Chicago's Weird And Wonderful Redmoon Theater Closes After 25 Years

By Mae Rice in Arts & Entertainment on Dec 21, 2015 10:34PM

Photo of 2015's Chicago Fire Fest (Rick Lobes / Chicagoist)

Chicago’s Redmoon Theater, a firehose of weird and wonderful public art for the past 25 years, has shuttered due to funding woes, according to a statement the theater released Monday.

“Our core mission was to bring massive, unexpected free art to public spaces — to bring people together across difference in acts of momentary and meaningful celebration,” said Frank Maugeri, producing artistic director of Redmoon, in the statement. “From the Fire Festival in recent years to some of our earliest outdoor work, our dream was to create a new kind of urban ritual.”

The theater, originally a puppet theater in Logan Square, did just that, working with more than 10,000 artists in a variety of disciplines. However, its 2012 decision to operate at “the scale of the city”—and to fill public spaces with free art—was so ambitious that it outstripped the non-profit’s funding. The city's first Great Chicago Fire Fest, which Redmoon spearheaded, was almost universally considered a big flub when it debuted on the riverfront in 2014.

“Our consolation at this sad moment is that Redmoon is bigger than this non-profit institution,” wrote Jim Lasko, Redmoon’s executive artistic director, in an email to the theater’s supporters. “It is a spirit that survives us... It is a memory sown into each of the sites that have hosted us. Most of all, we are consoled that Redmoon's mission to celebrate and uplift community is a shared concern powering amazing, if under-recognized, activity all over this great city.”

To remember the good times, read our write-up of this year’s Chicago Fire Fest, complete with an epic, flame-filled photo gallery.