January 13 – mid-May, 2023
Art & Exhibition Hall
400 S. Peoria St.
Chicago, IL 60607
Gallery 400 is proud to announce UIC first-year MFA student Samuel Schwindt as the Spring 2023 recipient of the Lobby Competition! Samuel's work is now on view in the Art and Exhibition Hall (AEH) lobby through mid-May.
Drawing from a Chicago Tribune article detailing the glamor of the queer community on Halloween night in 1989, Schwindt's sculpture molds leather into stand-ins for bodies that danced that night away. Its suspension poses that evening’s strange charm, hedonism, and complicated context as a brief interlude against Chicago’s intolerance of the queer community. At a time when the federal government undermined the AIDS epidemic and anti-LGBTQ politics were emboldened, the Tribune's article revealed tension surrounding 1980s queer nightlife.
The Lobby Competition is a Gallery 400 initiative aimed at showcasing the work of MFA and BFA UIC students in the lobby of Art and Exhibition Hall. The competition is an opportunity for students to exhibit a site-specific work with 24-hour visibility.