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Chicago Reader

Best of Chicago 2020: Arts & Culture

Illustration by Jason Wyatt Frederick

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In This Section:

showing 1 to 17 of 17

Best of Chicago 2020: Arts & Culture

on March 17, 2021 at 10:10AM

Best of Chicago 2020 is presented by
Arts & Culture poll winners

on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

From Brianna Wellen's introduction, "Losses and gains: Best of Chicago 2020": Some business to get out of the way: the reader poll results were determined by you, the readers!
Closing doors, opening windows

By Kerry Reid on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

Commercial theater has never been the lifeblood of Chicago the way it is in New York with Broadway, but that doesn’t mean losing for-profit producers because of you-know-what doesn’t leave a mark. Mercury Theater, the nifty 300-seat (plus intimate cabaret space) venue on the Southport corridor that started out as a nickelodeon in 1920, was originally renovated as a rental house for live theater by Michael Cullen in 1994, who also ran Cullen’s Bar and Grill next door.
Magic is still real

By Becca James on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

One of the best things about Chicago is the city’s magical history, that is, its history as a hub for magicians. For many years, these performance artists have provided Chicagoans a unique and compelling form of entertainment.
A non-obituary for Chicago improv

By Sheri Flanders on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

One cannot truly write an obituary for Chicago improv, because improv, like a zombie, is inherently undead. And like most horror flicks, improv is filled with the exciting thrill of watching actors delight without the safety net of the script, combined with legitimately disturbing scares.
A new way to go live

By Brianna Wellen on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

When artists of all sorts pivoted to livestreaming, the results were mixed at best. The technical difficulties of a Zoom show, the learning curve of TikTok, the inevitable energy shift that comes with playing to a computer screen, it can all add up to a bad show.
The thrill of a Quimby’s Qustomized Quaranzine

By Megan Kirby on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

A leisurely record store browse, a bartender’s recommendation, an unplanned run-in with a friend—pandemic life lacks these moments of happenstance. There’s no real replacement for digging through zines at Quimby’s Bookstore. The beloved store is open at limited capacity right now, but I live two bus transfers across town.
Stand-up anywhere with Comedy Pickup

By Ariel Parrella-Aureli on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

Every time I walk to Humboldt Park, which is a weekly occurrence that has kept me sane and outside during the pandemic, I’m reminded of a patch of grass that was full of laughter and community during summer 2020: It was comedy in a pickup truck. When entertainment venues shuttered in the early half of the year, artists all over the city struggled.
Yes, please

By Brianna Wellen on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

The dedication in Samantha Irby’s latest book, Wow, No Thank You., is made out to Wellbutrin. Fitting, then, that the pages that follow are an antidepressant in their own right.
Virtual hope

By Catey Sullivan on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

For the first few weeks, I was ignorantly, arrogantly certain we'd all pick up more or less where we left off. Soon.
Chicago’s art gallery alley

By Elisa Shoenberger on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

Calling itself “The Most Instagrammable Alley in Chicago,” The 12 brings art into the alley of the Tri-Taylor neighborhood. Named for its zip code, The 12 is a housing development built by Home& where each unit has an artist-painted garage door.
The lasting impact of the late Terrell Davis

By Leor Galil on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

Even before visual artist and designer Terrell Davis began his first year of classes at the School of the Art Institute in 2016, he’d already helped define outre pop and Web-centric electronic music. In the early 2010s, he contributed to the hallucinatory retro vision and sound of vaporwave.
Singing “Loser” on virtual karaoke

By Jack Riedy on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

I was once a regular at Logan Square bar Golden Teardrops’s Thursday night karaoke, but singing in a crowded basement is the opposite of safe during an airborne pandemic. I was resigned to lingering in livestream comment sections until mid-April, when my friends Erin McAuliffe and Matt Munhall sent an invite to virtual karaoke.
The birth of virtual art shows

By Jenna Rimensnyder on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

Remember the days of crashing an art gallery opening for free wine and a fat gourmet cheese spread? Now the thought of a crowd going open season on a platter of brie and sharp cheddar gives you the chills.
The return of drive-ins

By Arionne Nettles on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

With closed theaters, movies played on my small TV, and the lukewarm reaction of the summer’s releases, I was itching to watch something with others. And lucky for me, the drive-in was back.
All the tees

By Brianna Wellen on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

Dressed in a GlitterGuts T-shirt under a Hideout sweatshirt, sipping from an Empty Bottle mug, staring at my Reader tote bag (plug!), I can hardly remember a time before I was surrounded by merch from my favorite cultural institutions. But it’s a strangely recent phenomenon, one that was in part sparked by Barrel Maker Printing’s early-in-the-pandemic push to support small businesses with a limited run of T-shirts, $10 of each sale going directly to the business sported on the tee.
The drag show must go on

By Salem Collo-Julin on March 17, 2021 at 10:00AM

An important aspect of drag that doesn’t readily translate to a mini-challenge on RuPaul’s Drag Race is an artist’s ability to command a stage: whether that means lip-syncing in front of an audience, or marching in the streets. Chicago’s drag community showed up and showed out in 2020 at the crucial moments when we needed their unique perspectives and leadership abilities. In June, when civil unrest and public demonstrations were a consistent daily presence in the city, Black LGBTQ+ community activists organized the Drag March for Change, leading crowds on the “Boystown” strip in Lakeview to protest racial inequity in the neighborhood and beyond.

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