Vasia Rigou, author at Chicago Reader

Two models are seen from the waste down. They are standing in an alley with a building behind them. Both wear jeans painted with faces and other designs.

How Print & Object makes art collecting more accessible

by Vasia Rigou November 29, 2023November 30, 2023

A pair of denim jeans enhanced by acrylic paint, aerosol spray paint, permanent marker, and elbow grease. A lamp made out of tile, acrylic, and glass. A linen chore coat with flocked vinyl designs. Departing from the confines of traditional gallery settings, Anna Cerniglia and Kate Pollasch have united their decades-long curatorial and art programming […]

Gallery view shows a lantern covered in a silk, tent-like shape, with four steel legs. The lantern is on (via a plug) and the room, is dark.

Arts & Culture

The sacred and profound in Stephen Burks’s ‘Spirit Houses’

by Vasia Rigou September 19, 2023September 19, 2023

“Each morning I make my way to the large east-facing windows overlooking the Harlem River. Sage, photos of my Beloveds, candles, water and items too sacred to name adorn my makeshift altar—an antique wooden liquor stand turned ‘spirit house.’ . . . Imbued with the stories it holds and lives it has lived, my altar […]

Gallery view shows walls and partial floor covered with rectangles of abstract images, reflective material, and mirrors.

Arts & Culture

Iridescent illusions

by Vasia Rigou September 15, 2023September 15, 2023

The minute you step into the gallery, the clock starts ticking: you only have 30 seconds to experience María Burundarena’s world—if you choose not to return, that is. The line outside the door says otherwise. People are lining up, eager to get back in for another half-minute solitary experience that is what you make it—a […]

Installation photo shows a purple-seated metal chair in center of room. On the wall to the right is a huge decal of multi-colored, cartoon-like people. To the left are two smaller paintings, one of pink flowers. Other works are seen in the adjoining gallery.

Arts & Culture

Savoring culture

by Vasia Rigou August 11, 2023August 10, 2023

Celebrating the rich tapestry of Black and African identities, “Gumbo,” reveals the multifaceted narratives, cultural nuances, and poignant perspectives of the Black experience by bringing together 20 artists whose work spans mediums and scale. The works are carefully arranged within the Fulton Market gallery and rightfully so—each one demands a closer look so sufficient white […]

In this gallery view, several ceiling-hung jingle clouds are in view. They are the color of tin. The hanging fringe of another sculpture hangs right in front of the lens.

Arts & Culture

Sculpting unity

by Vasia Rigou July 31, 2023July 24, 2023

The sound of tens of thousands of tinkling bells fills Kavi Gupta. Marie Watt’s jingle clouds hang from the ceiling, creating an immersive experience. “I want people to walk through something, so their body will feel it and hear it,” says the artist, who pays special attention to the relationship that the dynamic sculptures, made […]

Large-scale paintings are on the left and right walls of this long gallery view. There is a window straight ahead with plants behind it. The black floor is highly polished.

Arts & Culture

Build your own narrative

by Vasia Rigou July 19, 2023July 26, 2023

Exploring intimacy, memory, and human connection through personal experience, Brenda Draney employs a less-is-more approach to painting. Here, absence and presence don’t seem to matter. Born in Sawridge First Nation, by the town of Slave Lake in Alberta, Canada, the Edmonton-based artist uses thick brushstrokes to depict aspects of contemporary Indigenous life. “Drink from the […]

On the white gallery wall hang two vertical rectangular paintings, one with a mustard background and the other a peach background. Both feature silhouettes of solitary black figures with swirls of vivid colors within their forms.

Arts & Culture

Unveiling the depths

by Vasia Rigou July 6, 2023July 26, 2023

Before even entering the gallery, “Somewhere between the eyes and the heart” pulls you in. Leasho Johnson’s densely textured paintings vary in scale. The dark color palette and shiny pitch-black silhouettes are interrupted by bright splashes of color: vivid pink, yellow, blue, and tangerine. The Jamaican-born, Chicago-based artist’s subjects are abstract enough for their facial […]

A long, horizontal abstract painting takes up much of a wall in the gallery. Two wooden beams bisect the space and a wooden bench is to the left of the frame. The painting's background is a natural linen color and the markings on it are in subtle earth tones.

Arts & Culture

Finding meaning in abstraction

by Vasia Rigou June 22, 2023June 27, 2023

Carmen Neely’s large-scale abstract paintings fill Mariane Ibrahim gallery with energy—feminine, intimate, and sensual but also strong and purposeful. “Sometimes a painting is a prayer” is a very personal exhibition; it’s almost esoteric. Soothing hues—creamy beige, earthy maroon, and soft pink—blend with wine burgundy, dark plum, and intense black. Lines, scribbles, and symbols take on […]

A color photograph of a Black child in the left of the frame, putting an LP on a record player that sits atop an ornate white column. On the floor sits a Black child holding an LP up to their house, while on the sofa behind them a Funkadelic record is propped up facing the viewer.

Arts & Culture

‘Shift: Music, Meaning, Context’ reveals music’s multitudes

by Vasia Rigou June 9, 2023June 27, 2023

Can music be propaganda? Torture? How about a tool of manipulation, disorientation, and oppression? “Shift: Music, Meaning, Context” contemplates how music changes in form and interpretation as it moves across time, body, and place. Reflecting history and culture unlike any other medium, music has shaped the world at a micro, meso, and macro level. This […]

Painting shows Serena Williams preparing to hit a ball on the tennis court. She wears a yellow top and skirt while the court is bright blue.

Arts & Culture

Battle royale

by Vasia Rigou April 25, 2023April 25, 2023

Nikko Washington grew up in a family of trained martial artists. Mastering discipline and control served him beyond the fact that he earned a black belt at a young age—harnessing the power of physical training and mental fortitude has elevated his practice to the next level. As Ciera McKissick writes in the exhibition text, painting […]

Still on the artist covered in blood, holding a knife aloft, and wearing a black face covering, through which one eye can be seen.

Arts & Culture

Transcending boundaries

by Vasia Rigou April 24, 2023May 31, 2023

In Roadworks (1985), Mona Hatoum walks barefoot through the streets of Brixton dragging a large pair of Dr. Martens boots (the same brand previously favored by the British police) attached to her ankles by their laces. The short video is edited from documentation of the artist’s hour-long performance of the same title. The Negotiating Table […]

A convertible overflowing with people sits in a city street in this color photo. The people wear natural hairstyles and 60s-era casual clothing. Children and adults crowd around outside the car.

Arts & Culture

Black culture as a force for change

by Vasia Rigou March 29, 2023March 22, 2023

“Things Well Worth Waiting For” is a small-scale, deeply comprehensive exhibition that transports you to a different time where women wore flamboyant dresses, men drove classic cars, segregation prevailed, and the power of soul music was palpable. Photojournalist and activist Kwame Brathwaite was there, documenting it all—in words and in photographs. Occupying two galleries at […]

Chicago artists Dutes Miller and Stan Shellabarger crochet a massive pink tube in a tree in Palmer Square.

Arts & Culture

Togetherness reevaluated

by Vasia Rigou March 2, 2023March 22, 2023

Chicago artists Dutes Miller and Stan Shellabarger have been doing everything together for decades—literally. The longtime partners in art and in life have been working with traditional American craft techniques—silhouette cutting, sewing, crocheting, and bookmaking—but they’re perhaps best known for their performative works: Untitled (Pink Tube), an ongoing nontheatrical performance they started 20 years ago […]