Chicago Architecture Biennial 2015: artist Theaster Gates has converted a derelict bank constructing in a low-cash flow Chicago neighbourhood into a cultural venue with galleries, event space, and libraries for books and vinyl information .
Called Stony Island Arts Bank, the task is the most current by Gates, a social activist artist and urban planner known for getting and transforming dilapidated structures in the city’s South Side district into cultural services.
Encompassing far more than 17,000 square feet (1,580 square metres), the new arts centre will host the opening occasion on Saturday for the Chicago Architecture Biennial.
During a press preview, Gates commended the Biennial organisers for pondering past Chicago’s architectural icons.
The city has an “wonderful history of racism, segregation, and a history of red-lining and housing covenants that work towards the poor and black and brown individuals”.
Gates calls the Stony Island Arts Bank “a laboratory for the subsequent generation of black artists and culture-interested individuals a platform to showcase future leaders,” in accordance to a statement.
Related story: ten of Chicago’s lesser-acknowledged architectural gems
“I come to feel wonderful that we have a mayor and an administration that is considering about what it implies to be a city of neighbourhoods, and trying to produce new possibilities for a lot more complicated architectural forms to emerge,” Gates mentioned.
The three-storey facility consists of exhibition room, libraries, a reading area, and offices for the Rebuild Foundation, a nonprofit that Gates began in 2010 with the aim of merging artwork practises with neighborhood redevelopment.
The organisation’s in-house design team oversaw the building’s renovation.
“We modified what we needed to, but we didn’t want to erase history,” said Mejay Gula, an architectural designer who began doing work for Gates in 2010. The most substantial structural modification concerned replacing the floor between the 2nd and third amounts.
Dating to 1923, the original Neoclassical structure – made of wood and steel and clad in white terracotta – was designed by architect William Gibbons Uffendell and was known as the Stony Island Trust & Financial savings Bank.
Located in a after-thriving neighbourhood, the constructing fell into disrepair more than the decades and has sat vacant given that the 1980s.
Gates bought the property from the city in 2013 for \$1 (£0.66). To assist fund its refurbishment, he salvaged marble parts from the structure and crafted them into one hundred rectangular blocks he dubbed “financial institution bonds”.
Each block was inscribed with the phrases In Art We Believe in, and he offered them at Art Basel in 2013 for \$5,000 a piece. The organisation also hosted fundraising events for the renovation task.
The ground level consists of a double-height atrium flanked by columns and topped with a ceiling lined with patterned cream-coloured tiles. The rear of the space is outfitted with a repurposed oak bar.
The second storey characteristics a 23-foot-substantial (seven metre) library filled with books from the former library of Johnson Publishing, which specialises in texts on African-American culture and publishes Ebony and Jet magazines.
The shelving in the compact room is lined with vertical wood beams that have been acquired from a salvage warehouse. “We usually are attempting to use reclaimed materials,” noted Gula.
The second level also homes a reading room and an area for the storage of 60,000 antique glass lantern slides. Featuring images relevant to art and architectural history – from the Paleolithic time period to the contemporary era – the slides have been donated by the University of Chicago and the College of the Artwork Institute of Chicago.
The third level includes offices, additional exhibition room, and a wood-panelled space with a collection of vinyl information by the producer and DJ Frankie Knuckles, considered the “godfather of residence music”. Gates acquired the albums following Knuckles died in 2014.
The leading level also houses a small collection of racist collectibles, known as “negrobilia.” The products once belonged to Edward J Williams, a prominent African-American banker in Chicago, who acquired them “in an attempt to remove offensive resources and stereotypical photos of black diaspora from circulation,” in accordance to the Rebuild Foundation.
The Stony Island Arts Financial institution will be routinely open to the public Tuesday by means of Saturday commencing on six October. In conjunction with the Chicago Architecture Biennial, the venue is internet hosting an set up by Portuguese artist Carlos Bunga that consists of tall columns made of cardboard.
Michelle Boone, Chicago’s commissioner of cultural affairs, stated the arts centre is a substantial addition to the South Side neighbourhood, where she grew up.
“I have invested my life driving back and forth previous this derelict building,” she stated in the course of Friday’s press event. “So to sit here in this room, surrounded by so a lot cultural heritage and attractiveness, is actually meaningful.”
Theaster Gates
The new arts centre is positioned close to Gates’ Dorchester Tasks – a assortment of four vacant buildings that have been converted into neighborhood venues. “The Financial institution is our fifth and by far our most ambitious venture to date,” mentioned Ken Stewart, CEO of Rebuild Basis.
The Biennial, which opens 3 October 2015 and runs to three January 2016, features installations, exhibitions and particular occasions. Much more than a hundred designers from around the globe are participating.
Photography is by Steve Hall and Tom Harris/Hedrich Blessing.
