Search | The Art Institute of Chicago

One Theme, Multiple Voices
Air as Sustenance: Four Artworks That Celebrate Breath

Four writers select works from four continents in an exploration of the involuntary but essential act of taking in air.

Inside the Museum
The Road to the Block Party Is Wide Open

Pitch us your idea for a chance to join the party!

Inside an Exhibition
Haute Hair for Fall, AD 140

Insights from the Conservation Lab
Mirrors with Memory: The Magic of Daguerreotypes

Conservator Jim Iska shows that looking at a daguerreotype is not a passive activity—and that the reward is an image unsurpassed in the history of photography.

A blond woman with her back to the viewer stands facing a white wall on which hangs four versions of Picasso's print Still Life with Lunch, one white and dark brown-red, two in the center that are black and white, and on the right that is black, white, gray, and red-brown. The print image consists of a wine bottle, a lamp, a cut ham, a glass, a cut onion, and a knife.

Inside the Exhibition
Made for the Present: The Many Styles of Pablo Picasso

Trace the major artistic approaches and themes Picasso explored at various points across his 70-year career.

Meet the Artist
An Interview with Mounira Al Solh

Perspectives
Andy Warhol Polaroid GIFs

In the bottom-left corner of a barren landscape, four ominous figures look at a butterfly, hourglass, and small sculpture. In the middle, a white-masked, blue-winged angel shows a rock to a horse-faced bust with breasts. To the left, white figures bathe in a black pool. On the right, a giraffe burns.

Inside the Exhibition
Double Visions and Disappearing Acts: Six Works by Salvador Dalí

Take a close look at three pairs of paintings by the famed Surrealist.

New Acquisitions
August Sander Takes His Camera to the Circus

Curator Elizabeth Siegel peers into the mirror that modern photographers revealed when they pointed their cameras at the circus.

Perspectives
Bare-Knuckle Boxing and Crazy Quilting

A solid gold version of a "protrait sculpture" bvut without any distinct features.

New Acquisition
Peruvian Portraits, Past and Present: Understanding Ana De Orbegoso’s Neo-Huaco #3

“That’s how culture transcends,” the artist stated, “transforming the past while keeping the roots.”

Hyperrealistic tableau of open books resting on stands in front of two globes, an orange and white tapestry, and an almost finished pillar candle in a gold holder. The books are placed on top of sheet music and a trumpet, and before them are an open compass, an ink well with a white feather resting in a holder, and wax seals hanging off the table.

Reexamining the Collection
The Not-So-Golden Age of Holland

The evidence of colonialism can be found in the most beautifully rendered objects in Dutch painting.

Inside the Exhibition
12 Things to Know About Myth and Marble: Ancient Roman Sculpture from the Torlonia Collection

Go back in time and behind the scenes for a closer look at this illustrious collection, which makes its North American debut this spring.

Two side-by-side black-and-white photos show Frida Kahlo on the left and Mary Reynolds on the right. Kahlo has her dark hair pulled back with braids crossed over her head, wears large dangling silver earrings, and has a cigarette in her hand. Reynolds looks to the right; her closely cropped light hair is topped with a small black cap, and she wears a dark fur coat.

Inside the Exhibition
Frida Kahlo and Mary Reynolds: A Serendipitous Meeting

The curatorial team introduces these two formidable artists and shares how their brief encounter reorients our understanding of the ways artists inspire one another.