A magnificent mausoleum, commissioned by Shah Jahan as a monument for his most loved wife, Mumtaz Mahal, designed by the architect Ustad Isa, formed by the hands of 20,000 men, the Taj Mahal was built behind an encircling wall for sixteen years, intended to be unveiled at day’s first light, revealing a pure and complete glory that could be experienced just once before, like us and everything, it began to decay....
On Monday at 7 PM, the Chicago Film Society will screen a 35-millimeter print of the Japanese drama A Scene at the Sea (1991) at the Music Box Theatre. Along with Lee Chang-dong’s Oasis (which plays from 35-millimeter at Doc Films on Sunday at 7 PM), it’s the best repertory screening in town this week—the film’s nuanced, small-scale storytelling provides a welcome antidote to the expensive bombast that’s crowding the multiplexes....
If you’re a fan of an independent musician who’s been trying to cobble together a living without touring or gig income, or if you’re just generally concerned with artists’ well-being during the pandemic, you probably already know about Bandcamp Fridays. But just in case, here are the basics: on the first Friday of most months since last March, digital music retailer Bandcamp has been passing along its usual cut of sales to artists and labels....
There are few things less cool than a singing drummer. Drummers already have it bad enough; they’re typically pushed into the background, the last member of a band to get any attention or credit. The only people who really care about them are other drummers, and then only on occasion. I’m a drummer myself, so I get it. And when drummers add lead vocals from behind the kit, they somehow seem even dorkier....
Bryan Murray Jon Lundbom Sometimes I feel embarrassed when I discover musicians who once lived, studied, and worked in Chicago only long after they’ve split town. Last week Irish composer Jennifer Walshe played in town with Tony Conrad, but years ago, when she was studying at Northwestern and performing around town, I was oblivious to her presence. Same goes for saxophonist Jon Irabagon, trumpeter Amir ElSaffar, and composer Michael Pisaro....
For many, Porchlight’s In the Heights seemed like another chapter in the long theatrical tradition of whitewashing nonwhite characters by casting white actors to play them even when numerous actors of color are available. (The classic example: Laurence Olivier playing Othello in blackface.) But why, others argued, shouldn’t roles go to the actor who had the best audition? “Do you think Jonathan Pryce should be banned from playing Shylock because he is not Jewish?...
Q: I’m your average straight 42-year-old white guy. Married for a little less than a year (second marriage for both). We have an active sex life and are both GGG. My wife wants to be forcibly fucked—held down and raped. Normally I’d be all over this because I do love me some rough sex. My issue: She told me she was traumatically raped by a man she was dating prior to me....
Formed in 2017, art-rock ensemble Je’raf arrange bits of hip-hop, jazz, funk, and postpunk into whimsical, progressive jams. All seven members (they’re split between New York and Chicago) play in similarly animated, eccentric bands outside the group too—bassist and vocalist PT Bell is in art-punk unit Blacker Face, for instance, and vocalist Brianna Tong fronts jazz-fusion group Cordoba. On Saturday, February 29, local labels Amalgam and No Index release Je’raf’s rambunctious and politically charged debut album, Throw Neck....
On Monday, April 23, within hours of Democratic state rep Anthony Deluca filing a bill to amend Illinois’s Freedom of Information law, a crescendo of opposition arose from civil rights lawyers and government transparency advocates. The amendment would’ve made misconduct complaints against police officers (and other records associated with pending criminal cases) off-limits in FOIA requests. Dozens of opponents filed witness slips, written statements, against this suggested change, and ultimately DeLuca backed down: he decided he would not be calling the bill for a debate....
When reporters have fooled you because you assumed they were being honest, did you give those reporters too much credit or too little? After William Gaines, who won two Pulitzer Prizes for his investigative journalism at the Tribune, retired from the paper in 2001 to teach journalism at the University of Illinois, he led his students in the unraveling of his business’s greatest mystery: Who was the Watergate scandal’s Deep Throat?...
I haven’t thought about Salvador Dalí since high school, a time when melting clocks, genitalia, and sundry visual jokes are especially well suited to the overheated adolescent psyche. Dalí specialized in realistic renderings of the subconscious, fantasy imagery as described and popularized by Freudian psychoanalysis. Like his fellow surrealists, he loved to shock and provoke with his art; what teenager doesn’t want to do the same? I tried to recall that period of my life while visiting “The Imaginative World of Dalí,” an exhibit currently on view at Zygman Voss Gallery....
Quentin Tarantino’s movie Once Upon a Time . . . in Hollywood is in part a gauzy wish fulfillment fantasy that fictionalizes and rewrites the true-life brutal murder of actor Sharon Tate. The play graveyard shift at the Goodman Theatre takes a similar, if not more practical, path. The play knows that it’s impossible to practice necromancy and raise the spirit of the beloved from the grave but hopes that perhaps it is possible to drape flowers on her legacy....
Lollapalooza may not have the boho fashion cred of Coachella or Glastonbury, but for four days the festival turned Grant Park into a parade of original looks. The overall theme seemed to be “come as you are, with a dash of who you want to be.” Feel like wearing a full-length prom gown over combat boots? Knock yourself out. Thinking more jeans and a T-shirt topped with a dramatic mermaid crown?...
Last summer, Intuit began exhibiting nearly a dozen Wesley Willis drawings as part of “Chicago Calling: Art Against the Flow” in conjunction with Art Design Chicago, an expansive, yearlong celebration of the city’s art history. Intuit’s show honored Willis and nine other local outsider artists (including Henry Darger, Lee Godie, and Mr. Imagination), and argued for their place in the historical canon. Willis, a six-foot-five schizophrenic Black man who drew detailed renderings of Chicago’s skyline and infrastructure, was the youngest figure included in the show—he was just 40 years old when he died in 2003—and he transcended the art world like none of the others....
This story was originally published by City Bureau on August 26, 2020. The Trump administration’s attempted changes to the census have stoked fear and discouraged immigrants from responding, according to PRI The World reporting. On top of delays in outreach due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. Census Bureau announced recently it will end all counting efforts one month sooner than planned on September 30. “The immigrant community [in Chicago] as a whole is very diverse, and looking at the foreign-born population alone doesn’t account for the many other factors that make a community hard-to-count, such as the presence of young children, housing insecurity and income levels that all contribute to civic participation,” said Brandon Lee, an Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights census consultant....
The Chicago Reader is one of the few alternative newsweeklies in the nation that still publishes long-form film criticism, and over the past 40 years we’ve presented work by such talented writers as Noah Berlatsky, Fred Camper, Cliff Doerksen, Andrea Gronvall, J.R. Jones, Joshua Katzman, Dave Kehr, Patrick Z. McGavin, Jonathan Rosenbaum, Ben Sachs, Lee Sandlin, Hank Sartin, Bill Stamets, Elizabeth Tamny, Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, and Albert Williams. The index below isn’t complete yet—we’ve made it only as far back as 1993—but we plan to keep adding to it until it is....
Starting this week, we present a biweekly post focusing on new additions to the streaming channel Filmstruck, a partnership between Turner Classic Movies and the Criterion Collection. Filmstruck is currently featuring Italian actress Anna Magnani (1908-1973), whom filmmaker Roberto Rossellini called “the greatest acting genius since Eleonora Duse.” Noted for her raw, intense performances, she starred in films for Rossellini, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Federico Fellini, Sidney Lumet, Jean Renoir, and Luchino Visconti....
As Wild Belle, siblings and Chicagoland natives Natalie and Elliot Bergman construct a tropical pop sound that draws from rocksteady, reggae, dub, dancehall, West African music, and more. The eclectic mix is unified by Natalie’s smoky, sultry voice and Elliot’s equally sexy baritone saxophone and electrified kalimbas. For their brand-new third LP, Everybody One of a Kind, the Bergmans eschewed outside producers, opting to work almost exclusively on their own in Elliot’s Chicago and LA studios....
In 2011, a Reddit user came to the site asking for advice on how to deal with his best friend’s passing. In a response that quickly went viral, a user by the name of GSnow wrote, “As for grief, you’ll find it comes in waves.” This prioritization of assertion over emotions comes with a cost when, after Tyler’s shoulder is severely injured early in the wrestling season, he bottles up his pain and continues to push himself until he is physically and emotionally broken beyond repair—taking his father’s painkillers instead of getting surgery and partying with his friends without acknowledging his drug use and injury....
Willie Clayton left Chicago in 1993 for the warmer climes of Atlanta, but he’s a proud product of the Windy City soul circuit. Well before turning 21, Clayton was opening for the greats of the genre at the city’s top venues. He’s long since graduated to headliner status himself: he made his main-stage debut at the Chicago Blues Festival in 1996, and Saturday evening’s set is his fourth appearance there....
