Newsroom

New Art Examiner: One Exhibition, Two Views

May 4, 2017

New Art Examiner Vol 31 No 5 Art AIDS America Chicago

 

Sixty Inches From Center

March 29, 2017

When the End is the Beginning: Art AIDS America

 

In the final minutes of Viral Representation: On AIDS and Art, a day-long conference held at the University of Chicago’s Logan Center that presented research on artistic responses to AIDS as part of the exhibition Art AIDS America, I found the nerve to raise my hand and pose a question to the roundtable that included all twelve speakers who presented or spoke that day.

“Where are the women?” 

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WGN Radio

February 28, 2017

“Art AIDS America” examines the AIDS epidemic through art

Chicago theater artist David Zak joins Justin to discuss the Art AIDS America exhibit that is running until April 2nd at the Alphawood Gallery in Chicago.

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Vocalo

February 23, 2017

Art AIDS America Explores the Impact of HIV in American Art

Chris Audain (Twitter: @cmmaudain) joined Jesse and Jill on the Morning AMp to talk about Art AIDS America, an exhibition now on display at the Alphawood Gallery. Art AIDS America examines the immense cultural impact that HIV has had on American art and culture.

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ABC 7 News Chicago

January 27, 2017

For more than three decades, choreographer and dancer Bill T. Jones has made an incredible mark on American dance.

He has won multiple awards, including a MacArthur Genius Grant, two Tony Awards, a Kennedy Center honor in 2010 and a Presidential Medal of the Arts in 2013. He’s based in New York but has come to Chicago to make a rare appearance at the DuSable Museum Friday night. (more…)

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Chicago Crusader

January 24, 2017

Bill T. Jones makes rare appearance at the DuSable

Award-winning artist, choreographer, dancer, theater director and writer Bill T. Jones makes a rare Chicago appearance in a free presentation at the DuSable Museum of African American History, 740 East 56th Place (57th Street and South Cottage Grove Avenue), Friday evening, January 27, at 7 p.m., in association with the Alphawood Foundation’s groundbreaking visual arts exhibition

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Third Coast Review

January 9, 2017

Artists Explore AIDS Impact in Art AIDS America Chicago Exhibition

Art AIDS America Chicago is a monumental exhibition that explores how the AIDS crisis had an impact on American art and culture.The works on display, from the early 1980s to the present, explore a wide spectrum of artistic responses to AIDS ― from political anger and social activism to personal grieving. The works also offer a story of resilience in the face of a devastating disease.

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Windy City Times

January 4, 2017

ART REVIEW Art AIDS America/Chicago

The entryway walls are emblazoned with bold monochromatic photos from ACT UP/Chicago demonstrations. The tone is set immediately. Memories consumed me as soon as I stepped inside: memories of devastating loss; of the silence of Reagan and his vile administration; of governmental bureaucracy; of church indifference and hypocrisy; of the greed of pharmaceutical and insurance companies…

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Chicago Reader

December 15, 2016

A former bank in Lincoln Park is housing an incredible exhibit about AIDS 

“Art AIDS America Chicago”—a free exhibit taking up both floors of the former bank, now rechristened the Alphawood Gallery—is astonishing in its breadth and unlikeliness. There’s painting, sculpture, installation, photography, video, and sound art. There are multiple pieces by artists whose work is typically seen only in large museums.

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Chicago Tribune

December 13, 2016

Top 10 new or temporary Chicago museum exhibits in 2016

This newly opened collection of AIDS-inspired artwork is rife with moments of black humor but many more of anger and anguish. Not for nothing are boxes of tissues placed amid the artwork in the new gallery, at 2401 N. Halsted St., set up specifically for this traveling show by the Alphawood Foundation.

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Chicago Theater and Arts

December 9, 2016

Four Art Shows to See Over The Winter Holiday

Art AIDS America, now at the Alphawood Gallery through  April 2, 2017, is an important traveling exhibition with works that range from videos and installations to photography and oils. 

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Chicagoist

December 9, 2016

Tour A Landmark Art Show On AIDS & America In A Converted Bank Building

The deeply affecting survey challenges expectations in terms of content and exhibition, spans the spectrum of media, doesn’t shy away from controversy and laudably expands its scope beyond just the activist art that has dominated other surveys of the epidemic. In sum, it’s one of the most important major exhibitions in some time.

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Yahoo! News

December 8, 2016

Photographing Black, Female, HIV Positive Power

the work was featured as part of Art AIDS America, a group exhibition looking at the legacy and contemporary work of various artists exploring the theme of AIDS. Kia was disappointed to be the only black woman among the 107 artists involved, but agreed to show her work nonetheless (“or else there wouldn’t be a black woman featured at all”).

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America’s AIDS Magazine

December 8, 2016

Art AIDS America Chicago

The Windy City iteration, working with the curators, has added works by Nan Goldin, Barbara Kruger, and African-American activist artist Howardena Pindell, as well as local artists, many of whom are of color and/or are women

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Chicago Tribune

December 8, 2016

A Look At How AIDS-Related Art Defined Era

A Look At How AIDS-Related Art Defined Era

Almost inconceivably, this is the first such survey to appear in major museums; it debuted at the Tacoma Art Museum in Washington, and its most recent stop before Chicago was at the Bronx Museum of the Arts in New York City.

 

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Medill Reports Chicago

December 8, 2016

AIDS LEGACY OF LOSS TOLD THROUGH NEW EXHIBIT ART AIDS AMERICA CHICAGO

Here the secrecy surrounding the history of the AIDs plague lifts in art that tells a complicated story of devastation, loss and hope that triggers tears and smiles as viewers navigate the gallery and, in some cases, actively participate in adding to the art.

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Windy City Times

December 7, 2016

Exhibit curator talks AIDS representation in the art world

AIDS, according to Jonathan Katz, co-curator of Art AIDS America, which opened Dec. 1 at the Alphawood Gallery, “is sadly still the ‘third rail’ of American art.” Katz spoke Dec. 3 at a presentation that contextualized the exhibit, which will be open through April. Much of the work there, he noted, was created at a time when right-wing elements were aggressively surveilling arts organizations for work that normalized HIV/AIDS, homosexuality or intravenous drug use. The mainstream arts world—which is normally quite conservative and staid—was at best apathetic to the plague, he said.

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Windy City Times

December 7, 2016

Art AIDS America recalls changes and a new threat

There was a powerful mosaic of sound that echoed through Chicago’s Alphawood Gallery in Lincoln Park on Dec. 3. Between the deep resonance of a bell sounded every 10 minutes ( audio art originally created by Robert Farber signifying the rate of AIDS-related deaths in 1991 ), performance artist Joseph Ravens was followed by an ensemble of five all dressed in bright crimson chanted the words “condom cloud” in a hauntingly Gregorian manner as they paced through the museum carrying with balloons of dark gray inflated condoms above them

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DNA Info

December 7, 2016

History Of AIDS Epidemic Depicted In New Art Exhibit At Alphawood Gallery

LINCOLN PARK — A new Lincoln Park art gallery is playing host to “Art AIDS America,” a national traveling exhibit on the story of the AIDS epidemic as depicted in art.The exhibit opened on World AIDS Day last week and continues at the Alphawood Gallery, 2401 N. Halsted St., through April 2.

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Rebellious Magazine

December 6, 2016

Art AIDS America Chicago’ Showcases Diverse Array of Artists

More than 140 contemporary visual works depicting hope and resilience from a devastating disease can be seen in “Art AIDS America Chicago,” an exhibition that opened at the Alphawood Gallery on World AIDS Day and runs through April 2, 2017.

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WTTW Chicago Tonight

December 5, 2016

AIDS in America’ Exhibition Responds to Cultural Climate of 1980s

A massive new art exhibition just opened in a new gallery created specifically for the show. At the corner of Halsted Street and Fullerton Avenue, a former bank has been re-imagined as a museum. Now called the Alphawood Gallery, the space is home to an exhibition that offers a variety of creative points of view on AIDS, art and America.

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CS Magazine

December 2, 2016

Art AIDS America Featured in Society and Culture

Titled Art AIDS America Chicago for its local iteration, the show will feature more than 140 artworks, adding Chicago artist to a roster that includes Keith Haring, Annie Leibovitz, and Tino Rodriguez. 

Art AIDS America Featured in Society and Culture

 

Chicago Now

December 2, 2016

Show Me Chicago’s top 6 things to do this weekend

Today is National AIDS Day. In conjunction with the day, Art AIDS America Chicago is kicking off a groundbreaking visual art exhibition, Art AIDS America that will serve as the catalyst for a citywide dialogue on the cultural impact of HIV/AIDS.

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BestGayChicago.com

December 1, 2016

Art Aids America Chicago

More than a groundbreaking visual art exhibition, Art AIDS America Chicago will serve as the catalyst for a citywide dialogue on the cultural impact of HIV/AIDS through robust public programming at the newly constructed Alphawood Gallery (2401 N. Halsted Street) and via a constellation of related events presented in association with local arts and advocacy community allies.

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TimeOut Chicago

December 1, 2016

Art AIDS America

Billed as the first major exhibition to examine the impact of the AIDS crisis on the American art scene, “Art AIDS America” comes to Chicago on the final leg of its national tour.

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DNA Info

December 1, 2016

HIV Infections Drop, Other Sexually Transmitted Infections On Rise In City

The news conference took place in an event at the Alphawood Gallery, 2401 N. Halsted St., where the national touring exhibit “Art AIDS America” opened Thursday, on World AIDS Day. The exhibit, which has been augmented with the work of Chicago artists on the AIDS epidemic, will be on site until April 2.

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Chicago Magazine

November 30, 2016

The Top Five Things to Do This Week in Chicago

The first-ever exhibition examining how the AIDS crisis changed American art features 100-plus works by artists who either died of the disease or had their communities devastated by it, including Judy Chicago, Roger Brown, Keith Haring, Félix González-Torres, Annie Leibovitz, and Robert Mapplethorpe.

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Chicago Sun Times

November 30, 2016

Chicago Sun Times Feature

Fred Eychaner doesn’t make little plans. He has built a gallery adjacent to his Lincoln Park offices to showcase a groundbreaking exhibition about AIDS. Art AIDS America Chicago Opens Dec. 1 for a four- month run in a former bank building that Eychaner owns on the corner of Fullerton and Halsted. 

Chicago Sun Times Feature

 

Crain’s Chicago Business

November 30, 2016

Holiday events galore!

The Alphawood Foundation, a Lincoln Park-based advocate for arts and civil rights, renovated a bank into a gallery space at its headquarters to accommodate the exhibition “Art AIDS America.”

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Windy City Times

November 30, 2016

Windy City Times Feature

On World AIDS Day Dec. 1, The Alphawood Gallery in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood will officially open the extraordinary and historic new exhibit for which the building was conceived and designed.

Windy City Times Feature

 

WTTW

November 30, 2016

10 Things To Do this Weekend

Inside a former Lincoln Park bank see more than 100 contemporary works of art responding to AIDS and exploring how the crisis forever changed American art.

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Chicago Magazine

November 28, 2016

65 Things to Do in Chicago in December

The first-ever exhibition examining how the AIDS crisis changed American art features 100-plus works by artists who either died of the disease or had their communities devastated by it

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Timeout Chicago

November 28, 2016

48 exciting openings in Chicago in December

Dec 1–Apr 2: Art AIDS America examines the AIDS crisis’ impact on the American art scene, featuring work from Keith Haring, Jenny Holzer, Kia Labeija and more.

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Chicago Pride

November 25, 2016

Interview with Jonathan David Katz

More than a groundbreaking visual art exhibition, Art AIDS America Chicago will serve as the catalyst for a citywide dialogue on the cultural impact of HIV/AIDS through robust public programming at the newly constructed Alphawood Gallery

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Showbiz Chicago

November 25, 2016

Showbiz Nation Live! Interview With “Art AIDS America” Co-Curator

Mr. Katz works at the intersection of art history and queer history, one of the busiest intersections in American culture, and yet one of the least studied. A specialist in the arts of the Cold War era, he is centrally concerned with the question of why the American avant-garde came to be dominated and defined by queer artists during what was perhaps the single most homophobic decade in this nation’s history.

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Chicago Sun Times

November 23, 2016

‘Art AIDS America Chicago’ exhibit a comprehensive showcase

Artists across the country responded to this deadly health threat, and a touring exhibition that opens Dec. 1 — World AIDS Day — at the new Alphawood Gallery, offers the first comprehensive look at these sometimes controversial works and their art-historical and socio-political impact.

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Victory Gardens

November 22, 2016

Victory Gardens Partners with QUEER, ILL + OKAY and More for World AIDS Day

Victory Gardens Theater, Art AIDS America Chicago and Center on Halsted announce the two-day World AIDS Day Celebration We’re Still Here: HIV/AIDS Then & Now, an HIV/AIDS Arts and Cultural Impact Panel and Performance is scheduled to take place on Wednesday, November 30 at 7:30pmat Center on Halsted, 3656 N. Halsted Street

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Chicago’s Progressive Talk

November 20, 2016

OutChicago Radio

Alphawood Gallery Director of Exhibitions, Anthony Hirschel, interview with OutChicago Radio about  the Exhibition Art AIDS America in Chicago. 

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WIRED

June 23, 2016

A Sobering Look at How AIDS Changed Art in America

While organizing the exhibit, Hushka had a mantra: “It’s not about HIV, but it’s never really not about HIV.” The phrase, which the curator says he borrowed from a professor at the University of Southern California, is a handy framework for understanding how he and co-curator Jonathan Katz selected the 125 pieces in the exhibit.

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The Huffington Post

June 23, 2016

Art AIDS America: An Impressive Exhibition and an Important Curatorial Event

Art AIDS America is the first comprehensive survey considering some 30 years of art produced in response to the AIDS epidemic in the United States. Covering the early years of the crisis through to the present day

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University of Washington Press

June 23, 2016

Art AIDS America Catalog

Art AIDS America is the first comprehensive overview and reconsideration of 30 years of art made in response to the AIDS epidemic in the United States.

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