1:15am

THE ART FAIR STORY | MELANIE GERLIS IN CONVERSATION WITH TONY KARMAN

Join art market journalist and author Melanie Gerlis for a short conversation with President and Director of EXPO CHICAGO Tony Karman on the occasion of the release of her book The Art Fair Story which examines the art fair industry’s influence on the art market in just a half century of growth. The conversation will be followed by a book signing.

12:00pm
HANS ULRICH OBRIST IN CONVERSATION WITH AFRICOBRA

Panelists | AFRICOBRA artists: Gerald Williams (SAIC 1966-67, Artist), Jae Jarrell (SAIC 1959-61, Artist), Wadsworth Jarrell (SAIC 1958, Artist), Sherman Beck (Artist), and other key members of AFRICOBRA in conversation with Hans Ulrich Obrist (Curator and Artistic Director | Serpentine Galleries, London).

AFRICOBRA™, or the African Commune of Bad Relevant Artists, was an artist collective founded on the south side of Chicago in 1968. Known for creating art to address social and cultural challenges affecting the Black community, AFRICOBRA is one of the most significant arts movements of the second part of the 20th century. Internationally renowned Curator and Artistic Director of the Serpentine Galleries in London, Hans Ulrich Obrist will speak to integral members of the over 50-year-old collaborative to discuss the group’s history and their individual practices seen through the lens of historic group exhibitions. Presented in partnership with MOUSSE.

2:00pm
DIRECTORS SUMMIT | IMAGINING THE FUTURE: PART I

Panelists | Amy Gilman (Chazen Museum of Art, University of Wisconsin), Adam Levine (Toledo Museum of Art), Cameron Shaw (California African American Museum), Christina Vassallo (The Fabric Workshop and Museum). Moderated by Jill Snyder (Museum Consultant).

The inaugural Directors Summit, organized by EXPO CHICAGO alongside experienced museum leader Jill Snyder, brings together a diverse group of emerging art museum leaders from across the United States for a three-day program addressing the shifting dynamics of museum leadership today.

In part one of two roundtable discussions, four emerging art museum leaders explore the shifting dynamics of museum leadership today. In lively conversation, this cohort of change agents will share insights and examples illustrating how they are leading from an imperfect past to create a more equitable future.

3:30pm
THE EDUCATION OF THE UN-ARTIST, PART I

Panelists | Kameelah Janan Rasheed, Sarah Oppenheimer, in conversation with Prem Krishnamurthy.

Where are the limits of the modern paradigm of the “artist”? What contemporary modes of practice can help to reimagine their roles and responsibilities?

Many of the most compelling creative practitioners working within the arts today are no longer limited by a singular medium or discipline. Neither do they develop their work within the narrow mythologies of individual genius or sole authorship. Rather, their work emerges as a collaborative process that intersects with multiple communities, cultures and contexts. Sometimes, as Allan Kaprow suggested in the late 1960s, this might even entail rejecting the term “artist” itself.

FRONT International 2022, “Oh, Gods of Dust and Rainbows,” focuses on art as an agent of transformation, a mode of healing, and a therapeutic process. In this conversation with FRONT 2022 participants Kameelah Janan Rasheed and Sarah Oppenheimer, FRONT 2022 Artistic Director Prem Krishnamurthy explores the edges of contemporary artistic practice and asks what we need to learn to make creative work more sustainable now and in the future. Presented in partnership with FRONT International, the Joyce Foundation, and Pigment.

5:00pm
DAWOUD BEY IN CONVERSATION

Panelists | Dawoud Bey (Artist), Sarah Meister (Executive Director | Aperture)

Dawoud Bey’s series In This Here Place presents images made in and around the landscapes of five plantations in Louisiana: Destrehan, Evergreen, Laura, Oak Alley, and Whitney, locations in which the history of enslavement still hangs in the air. In conversation with Aperture’s Executive Director Sarah Meister, Bey will discuss this project along with other recent history-based work that examines aspects of the African American past embedded in the American landscape. The conversation will be followed by a book signing. Presented in partnership with Aperture and OCULA.