Chicago Humanities Festival, in partnership with the Terra Foundation for American Art, EXPO CHICAGO and Navy Pier, today announced the initial list of participants for Creative Chicago: An Interview Marathon—a centerpiece program of Art Design Chicago, taking place Saturday, September 29 in Navy Pier’s Aon Grand Ballroom during EXPO CHICAGO 2018.

Creative Chicago is a free, five-hour series of interviews with artists, authors, architects, and others representing Chicago’s diverse creative community, presented by Chicago Humanities Festival.

Led by Hans Ulrich Obrist—artistic director of the Serpentine Galleries in London and one of the world's leading art curators and critics, and known for his long-form, dynamic interview marathons—Creative Chicago will take a multi-dimensional, multidisciplinary look at creativity in the city, past, present and future.

Current participants include:

Amanda Williams, Artist

Art Green, Artist

Barbara Kasten, Artist

Brandon Breaux, Artist

Buritt Bulloch, Owner, Old Fashioned Donuts

Cauleen Smith, Artist

Dawoud Bey, Photographer

Eddie Bocanegra, Organizer/Activist

Eula Biss, Writer

Eve L. Ewing, Writer/Visual Artist

Fatimah Asghar, Poet

Gerald Williams, Artist

Jeanne Gang, Architect

Joseph Grigely, Artist/Art Historian

Louise Bernard, Museum Director, Obama Presidential Center Museum

Richard Hunt, Sculptor

Shani Crowe, Artist/Performer

Stanley Tigerman, Architect

Theaster Gates, Artist

Tim Samuelson, Cultural Historian

Alison Cuddy, Marilynn Thoma Artistic Director, Chicago Humanities Festival

Through a wide-ranging dialogue, Creative Chicago will examine the forces that have and continue to make Chicago a creative powerhouse. As one of Art Design Chicago’s centerpiece programs, Creative Chicago bridges Chicago’s historical role as an art and design center with the contemporary work of artists and other creatives in the city today.

Studs Terkel, the celebrated oral historian and iconic Chicagoan author, was a major influence and inspiration for Obrist’s creative practice—making Chicago a fitting destination for the curator’s first U.S. marathon. Creative Chicago will feature audio from the Studs Terkel Radio Archive, along with Obrist’s own Chicago-based archive.

“The Creative Chicago marathon is certain to bring greater awareness of Chicago’s role as an important art and design center, past and present,” said  Elizabeth Glassman, President and CEO of the Terra Foundation for American Art. “The diversity of participant perspectives adds to a deeper understanding of the many ways our creative communities continue to shape culture locally and well beyond Chicago.”

A centerpiece program of Art Design Chicago, the interview marathon will contribute to the rich array of stories explored through the initiative this year. The marathon will also launch the Chicago Humanities Festival’s Fallfest 2018: Graphic!, focusing on the increasingly visual nature of the world, which is transforming the way people work, play, communicate and think.