday, January 9, 6pm-8pm. (773)702-3787. arts.uchicago.edu/landsend (Kristin Lin)

Exodus Exodus: the triumphant escape from slavery into...into what? Into the desert for forty years? A collaborative new show featuring the works of Alexandria Eregbu and Alfredo Salazar-Caro, “Exodus” plays with and inverts the themes of liberation and migration in vivid multimedia. Eregbu’s installations employ curious combinations of industrial materials to probe the meaning of identity, belonging, assimilation, and alienation, drawing on her own Nigerian-American heritage. Salazar-Caro’s interactive installation, titled “Border Crossing Simulator Beta,” features a video game narrative of crossing the United States-Mexico border. His digital work complements Eregbu’s physical constructions while challenging the viewers with disorienting touches, demanding that the viewer engage with the world presented in “Exodus.” This installation was chosen as the winner for Arts + Public Life’s 2015 open call for proposals. Arts Incubator Gallery, 301 E. Garfield Blvd. January 16 through March 20. Opening reception Friday, January 16, 6pm-8pm. Tuesday-Friday, 12pm-6pm; Thursday. 12pm-7pm. Free. (773)702-9724. arts.uchicago.edu/ (Lillian Selonick)

Free at First The Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) is an experimental jazz collective founded in 1965 by Chicago musicians and composers interested in developing a radical infrastructure to support their unconventional style. Since its inception, AACM musicians have made monumental contributions to the development of free and experimental jazz. “Free at First: The Audacious Journey of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians” at the DuSable will take visitors on a journey through the early years of the AACM and the sociopolitical context of the musicians who liberated themselves through their genre-defying musical pursuits. In addition to archival photos, performance artifacts, and a musical soundscape, the interactive exhibition will feature a scavenger huntstyle game and a working recreation of AACM member Henry Threadgill’s “hubkaphone,” an instrument made of hubcaps. DuSable Museum of African American History, 740 E, 56th Pl. January 19 through September 6. Tuesday-Saturday, 10am-5pm; Sunday, noon-5pm. $10 general admission; $8 Chicago residents; $7 students. (773)9470600. dusablemuseum.org (Kirsten Gindler)

Boys Will Be Boys There aren’t many things in this world sadder than the sight of a stripped Christmas tree shivering by the dumpster in January. While the smell of pine may linger on the pillows and curtains for a few days, most would say it’s time to move on from the last month of jolly excess and consumption. With an on-site installation featured at the Ordinary Projects, however, Kasia Ozga brings the Christmas tree back into the New Year with commentary on the events of the year past. Her giant sculpture of fifteen Christmas trees will challenge the ordinary conception of those skimpy green branches to trigger reflection on ties between consumerism and racism in America, including recent events of police brutality. After an encounter with “Boys Will Be Boys,” you might never look at your Christmas tree’s “unchanging leaves” the same way again. Ordinary Projects, 2233 S. Throop St., fifth floor. Through February 6. Gallery hours TBA. ordinaryprojects.org (Amelia Dmowska)

Leftyoutthere

CALENDAR A sculpture of a pair of blue legs speckled with red daubs of paint. A green face almost buried in a sea of green, orange, and pink zigzags. With street artist Leftyoutthere, FLATspace’s newest exhibition seeks to explore “the intervention of line and its ability to interrupt and transform spatial and temporal orientations.” Leftyoutthere’s art uses multiple mediums—painting, sculpture—and features busy backgrounds and patterns combined with interjections of solid color. FLATspace’s mission is to aid early-career artists by providing a space for exchange with more established art organizations. The end result of this collaboration is an exhibit investigating the effect of the line in Leftyoutthere’s artwork and a short, twoday opportunity to view it. FLATspace, 2233 S. Throop St., fourth floor. Opening reception Saturday, January 24, 6pm-10pm; January 25, 11am4pm. (312)647-6286. flatspace.org (Akanksha Shah)

Level Eater 5.0 Take up thine sword, young hero. The halls of the Co-Prosperity Sphere beckon thee toward a stop on your epic quest to fill your goblet with specialty-brewed ales courtesy of 3 Floyds and Marz Community Brewery, or to feast upon Dönerman Food Truck vittles. Limited-edition Level Eater hoodies will be available and add +15 defense when equipped. Art from all across the realm, curated by Ed Marszewski and Nick Floyd, will be on display for your inner nerd’s pleasure. The dungeon will house a secret band, which is much better than the traditional troll or ogre. Admission price will include a complimentary Level Eater beverage. Co-Prosperity Sphere, 3219-21 S. Morgan St. Saturday, January 31, 5pm-10pm. $15. (773)837-0145. leveleater.org (Mark Hassenfratz)

MUSIC Southside Music Series ft. De La Soul It’s high time someone decided to blend tasting plates with experimental jazz, wining-and-dining with hip-hop. This month the Promontory will present the Southside [sic] Music Series, focusing on the discography of the eight-piece band of brothers (really) known as the Hypnotic Jazz Band. Over the course of eighteen releases, these brothers have traveled the world with only their horns and their drum set, playing with the likes of Prince, Mos Def, and Gorillaz, as well as living up to the name of jazz legend Phil Cohran, their father (really). The band’s show at the Promontory will feature legendary guest artists De La Soul, a renowned hip-hop trio who revolutionized the genre in 1989 with their debut album. The collaboration between the two is sure to bring a night of innovative, witty, and masterfully played music. The Promontory, 5311 S. Lake Park Ave. January 15, 9pm, doors at 8pm. $25-$60. (312)801-2100. promontorychicago.com (Sammie Spector)

KRS-One at the Shrine As the entire country once again finds itself in turmoil over issues of race and civil rights, the city of Chicago makes ready for a visit from the rap legend known as “the Teacher,” KRS-One. One of the original hardcore rappers and the former leader of Boogie Down productions, KRS-One will be performing and empowering our great city for one night at the Shrine on January 16. Attendees should expect to hear all his classics and be ready to bounce to slamming, old-school beats and sharp, smart lyrics that have stayed bitingly relevant even as the man himself has aged. Tickets are going for $30, but early birds will get a ten-dollar discount. The Shrine, 2109 S Wabash Ave. January 16, 9pm. $30. 21+. (312)753-5700. theshrinechicago.com (Colette Robicheaux)

Oi! with the Punk Boys Already “It’s time for an old-fashioned hippie ass-whomping!” proclaims the sampled voice of The Simpsons’ fictional Police Chief Wiggum at the start of “Ain’t Gonna Win,” the best-loved track on Brass Tacks’ 1999 album Just The Facts. This week, the Madison, WI natives will bring their hardcore sound to headline the Oi! punk show of your guitar-slamming nightmares, whomping

some serious hippie ass alongside seasoned acts with such intense names as Assault and Battery, Degeneration, and Brick Assassin. Rooted deep in the working-class struggle, the Oi! punk scene eschews commercialization and extols a kinship born of the hard-knock life. So, if your New Year’s resolution is to embrace your inner rage and assert a sense of tough-scrapes brotherhood, this Reggies lineup is your first (and likely your best) opportunity to make good. Reggies Chicago, 2105. S. State St. January 16, doors at 7:30pm. $10-$12. 18+. (312)949-0120. reggieslive. com (Olivia Myszkowski)

Gregory Alan Isakov Thalia Hall, Pilsen’s freshest renovated venue, will play host to singer-songwriter Gregory Alan Isakov on January 17. Raised in Philadelphia, but with strong artistic roots in the American West, Isakov’s music is lyrically driven, often reflective, and could easily be compared to the softly sung storytelling of Leonard Cohen or Josh Ritter. Parallels aside, Isakov is a talented artist all his own, dishing out acoustic ballads lush with skilled instrumentation and his unique lilting voice. Although Isakov’s music lends itself best to solitary listening, Thalia Hall offers you the chance to listen to his melancholic, emotional compositions in the company of others who may be equally moved. Pass the tissues. Thalia Hall, 1807 S. Allport St. January 17, doors 6:30pm. $21. (312)526-3851. thaliahallchicago.com (Elizabeth Bynum)

Hell on Wheels Birthday Bash Rockford, Illinois, conveniently placed between Chicago and Galena on the banks of Rock River, has long been a center of manufacturing production. Furniture, tools, and heavy machinery of all sorts have been churned out of Rockford factories since before anyone still alive today can remember. Perhaps it makes sense, then, that Rockford has become something of a factory for heavy metal bands, too. 99 Proof Devils, So Called Saints, Devolve, and On My Six will represent the “Forest City” on Chicago’s South Side this Saturday, bringing their raw Rust Belt sensibilities to a big city stage for the Hell on Wheels Birthday Bash. If you’re feeling especially metal, hit up the pre-show party at Rockford’s own Whiskey’s Road House—buses to see the hometown boys play leave for Chicago at 6pm. Reggies Chicago, 2105 S. State St. Saturday, January 17, doors 9pm. $5. 21+. (312)949-0120. reggieslive.com (Olivia Myszkowski)

Patrice Michaels with INTERSECTION If you find yourself growing weary of the barrage of brain-invading hooks and repetitive lyrics thrown at you every time you turn on the radio, a Sunday afternoon spent listening to Patrice Michaels may be just the respite you need. The celebrated soprano will be offering her own classical interpretations of jazz and blues, backed by a trio of musicians playing the violin, cello, and piano. The concert will feature songs both familiar and not, by composers like Duke Ellington, Chuck Israels, and Randy Bauer. Come in with an open mind, leave with the knowledge that innovation and creativity are still alive in the music world today. Logan Center for the Arts, 915 E. 60th St. Sunday, January 18, 4pm. $15; free with UofC ID. (773)702-8484. arts.uchicago.edu (Eleonora Edreva)

Yesterday I had The Blues: The Music of Billie Holiday You may have missed your chance to see the real Billie Holiday live in concert, but her music lives on. This Sunday, José James will present “Yesterday I had The Blues: The Music of Billie Holiday,” a tribute to the famous singer’s influence on James’s own music. In addition to Holiday, James has drawn inspiration from notables like Nirvana, Radiohead, and Marvin Gaye. In the enigmatic world that is the contemporary jazz scene, James has carved out a place for himself with his eclectic music. Sam Trump, a Chicago-based trumpeter, will also be performing. The Promontory, 5311 S. Lake Park Ave. Sunday, January 18, 8pm, doors at 7pm. $16-$36. (312)8012100. promontorychicago.com (Elizabeth Bynum)

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