Join us Sunday March 31st for a full afternoon of activities and celebrations at the Hyde Park Art Center as we open FOUR brand new exhibitions. All events and art making are FREE and welcome for all ages. Refreshments and drinks will be served.

1-4 PM: ART MAKING ACTIVITIES Create something fun at the Art Center’s series of free, family friendly art making activities led by Hyde Park Art Center professional teaching artists.

2-5 PM: OPEN STUDIOS Meet our resident artists and get an inside look at their studios and practices. Find them on site in the Creative Wing on the 2nd Floor: Liz Born, Jared Brown, Christine Forni, Derek Ernster, Tanya Gill, Susan Gilles, Katherine Lampert, Sally Morfill, Fo Wilson, Sara Nishiura, Yoon-Shin Park, and Gabriel Villa.

3-5 PM: EXHIBITION RECEPTIONS Dark Matter: Celestial Objects as Messengers of Love in These Trouble Times March 31 – July 14, 2019 Dark Matter: Celestial Objects as Messengers of Love in These Troubled Times is a solo exhibition by artist, designer, and current Jackman Goldwasser Resident Folayemi (Fo) Wilson that reconsiders the power of objects to create a dynamic atmosphere for reflection, meditation and healing. Wilson embellishes slip-cast objects with various materials and incorporates video and audio to create a celestial AfroFuturist landscape. Soundscapes and cosmic orbs, landing via a shotgun house-like structure that appears to come from another realm, embody the artist’s desire “…to infuse love and restore dignity to a culture that is troubled with unfortunate manifestations of fear, hate, greed, shame, and a disregard for others.”

Beginning to See the Light March 17 – July 27 Gallery 2 and Cleve Carney Gallery Public Programs at the Hyde Park Art Center marks its official launch this spring equinox with Beginning to See the Light: an exploration into the experiences and obsessions that generate collective joy & happiness. Written in 1977 for the Village Voice, Ellen Willis’s essay of the same name explores the ever shifting politics of freedom and the fight for equality through the lens of the radical shift felt during the 60’s rock and roll revolution, into the tumbling onslaught of rage centered punk, all while questioning how exclusionary these movements have been to those outside the cultural standard (i.e. cis, white, het, able-bodied) without uplifting alternative forms or voices. The everyday can seem impossible, and Light seeks to make it hopeful through rotating pop up exhibitions, interactive activities, tender dialogues, and community gatherings for music, poetry, honesty, empathy and time spent presently together. Searching to foil the energy present in our current lived environment, we ask our visitors to prioritize their own joy in this moment.Grounded in the essence of rock and roll, Beginning to See the Light is a jam session we all play within. This project is curious if there are new ways we want to understand the world and feel connected to each other, when we have exhausted other forms of social or online engagement. What are ways we can create happiness, and shared collective joy by taking time to reflect on where we have been, where we are, and where we would like to go? How can we learn to not just listen, but hear and understand? How can we manifest the change we long for in small, collective action? How to balance survival of the self and survival of the planet? Or as Willis directs us: “I just thought that the question they ought to ask was not “How can I make them like me?” but “How can I make them hear me?”

(SUB)URBAN March 3 – April 7, 2019 Gallery 5 The Art Center celebrates its 80th Anniversary by inviting our current community of class-taking artists, and faculty to reflect on the history of Hyde Park’s shifting categorization. Hyde Park began as a rural township, but by the 1893 World’s Columbian Exhibition was officially annexed to the city of Chicago. Located a mere seven miles south of the city center, Hyde Park maintains a small town vibe that can feel worlds away from the bustle of Chicago’s downtown. Curated by Curatorial Fellow, Audrey Moyer, the exhibition features painting, drawing, sculpture and print work that consider the qualities of urban, suburban, and the porous boundary between.

Steve Reber: Anemic Compass March 10 . – June 16, 2019 Kanter McCormick Gallery Anemic Compass introduces a new body of work in which Steve Reber considers the high-performance vehicle as a multi-layered point of departure for examining American culture.In this work, youth, optimism and vulnerability are examined through the lens of family and personal histories. Reber’s free-standing sculptures incorporate a bricolage of familiar shapes where a functional potential or use is suggested. Cast and fabricated forms share a machine-like quality and allude to a location and ideology of a former era. These works also examine the American identity of production, progress, and innovation. As Reber explains, “the title ‘Anemic Compass’ implies a break in navigation, getting lost, and using the vaguely familiar for guidance.”