With the turn of seasons comes a new rotation of exhibits for Chicago’s art scene, and the Museum of Contemporary Art is on board with three new exhibits that all opened May 18.
Theaster Gates’ “13th Ballad” is hard to miss, but easy to overlook. The bulk of the exhibit is in the atrium of the museum, just beyond the front entrance. However, museum visitors might mistake the rows of church pews for museum equipment or event seating.
As is so often the case in modern art museums: determining what is and what is not art can be deceiving. A closer look reveals that the atrium has been deliberately arranged as a chapel by the artist to compare museums to churches as places of contemplation and reverence.
Gates’ materials have an interesting history. Most of the scrap wood and household items in the exhibit originate from the reconstruction of neighborhood homes on the South Side of Chicago. Some of the building materials from this Chicago project were repurposed for the restoration of a historic home in Kassel, Germany and an exhibit called “12 Ballads for Huguenot House.”
“12 Ballads,” and its reworking in “13 Ballads,” explore migration and marginalization in two very different communities: the African American community on the South Side of Chicago and French Huguenots who fled Catholic France to Protestant Germany in the 16th and 18th centuries.
The MCA exhibit consists of arrangements of building materials from these projects, supplemented by video and audio installations located on the fourth floor. The exhibit will also feature three events titled “The Accumulative Affects of Migration 1-3” June 30, Aug. 11 and Sept. 22.