Fashion and Fabric: Textiles, Trade, and Africa
@ The Richard H. Driehaus Museum
40 E Erie St, Chicago, IL 60611
Opening Thursday, April 11th, from 6PM - 7:30PM
Explore Yinka Shonibare’s practices of leveraging extraordinary textiles and period clothing as cultural signifiers through a discussion between Melinda Watt, the Christa C. Mayer Thurman Curator of Textiles at the Art Institute of Chicago and historian Kirstin Purtich.
About Yinka Shonibare: A Tale of Today
The inaugural exhibition in the Driehaus Museum’s new contemporary art series, A Tale of Today, focuses on Yinka Shonibare CBE, an artist who draws on history, politics, and fashion influences to explore and critique our understanding of the past with equal doses of humor, irony and theatrics playfully woven in. All of the British-Nigerian artist’s work reflects the intersection of his English and African heritage and, in his own words, is “about raising questions rather than answering them.”
This exhibition features the artist’s earlier work, from photography series to sculpture installations. It is presented within the context of one of America’s great Gilded Age mansions – the Driehaus Museum’s home – creating compelling juxtapositions that will reveal new perspectives on both the art and its setting.
A Tale of Today will provide opportunities for audiences to see the history of the Gilded Age through different lenses, and explore the social, class, racial and economic issues that make that history relevant to society now.
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Tags: Chicago, Fashion and Fabric: Textiles Trade and Africa, Kirstin Purtich, Melinda Watt, Near North Side, The Richard H. Driehaus Museum, Yinka Shonibare
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