Category Archives: Field Trip

August 1, 2026 · 8:10 PM

Art in These Times: an InterCcECT exhibition

In conjunction with Fall of Freedom, which calls on artists to unite as a constituency specifically challenged by ascending authoritarian attacks on the freedom to learn and free association, InterCcECT undertakes to theorize yet again as always the politics of aesthetics and the aestheticization of politics. This time our theorizing will materialize in our first curated exhibition: ART IN THESE TIMES.

“Political art” has an all too familiar repertoire, but uncertain effects. What media, modes, styles, and ideas activate political critique and political organization today? How can we collect and sustain forms and experiences that refuse profit laundering and prestige mining?

Lots more to come about events and festivities around the exhibit (opening party! closing poetry reading with Daniel Borzutzky and more! refreshments by Nabal Cafe! commemorating 50 years of Chicago left media at In These Times! political stand-up after hours downstairs!) But today’s notice on this channel: proposals from interested artists are due August 10!

Selected artists will be paid, which is but one little way to build in some political effect. Spread the word to artist friends, mark your calendars, get in formation!

-Discrete 2D works or small 3D works suitable for a small, untraditional gallery space

-Moveable via public transport for installation or easily transportable to gallery space in Logan Square/Bucktown

-Chicago or midwest themes encouraged

-No artworks featuring words with explicit, didactic political messages/slogans

-No generative AI in any phase of the work, attested by artist

Prospective participants should email brief statements of interest, and photos of proposed piece(s), to interccect@gmail.com by Aug 10, for invitation by Aug 31.

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July 4, 2026 · 5:06 PM

InterCcECT turns 15! the art of theory blazes in July

Since summer 2011, the Inter Chicago Circle for Experimental Critical Theory has convened big heads for adventures in abstraction. America’s birthday blares the need for big ideas to propel a new founding. Grateful for the many years of wild speculation and vivifying conversation, we’ll use our birthday to double the big ideas: two events in July on the art of theory.

First: extending our exploration of the modernist turn in art with TJ Clark, in his new essay on de Kooning and a field trip to the Art Institute’s special exhibit Willem de Kooning Drawing. (above: Untitled III) 4pm Thursday 16 July. Meet at the entrance to the Modern Wing. RSVP for the readings and to let us know to look for you. Special tickets are required.

Second: when fascism aestheticizes politics, communism responds by politicizing art. or so Benjamin said. What’s happening politically in art today? Join us for a reading session on Angela Dimitrakaki’s Feminism. Art. Capitalism. (Introduction and Chapter 5). 5pm Monday 27 July. Special venue: In These Times, which is expanding its political education programming. More on that soon, including an October partnership with InterCcECT on political art! 2040 N Milwaukee, upstairs. Blue Line: Western. RSVP to interccect at gmail for PDFs (please do not use the wordpress comment function).

As always, send us proposals for events. Theorists visiting Chicago, book touring, and more are warmly invited to get in touch.

Want an InterCcECT near you? Be like Saint Louis, Columbus, Knoxville, and Columbia, SC and start an InterCcECT satellite. Handbook and consult available upon request.

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April 22, 2026 · 1:38 PM

giving form to modernity

Did the style of modern painting emerge to celebrate the wonders of nineteenth century Paris, or to critique industrial urbanization, consumer culture, and false gods of progress? If Modernism was this duality, what would leaving it for another paradigm of artistic production require?

Join InterCcECT for a reading session on TJ Clark’s classic work The Painting of Modern Life, along with his updated short essay “The Painting of Postmodern Life.” Along the way we’ll take stock of Chicago’s contemporary urban aesthetic opportunities by partnering with a new social infrastructure, The Pub – a print-only newspaper anchoring a community third space. Subscribe and submit to print; check out their events page for a range of good things!

Wednesday 27 May 4pm

The Pub 2150 W Armitage Ave (Blue Line: Western)

RSVP to interccect at gmail for PDFs. (We’re using the Revised Second Edition; read the Preface, Introduction, and Chapter One.)

now welcoming summer proposals! on our calendar:

InterCcECT on Lacan’s Seminar 4, with special guest Professor Chris Breu, 29 June

Alyssa Battistoni 4 May, U Chicago 3CT, 4pm

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April 15, 2025 · 9:33 PM

beam us up, scotty

In search of other worlds, in quest of cultural heritage, and in complement to last month’s discussion of asset managerial aesthetics, InterCcECT convenes to celebrate the publication of LATE STAR TREK, the latest book from stalwart Adam Kotsko. Seminary Coop hosts a conversation between Kotsko and Gerry Canavan, editor of the series Mass Markets: Storyworlds Across Media, Thursday 8 May, 4pm. Directly afterwards we’ll adjourn to Jimmy’s (aka Woodlawn Tap) for libations.

As semesters wind down and quarters begin to feel the spring breeze, fire up your summer theory desires. InterCcECT always takes proposals for events, and we welcome guests on book tours / with miniseminar ideas. Coming to town? Schedule your fall event now. And mark your calendars for our first summer ambition, an initial session on Theodor Adorno’s Negative Dialectics on 22 May! Behave, and we’ll have multiple summer sessions devoted to carefully reading it.

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September 29, 2021 · 1:55 PM

Chicago Avant-Garde

InterCcECT field trip!

A new exhibition from the Newberry Library, curated by Dr. Liesl Olson, spotlights Chicago as a site of historic, boundary-pushing experimentation in art, literature, and dance.  Chicago Avant Garde centers five women whose lives and careers embodied a uniquely Chicago style of avant-garde creativity in the 1930s, 40s, and 50s: artist Gertrude Abercrombie, poet Gwendolyn Brooks, dancers  Katherine Dunham and Ruth Page, and curator Katharine Kuh.

Open to the public and free,  Tuesday – Saturday, 10 am – 4 pm, now through December 30th.

The exhibition is accompanied by a catalog designed by graphic artists Nick Butcher and Nadine Nakanishi of Sonnenzimmer and letterpress printer Ben Blount. It includes more than 100 photographs, an essay by Dr. Olson (Director of Chicago Studies at the Newberry ), and new poems dedicated to each of the five avant-gardists by Chicago-based poet and educator Eve L. Ewing.

Two special events also feature the exhibit:

Wednesday, October 13, 6 – 7:15 pm

Designing the Chicago Avant-Garde Identity

Saturday, October 23, 11 am – noon

A Woman Ahead of Her Time: Katherine Dunham and Afro-Caribbean Dance

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