A spokesperson describes the event as follows:
“...Catalyst spotlights 22 artists and features more than 75 works from both local and leading collections, in a range of media, including drawing, painting, collage, sculpture, printmaking, textiles, ceramics, woodcarving and installation. Catalyst: Im/migration and Self-taught Art in Chicago is part of Art Design Chicago, a citywide collaboration initiated by the Terra Foundation for American Art that highlights the city’s artistic heritage and creative communities.
...Catalyst: Im/migration and Self-taught Art in Chicago explores catalysts for leaving home, for coming to Chicago and for pursuing an art practice. The range of personal and political subject matter and artistic styles reflects artists processing distinct cultural traditions, memories and experiences of living far from one’s homeland. Themes in the artworks range from belonging and longing for homeland, to labor and individual expression, to bearing witness to history, to assimilation. The narrative centers on the rise of self-taught art in Chicago during the second half of the 20th century, opportunities for artists leading up to this time, and the continued importance of im/migration and self-taught art to Chicago today…
...Participating Artists
Carlos Barberena (active in the United States, born Granada, Nicaragua), Isamu Guy Conners (active in the United States, born Tokyo, Japan), María Enríquez de Allen (American, born Allende, Mexico), Albina Felski (American, born Fernie, Canada), Stefan Harhaj (active in the United States, born Stuttgart, Germany), Aaron Kleeblatt (active in the United States, born Poland), Tae Kwon “Thomas” Kong (American, born Hwanghae Province, North Korea, raised in Incheon, South Korea), Alfonso “Piloto” Nieves Ruiz (active in the United States, born Querétaro, Mexico),Marion Perkins (American, born Marche, Arkansas), Aldobrando “Aldo” Piacenza (American, born S’Anna-Pelago, Italy), Marva Lee Pitchford-Jolly (American, born Crenshaw, Mississippi), Pooja Pittie (American, born in Coimbatore, India, raised in Bombay/now Mumbai, India), Pauline Simon (American, born Nesvizh, Russia/now Belarus), Genya “Jennie” Siporin (American, born Łódź, Russia/now Poland), Drossos P. Skyllas (American, born Kalymnos, Ottoman Empire/now Greece), Dr. Charles Smith (American, born New Orleans, Louisiana), Bronislaw “Bruno” Sowa (American, born Lubomierz, Poland), Stanislaw “Stanley” Szwarc (active in the United States, born Krotoszyn, Poland), Jesús Torres (active in the United States, born Silao, Mexico), Charles Warner (American, born Prussia/now Poland), Derek Webster (American, born Puerto Castilla, Republic of Honduras, raised in Belize City, British Honduras/now Belize), and Badaskhan “Betty” Zakoian (American, born Harput/Kharput, Armenia/now Turkey)..."
