Newcity

No amount of frosting can sweeten the bitter aftertaste of this Midwest premiere at Rivendell Theatre Ensemble.

Marriott Theatre whips fresh wind into Rodgers and Hammerstein’s classic.

This wrenching, rarely-performed drama from William Inge gets a stirring revival at Eclipse Theatre Company.

Working within the history and discursive space of portraiture, Sepuya visualizes queer intimacies, uses photographic equipment as signifiers and the space and function of the studio to ask questions about who we are and what makes it so.

Aque infuses sterile and utilitarian objects with quiet, intimate labors of love that meditate on romantic and unresolved relationships forced to operate in obfuscation.

This music/theater hybrid from A Red Orchid takes some creative risks but reinforces some tired stereotypes in the process.

Aries: Sometimes the original idea or the early model or the first try is better.

An exhibition in Milwaukee places a series of paintings by the beloved American artist Winslow Homer in the company of work by his English contemporaries.

This wild world premiere at Steppenwolf Theatre Company sees no separation between tail and dog when it comes to wagging.

While the United States considers a trade war with China and a return to negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership, paintings by sixteen artists from the region demonstrate the diversity of Southeast Asia's artistic expressions.

This magical production from Adventure Stage Chicago follows its twin protagonists on a journey of self-discovery through their personal and cultural histories.

You think to yourself, “Who do I love? I want to bring them here.”

A hundred years of advertisements are stripped of their slogans to reveal the racial and sexist biases underneath.

This immersive and site-specific work from Nothing Without a Company explores the persuasive, cultish appeal of corporate branding.

Wine times among friends in fine Gallic comic appellation.

How to demonstrate the torrid depths of that marvelous, menacing slipstream through image and sound, through music and modern mayhem?

Remounted little more than a year later, Ike Holter's play has lost none of its bite with this production at 16th Street Theater.

The suspense-free structure does not click.

Three women painters paint as they have always done, and yet we still call it a show of "women painters."

“There will be a heavenly castle; there is a holy grail; there did fall golden apples.”

Aries: Did Thomas Jefferson procure the French recipe for macaroni and cheese while living in France?

"No noise, but silence and eternal sleep." “Titus Andronicus,” William Shakespeare.

"When the numbers change, so does the woman."

An impressive show of paintings, drawings, prints and sculptures by a Native artist who treated subjects from Native American mythologies as well as themes of abstraction and more recognizably western iconography.

Trolls, psychedelics and witty performance make light of the internet's anonymous legions.

The chair tells the history of modern design and the exhibition examines its evolution in America.

Delirious precision, devious nightmare.

Aries: On the early stages of a new project, be scrupulous and adroit so that you will sail on to the next stages.

Poems published in journals today have double work to do. Because the gatekeepers are changing and the landscape is changing and the idea that social status and pedigree holding space for mediocrity is no longer accepted. So yeah, good luck on reading that incredibly tight and creatively dead piece of art—we'll see whose soul it saves.

"The communal experience of watching works of art about real people makes a huge difference in how we experience a film.”

Spring is coming soon and a sailing winemaker dinner, oyster how-to and rum festival will help kick it into gear.

A graphic novelist kicks it off with some great events in April.

Fashion, flowers and the influence of Mexico on the Chicago design scene.

The landscape of a career.

The anti-"Matrix."

Stanley Tucci again defines an artist's process.

This mutually supportive community is why Chicago has fostered one of the nation’s most vital culinary cultures.

We’re living in a moment where chefs have become cultural stars.

Witchcraft, authenticity and cooking with love.

Aries: initiate big, bold projects.