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Artists Run Chicago: In Focus at EXPO Chicago

Hyde Park Art Center > Exhibitions > Artists Run Chicago: In Focus at EXPO Chicago

We are thrilled to be returning to EXPO Chicago this year with a special focus on Artists Run Chicago, our ongoing platform supporting the city’s essential artist-run projects. Our booth presentation features four dynamic artists, who in addition to developing their independent art practices, also contribute to some of the most future-facing artists-run spaces in Chicago: zakkiyyah najeebah dumas-o’neal (Concerned Black Image Makers), Chris Pappan (Kanza/Osage, Lakota; Center for Creative Futures), and Norman Teague (Blanc Gallery and blkHaUS studios), and Jory Drew (F4F).

Chicago has a deep network of artist-driven initiatives that foster a subculture and alternative market for new ideas and stylistic forms in contemporary art. Hyde Park Art Center was born out of this spirit in 1939 and has grown into a vector space that forges meaningful relationships between artists, art, and community. The micro exhibition at EXPO features artists working with some of the future forward spaces.

Image caption: Chris Pappan, "Akikipa Washpezhi (The Meeting Place)," 2022, graphite, ink and colored pencil on Evanston municipal ledger,
40 x 40 inches each (diptych).
  • April 7 – April 10, 2022
  • Booth 423, Navy Pier

Expo Chicago

Featured Artists

zakkiyyah najeebah dumas-o’neal (co-founder of Concerned Black Image Makers), Jory Drew (co-founder of F4F), Chris Pappan (co-founder of Center for Creative Futures), Norman Teague (collaborator of Blanc Gallery and co-founder of blkHaUS studios)

For over two decades, Hyde Park Art Center has been an ally for independent art spaces. The Art Center exhibited the first Artists Run Chicago show in 2009 with contributions from 40 spaces in existence between 1999 and 2009. Our 2020 exhibition Artists Run Chicago 2.0, although delayed by the pandemic, celebrated the work of fifty current artist-run spaces that fuel Chicago’s independent art scene. Since then, we have distributed over half a million dollars in grants among 70 of Chicago’s artist-run spaces and platforms.