Sightings Articles

Two intertwined dark bronze hands lightly touching at the fingertips with small space in between

art | Embodiment | Religion and the Senses

Smart Sightings | Embodying Religion in Rodin's "The Cathedral"

Time and again, my camera has taught me that religion is deeply enmeshed with the body and everyday lived experience. Rodin’s piece resonates similarly....

November 16, 2023
A field of red tulips with green stems

Redlining | Amanda Williams | art | Reformation

Redefining Redlining on Chicago’s Southside

The tulips in Amanda Williams' art installation enact for residents who live in or pass through the area that tenacious double effect of urban redlining: the mark of the past is never entirely erased....

June 15, 2023
god - blake

art | Religion and Literature | prophets

The Christian Who Was a Church of One

In a world that seems to me to offer precious little of the mantle of prophecy, I offer you William Blake....

February 17, 2022
statue

Coronavirus | art | memorial | Death

Creating a Just Memory of the Pandemic

The importance of community art for processing our collective trauma...

April 1, 2021
Plant growing in rocks

Smart Museum of Art | Coronavirus | health care | art

The Precariousness of Care

Attending to each other and our communities is costly, messy, exhausting — and vital...

October 22, 2020
Art

art | George Floyd | Race and religion

We Need Art to Help Us Heal, Now More than Ever

An invitation to process pain and to heal through the viewing and contemplation of contemporary Black art...

June 4, 2020
Warhol

art | pop culture

Andy Warhol’s Iconicity

Exploring the religious dimensions of the exhibit, "Andy Warhol—From A to B and Back Again," currently on display at the Art Institute of Chicago ...

January 27, 2020

art

The Epistemology of Frida's Closet

Frida Kahlo is once again the subject of a major exhibition....

April 15, 2019

art | prayer

The Art of Prayer Meets the Prayer of Art

Both art and prayer invite us to assume unconventional or inconvenient postures that demand we orient ourselves differently. ...

October 18, 2018

art

Native Sons? Of Gilded and Guilty Ages in the Windy City

Ed. Note: Both the Monday and Thursday columns this week feature current and recent exhibitions at the Art Institute of Chicago. Stay tuned for Cynthia Lindner's reflections on the James Webb installation, "Prayer," currently on display at the Art In...

October 15, 2018