Stories by marc vitali

The star attraction is Vincent Van Gogh, and he has a stellar supporting cast — including the painters George Seurat, Paul Signac, Emile Bernard and Charles Angrand. The exhibit features landscapes from the suburbs of Paris in the 19th century.

Intuit, the Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art, has been on Milwaukee Avenue near Chicago and Ogden avenues since 1999. The museum showcases artwork by self-taught and often marginalized artists who didn’t follow a traditional path to art-making.

Two of the five Grammy nominees this year for Best Children’s Album are from the Chicago area. For Justin Roberts, it’s his fifth nomination. And for the duo Wendy and DB, it’s their first.

In 1968, a U.S. Marine was wounded and evacuated from Vietnam and returned to Chicago. He found his calling making artwork with an approach that could be called obsessive.

The unpopulated environments created by Michiko Itatani suggest settings for sci-fi stories, filled with rockets, planets, books and music. In short, art and science. The work is about inner space – and outer space.

Pianist Inna Faliks is an educator, mom and a distinguished concert pianist who is in demand across the globe. But before all that, one of her first television appearances was on WTTW in 1994 when she was just 15 years old.

Called “The First Homosexuals,” the show is about a time when the art world released a flood of new representations of same-sex desire.

Legendary musician, poet and writer Patti Smith was born in Chicago. Here's a rundown of her cultural connections. 

The Smart Museum on the University of Chicago campus is currently saturated with monochromatic modern art. The curators call the show “Monochrome Multitudes.”

For the 36^th year, the National Museum of Mexican Art in Pilsen is presenting an ever-changing art exhibit that celebrates love and loss. This year’s Day of the Dead exhibition blends the contemporary with the traditional. Its somber tone is meant to be a reflection of the world at large.

The artwork is on loan from a museum in the town of Ponce on the southern coast. Now, Chicago’s National Museum of Puerto Rican Arts and Culture in Humboldt Park is the temporary home to a small but significant exhibit.