What Came After:
Figurative Painting in Chicago 1978-98
on view September 14, 2019 - January 12, 2020
Exhibition organized in conjunction with newly installed Chicago Imagists installation at Elmhurst College
(Left to Right) HOLLIS SIGLER (AMERICAN, 1948-2001), IT KEEPS HER GOING, 1991-92, OIL ON CANVAS WITH PAINTED FRAME, 53 X 66 INCHES | COLLECTION OF ROCKFORD ART MUSEUM, ILLINOIS, USA, GIFT OF FRANCIS AND JUNE SPIEZER | PHOTOGRAPH COPYRIGHT OF ROCKFORD ART MUSEUM
TONY PHILLIPS, THE SPACE BETWEEN, 1993, OIL ON CANVAS, 48 X 58 IN. |ARTIST COLLECTION
PHYLLIS BRAMSON, DECOYS, 1989, OIL ON CANVAS, 84 X 72 IN. | COURTESY OF THE ARTIST AND ZOLLA/LIEBERMAN GALLERY
Elmhurst Art Museum (150 South Cottage Hill Avenue) proudly presents What Came After: Figurative Painting in Chicago 1978-98 on view September 14, 2019 – January 12, 2020. Organized by Chicago-based, internationally exhibited artist Phyllis Bramson, What Came After is a survey of diverse interests in the figure as a subject, the human condition, and an interest in personal iconography.
According to Bramson, “Many have struggled with understanding and processing the term ‘Chicago Imagism’ since it was first used in the early 1970s, including artists that built on the ideas of their peers or sought to break free from expectations of that legacy. What Came After better defines and celebrates this later generation of artists, which have been called third generation Imagists, Post-Imagists, and the Chicago School.”
In addition to Bramson, artists represented in What Came After include Nicholas Africano, Susanne Doremus, Eleanor Spiess-Ferris, Richard Hull, Michiko Itatani, Paul Lamantia, Robert Lostutter, Jim Lutes, Tony Phillips, David Sharpe, Hollis Sigler, Ken Warneke, Margaret Wharton, and Mary Lou Zelazny. The show of 30 paintings will serve as an introduction to these artists for a broad audience, while also examining a specific time and place in Chicago’s recent history.
“We are thrilled to work with this group of artists, as well as Elmhurst College again, to dig deeper into Chicago’s rich cultural history. The exhibition builds on an ongoing conversation about Chicago Imagism, which has become broadly and internationally known, but often misunderstood,” said Elmhurst Art Museum Executive Director John McKinnon. “The painters in this exhibition have all been recognized in their own right, yet this period of history has often been overlooked.”
The exhibition’s original scholarship will include a brochure with essays by Bramson, Chicago curator Lynne Warren, and New York curator/critic Deven Golden. In these texts, the wide-ranging term of Chicago Imagism will be discussed as valuable yet limiting. Public programs will better define how the well-used term was formed, what it originally meant, and what it has come to mean through time. What Came After is dedicated to the late art critic James Yood, a champion of Midwest artists, who was involved in early conversations of this exhibition.
What Came After is organized in conjunction with a new installation across Elmhurst’s museum campus at Elmhurst College’s A.C. Buehler Library. This new display was organized by Suellen Rocca, one of the original members of the Hairy Who collective and current Curator and Director of Exhibitions at Elmhurst College.
RELATED PUBLIC PROGRAMS
· Panel Discussion: Despite Imagism
Saturday, September 14, 1:30pm
Presenters including artist Phyllis Bramson, curator Lynne Warren, curator/critic Deven Golden, and artists Richard Hull, Susanne Doremus, and Jim Lutes. Free with museum admission.
· Family Days
Saturday, September 28, 1 - 4pm, and Monday, October 14 (Columbus Day), 1 - 4pm
Children and parents are invited to participate in hands-on activities inspired by the current exhibition. Available to all ages. Free with museum admission.
· Tours of Elmhurst College’s Chicago Imagist collection with Suellen Rocca
Saturday, October 19, 1:30pm and Saturday, November 9, 1:30pm
See the newly reinstalled, internationally recognized Chicago Imagist collection at Elmhurst College with these exclusive tours by Suellen Rocca, one of the original members of the Hairy Who collective and current Curator and Director of Exhibitions at the College. Rocca will offer first-person accounts of Chicago’s cultural history, while also providing context and furthering the dialogue about art from Chicago during the 70s-90s.
· Lecture: What is Chicago Imagism?
Saturday, November 2, 1:30pm
Join us for a talk about Chicago Imagism and its legacy by art critic, curator, and essayist Deven Golden. This talk will look at the artist dialogue that led up to this period, what followed, and how things irrevocably changed as the 20th century came to an end.
· Lecture: What Came After?
Saturday, November 23, 1:30pm
Curator Robert Cozzolino better defines how the well-used term of Chicago Imagism was formed, what it originally meant, and what it has come to mean through time.
· Exhibition Tour with artist and exhibition organizer, Phyllis Bramson
Saturday, January 11, 1:30pm
What Came After is sponsored by the Explore Elmhurst Grant Program, with public programming sponsored by Terra Foundation for American Art.
About Elmhurst Art Museum
Elmhurst Art Museum is located at 150 South Cottage Hill Avenue in Elmhurst (IL), 25 minutes from downtown Chicago by car or public transportation (Metra). The Museum is both an international destination for Mies van der Rohe scholars and fans and a regional center where people from Chicago and the western suburbs learn to see and think differently through the study of the art, architecture and design of our time. The Museum is one block from the Elmhurst Metra station and open Tuesday-Sunday from 11am -5pm. Admission is $15 ($12 for seniors) and free for students and children under 18.
Simultaneous with What Came After, Elmhurst Art Museum will be mounting McCormick House – Past, Present, Future, also September 14, 2019 – January 12, 2020. For the first time ever, the Museum will exhibit a full 1950s domestic representation of its Mies van der Rohe McCormick House (1952) as well as historic images showing how residents lived in the home and explanations about the current transitional state of its preservation.
For more information, please call 630.834.0202 or visit elmhurstartmuseum.org.
