Month: January 2020

Landscape of What is the Midwest? exhibition at The Newberry Library

What is the Midwest?

Published by Amanda Dee

“Place is a home, be it homestead, henhouse, town, nest, den, or cave. Place is renewal. It is history and hope for those who dwell there.” —Jill Metcoff “Doubtless it will be painful to leave the graves of their fathers.” —Andrew Jackson, 1829 State of the Union Address The door is a question mark, one that also punctuated the title of the recent Newberry Library exhibition What is the Midwest? It’s a question I’ve been stuck on for years now, as I’ve grown and felt the tugging that can only happen after you have sprouted roots in a place. This question of place functions as storage organ for the words and images produced by creators in the region. It is a lonely sort of potato. It can power the work – we feel we have to prove our place – or drag us down – we feel we have to prove our place. Writer Dorothy Allison grew up in one such no-place, “the place that is no place for most other people.” The truck stop. …

Talking Culture and Taking Chances with Urooj Shakeel

Published by Tempestt Hazel

Like many people who move to Chicago, Urooj Shakeel made the decision to relocate from a suburb of Detroit after realizing that if she wanted to try her hand at a career in the arts, now was the time. She doubled down and left long careers in healthcare and marketing to study arts administration and policy at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Prior to her move, she took a moment to reflect on her love of Detroit and the ways in which it seeded her love for art. Urooj wrote on her website, “I could go on forever talking about Detroit and all the artworks I’ve come across, interacted with and studied. How each one of them inspired me in my own art projects and where my ideas originated from. I can never be thankful enough for my colossal beginnings in Detroit. Everything I’ve learned from this city will inspire me in everything I plan to do in Chicago.” Her words foreshadow how she would shape her practice after landing in Chicago …

Intimate Justice: Clitora Leigh

Published by S. Nicole Lane

“Intimate Justice” looks at the intersection of art and sex and how these actions intertwine to serve as a form of resistance, activism, and dialogue in the Chicago community. For this installment, we met with Clitora Leigh in Andersonville to talk about strip clubs in Chicago, coming out as a sex worker, and being a sexy clown.  S. Nicole: I saw you perform at Reunion and was like—oh my gosh—I have to talk to this person! It was amazing. Are you from Chicago? If you’re not, what brought you here? Did you go to school?  Clitora Leigh: I’m originally from the Cleveland area. I’ve lived in Chicago for six years. I studied theater performance at Ohio University. I got my BFA, and then immediately after I graduated, I was like – okay, I have six hundred dollars in medical bills, how will I ever pay this off?! I couldn’t even fathom having six hundred dollars in my life. I was working in a daycare. Around that time, I started stripping. So, I’ve been stripping for, …

Three Poems by Sharanya Sharma

Published by Sharanya Sharma

content warning: descriptions of violence nandi relays a message after an endless swallowing    of years a little girl, limbs molded from mother’s darkest saffron stole   to my soot-stoned side hewn from sweat      and love.  hungrily she cupped a hand        to my frozen ear.      the cold pelt          singed        in her exhale   as  with earth-stained lips she scratched words           into being   the way eyes were once carved            into my face.    she said               lord       give me a mouth           that is too full            of teeth to hold a prayer still              in my blood.  and skittered away      before a guard     could tell her not to touch me             as if the whorls            of her ancestors’ fingers            were not imprinted     in my skin.  unblinking i gaze into a land of concrete      and glass. even here,    in a view of metal ants and water         i cannot cross, i see              your feet  blue thighs poised      melding into              sea and sky                  toes jeweled            in a blanket                of white.  they call it snow. the falling of silk slivers that disappear into hair               and flesh.  lord, tell me.        will they     know the …

Featured image: Sharanya Sharma. Sharma sits with hands folded on a white table, with copies of “Set Fire to This Crooked House” and multi-colored notebooks in the foreground. Sharma wears a marigold cardigan open over a black and white striped shirt and smiles at the camera. Behind Sharma are several pastel throw pillows and a large plant, and natural light comes through the windows. Photo by Kristie Kahns Photography.

Beyond the Page: Sharanya Sharma

Published by Marya Spont-Lemus

“Beyond the Page” digs into the process and practice of writers and artists who work at the intersection of literary arts and other fields. For this installment, I interviewed writer Sharanya Sharma about her MFA thesis project, “Set Fire to This Crooked House,” a poetry collection that she is in the process of developing into a book. We spoke this summer about how her poems re-envision Hindu mythology and critique histories of colonization, especially in relation to museum culture; how acts of retelling can help keep stories alive; and the broader impacts she hopes her work has. Three poems from “Set Fire to This Crooked House” are published on Sixty here. Find Sharma on Twitter @sharanyawrites. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Marya Spont-Lemus: I loved the poems you shared at the MFA reading and am so excited to learn more about the collection and your plans for it. Is that program what brought you to Chicago originally? SS: It is. I was a teacher full-time for six years and didn’t have much …

Most Read Articles of 2019

Published by Sixty Inches From Center

In 2019 Sixty published over 140 articles about Chicago’s artists, archivists, writers, organizers, activists, cultural workers, and extended community. This list of Sixty’s most-read articles of the year is a snapshot into the ones that had you lingering on our website throughout the year. Brought to you by writers Amanda Dee, Michael Fischer (with Gretchen Hasse), Angelica Flores, Courtney Graham (with Ryan Edmund), Tempestt Hazel, Yasmin Zacaria Mikhaiel (with Josh Johnson), Chelsea Ross, Sasha Tycko, and Tamara Becerra Valdez, here are our 10 most-read articles in no particular order: _All images taken from their original articles. All photo credit can be found at each link.