Art News. Vasari Codex

museum exhibitions schedule Apr 9, 2026 visibility 62 link 22 artists, 5 galleries

Chicago’s Obama Presidential Center has art at its core

The Obama Presidential Center is set to open on Chicago’s South Side on June 19, 2026. The $850m institution, designed by Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects, features more than 25 site-specific contemporary art commissions integrated into its architecture and 19.3-acre campus. Ahead of the opening, the museum has partnered with Expo Chicago to preview these works, which include monumental contributions from artists such as Julie Mehretu, Mark Bradford, and Nick Cave.

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article news schedule Apr 25, 2025 visibility 18 link 7 artists, 1 gallery

obama presidential center chicago artist commissions

US artists Spencer Finch and Lindsay Adams have been commissioned to create new installations for the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago, which is set to open in early 2026. Finch will produce a 70-foot-long tiled mural for the Forum building's lobby, inspired by Barack Obama's memoir *Dreams from My Father*, while Adams will adapt a 2024 painting into fabric panels for the center's public café. The commissions are led by museum director Louise Bernard and curator Virginia Shore, who are building a collection of approximately 20 public artworks for the campus, including pieces by Julie Mehretu, Richard Hunt, and Maya Lin.

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museum exhibitions schedule Feb 18, 2026 visibility 19 link 12 artists, 1 gallery

Must-see Chicago museum openings, exhibitions and events in 2026

Chicago's cultural institutions are preparing a diverse slate of exhibitions and openings for 2026. Highlights include the Art Institute of Chicago presenting Henri Matisse's complete 'Jazz' book of cutouts for the first time, a survey of Dominican artist Firelei Báez at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the National Museum of Mexican Art exploring the history of Mexican railroad workers, and a costume design exhibition featuring Paul Tazewell's work at the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry. The year also features the grand opening of the Obama Presidential Center and a Barbara Nessim survey at the DePaul Art Museum.

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article news schedule Oct 22, 2025 visibility 21 link 7 artists

obama presidential center new york times interview

Barack Obama discussed the Obama Presidential Center, set to open spring 2025 on Chicago's South Side, in a New York Times interview. The four-building complex will include a museum, library, auditorium, basketball court, gardens, and commissioned works by 25 artists, including Julie Mehretu, Maya Lin, Nick Cave, Jenny Holzer, Kiki Smith, and Richard Hunt. Designed by Tod Williams and Billie Tsien Architects, the centerpiece is an eight-story granite museum nicknamed "the Obamalisk," featuring an 83-foot-tall abstract glass work by Mehretu. Obama emphasized the center's role as a public space to inspire community action, not a presidential mausoleum.

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museum exhibitions schedule May 20, 2026 visibility 5 link 19 artists

From Obama Presidential Center opening to Anne Frank to Pokemon: Chicago museums unveil ambitious summer exhibitions

Chicago museums have announced a slate of ambitious summer exhibitions, including the opening of the Obama Presidential Center, an Anne Frank exhibition, and a Pokemon-themed show. These exhibits span a range of cultural and historical topics, aiming to attract diverse audiences to the city's major cultural institutions.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 17, 2025 visibility 17 link 9 artists

Theaster Gates to create giant frieze for Obama Presidential Center

The Obama Presidential Center has announced a new commission by Chicago-based artist Theaster Gates, who will create a large frieze made of photo-printed aluminum using images from the Johnson Publishing Company archives—the publisher of Ebony and Jet magazines—and the work of photographer Howard Simmons. The installation, set to open in 2026, honors the dignity of Black life and the vibrancy of Black culture throughout the 20th century. Gates has been working with 20,000 photographs from the archive since 2016, and the frieze will be visible from Stony Island Avenue, near his own Stony Island Arts Bank. Other high-profile commissions for the center include works by Julie Mehretu, Maya Lin, Lindsay Adams, Nick Cave, Aliza Nisenbaum, Jenny Holzer, and Idris Khan.

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