Crain's has a very interesting article in today's edition that details the depth of the struggles currently being wrestled by the Field Museum; the headline "Evolve or Die" is a nice and fitting touch to the story. more ›

The long-delayed Museum of Broadcast Communications is nearing completion. No, really. Steve Dahlman of Marina City Online has posted an update on the progress of the 62,000-square-foot facility at State and Kinzie, including a model of the finished museum. more ›

Okay, so it's not even March yet, but the major spring-summer museum exhibits are already on view. Here are a few we think you won't want to miss: more ›

The Art Institute has put together a stellar exhibit with John Marin's Watercolors: A Medium for Modernism, and Marin’s work is surprising on both planes. He defies traditional watercolor methods to produce paintings that are radical, colorful testimonies to the urban architecture of New York City, the craggy shorelines and pine trees of Maine, and the mountainous forms of New Mexico. The New York paintings are extraordinary—the buildings and trees sway together like dancers, no small achievement for a painter who had no formal training in watercolors. Marin’s exuberance comes through both in painting and in word: “There come days when I am glad to be alive and just to see the wonderful city in its different aspects and then say I will! I will! I will!” more ›

The Sun-Times reports that attendance at area museums and zoos was down 3 percent over 2009. Which probably explains the spate of free days that kicked off 2011 at the Art Institute and other museums. more ›

The Field Museum is getting into the spirit of Bears-Packers III. They've bathed the outside of the museum in orange and blue, to show their support for the Monsters of the Midway Sunday. more ›

We’ve mentioned this Museum of Contemporary Art exhibit before, but finally got a chance to check it out this weekend. And we’re sorry we waited this long. Vito Acconci, the artist who created the exhibit’s Convertible Clam Shelter, puts the exhibit’s philosophy succinctly: “A piece should be inhabitable, used by people the way they use other things in their everyday life…” Taking up the two galleries on the main floor, Without You I’m Nothing: Art and Audience explores the relationship between art and artist with provocative works from the permanent collection. Some of the art is physically interactive (like a pre-fab-style compartment you can walk through), and some of it invites more contemplative engagement. Each work’s label sets the boundaries, inviting you to walk through it or climb inside it or move it around. We’re so accustomed to museums’ hands-off policies that we actually had to walk around the gallery a couple times before we got comfortable enough to dig in, and we noticed other visitors who were just as tentative about touching/walking on/traipsing through some of the art. We love how the MCA is challenging our ingrained beliefs that art is something to be viewed, not experienced. more ›

Grab a pen and paper, crimestoppers. The Art Institute is doing some shuffling of its free admission days, away from the free weekday admissions through Feb. 4 they announced earlier this week. more ›

Hey, all you art-loving crimestoppers! The Art Institute of Chicago is stepping 2K11 off on the right foot by waiving admission fees for the month of January. more ›

Whether you love spending time with your family or need to get them out of the house (or both), today’s a great day to take (or send) your out-of-town visitors to one of Chicago’s museums. There are some great exhibits showing, so skip Black Friday and work off your tryptophan hangover with some culture. While we think the crowds will be a lot more pleasant at the Art Institute than the mall, this is a busy day for museums, so plan accordingly. more ›

If you're planning on heading to the Museum of Science and Industry for the Jim Henson exhibition, you'll also be brought into the early holiday spirit with their annual "Christmas Around the World & Holidays of Light" exhibit. The centerpiece, a 45-foot tall tree in the Rotunda, is decorated with over 30,000 lights, 1,000 ornaments and surrounded by over 50 smaller trees decorated by volunteers to reflect Christmas traditions in other countries. more ›

Yesterday, Chicagoist sat down (virtually) with Kate McGroarty, the winner of MSI's Month at the Museum contest. Karl had already bothered her for the podcast, but we wanted to know more details about how you eat when you're stuck living in a museum! Is she stuck eating from the food court? What about (horrors) a month without booze? more ›

The "First Fridays" events at the Museum of Contemporary Art are usually themed affairs that also double as one of the more popular meet markets in town. more ›

Last week we brought you some not-to-be-missed museum exhibits that are closing this week. This week we’re rounding up a few exhibits that are kicking off the fall season. Rest up over Labor Day weekend and then add these to your calendar: more ›

The Art Institute’s Matisse exhibit is beautifully spare and concise - white walls, no visual distractions - and in many ways echoes the art itself. Subtitled Radical Invention 1913-1917, the works in this exhibit were created at the height of World War I, and many of them bear the fervor and darkness of war, painted in shades of olive greens and murky grays not typically associated with Matisse. The exhibit was built upon a key painting already in the Art Institute’s collection, Bathers by a River, named by Matisse himself as being “most pivotal” to his work. more ›

With admission prices creeping toward $20, we understand if you've put off checking out the Art Institute's Modern Wing. But no more excuses: for the entire month of February, the Art Institute is free. more ›

And now for some good news: the city's museums saw a seven percent increase in 2009 over 2008 as 14.8 million people visited 14 Chicago-area museums and zoos in 2009. Tops was the Shedd Aquarium - which got a bounce from its revamped Oceanarium - with 1.9 million visitors. The Art Institute saw a huge bounce of 32 percent for a total of 1.8 million visitors, the new Modern Wing overcoming any negative reaction to the new admission fee hike. And the MSI, which also had a small admissions hike, had 1.6 million visitors, buoyed by the Harry Potter and You! exhibits. The Field Museum was the other museum to break the million visitor barrier with 1.3 million. Meanwhile, according to the Museums in the Park press release, the Lincoln Park Zoo welcomed an estimated 3 million visitors while the Brookfield Zoo had 2.2 million visitors. [CBS 2] more ›

On a damp, chilly afternoon in Skokie, an estimated 12,000 people packed a tent on the grounds of the new Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center for the new museum's official opening. The first of its kind in the Midwest, Illinois' Holocaust museum is also likely the last built with the input of Holocaust survivors. The day included performances by hip-hop violinist Miri Ben-Ari and Soul Children of Chicago, as well as speeches from numerous people involved with the creation of the museum, including Holocaust survivor and museum president Samuel R. Harris, Skokie mayor George Van Dusen and Executive Director Richard Hirschhaut. J.B. Pritzker, the museum's capital campaign chairman, served as MC for the afternoon. more ›

The Shedd Aquarium, as part of their Community Discount Days, is offering free admission for the rest of this week! From February 16th through the 20th, visitors get in to the main exhibit galleries free . Entrance to the Wild Reef exhibit (which is excellent, by the way) is available at a discounted rate. We're guessing that the Shedd might be trying to drive up their attendance, since the Oceanarium is closed until June of this year. In combination with the Art Institute letting visitors in for free every day in February, it’s a very good month for museum-goers on a budget. more ›

A Jackson 5 museum is in the preliminary planning stages in Gary, but it got a visibility boost after patriarch Joe Jackson announced his support for the project yesteray. So far, there's no groundbreaking date and no timeline for completion. In other words, people are sort of talking about maybe doing a museum or something. The proposed museum would be built near I-80 on city-owned property, and might include the Jackson family's old house. more ›

Eco-friendly advancements are being made in building design and construction—think sustainable materials, efficiency of resources, and energy-reducing wiring and appliances. If this topic interests you, the new Smart Home: Green + Wired exhibit, opening tomorrow at the Museum of Science and Industry, is a neat opportunity to learn more about green buildings. more ›

Oh my god, nerdgasm. The MSI is planning a 40-foot artificial tornado that visitors can stand in. Dibs! Those bad boys don't come cheap, though. The Museum announced its plan for the 'nado as part of its $205 million fund-raising effort. So far, the MSI has raised $128 million, according to its press release. more ›

A new exhibit at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago sheds light on the looting and destruction of Iraqi artifacts in the wake of the Fall of Sadaam. Catastrophe! The Looting and Destruction of Iraq’s Past, opened yesterday, the five year anniversary of the Fall of Baghdad, and continues through the end of the year. The exhibit focuses not only on the well-publicized looting of the Iraq Museum, but on the continued looting of these artifacts as well as the damage done to historical and archaeological sites from the ongoing war and what can be done to save them. more ›

Oh man, we almost forgot about the Children's Museum debate! Luckily, Alderman Brendan Reilly wants to keep it front and center, which is why he sent the Museum a list of 24 possible places it could relocate that aren't Grant Park: more ›

We loved the Museum of Science and Industry even prior to having our kid (the submarine! the Omnimax! Clarence Darrow’s ghost!), but MSI’s "Idea Factory" is, arguably, the best kid-centered exhibit in Chicago. Since the museum has closed this exhibit for repairs until the end of March, we wondered how toddler-friendly the rest of the museum would be. In short, not much. more ›

The Museum of Science and Industry is raising its prices. Adult Chicago residents will now pay $12 (up from $10), adult non-Chicagoans $13 (from $11), Chicago children $8.50 ($6.25), non-Chicago children $9 ($7), Chicago seniors $11 ($8.75), and non-Chicago seniors $12 ($9.50). more ›

The Shedd Aquarium is free through Friday, and Chicagoist can’t think of a more mesmerizing place to take your kids. more ›

The Museum of Science and Industry announced today that a fully-functional, three-story "green" home will be built just east of the museum on its Jackson Park grounds in Hyde Park this spring. The foundation is currently being laid, and it will be open to the public from May 8, 2008 through January 4, 2009. The 2,500-square-foot home will exhibit some of the latest environmentally-friendly technologies and offer a primer on incorporating these innovations into our homes. more ›

The biggest cultural stories of 2008 are likely less predictable than this week’s Rose Bowl. Every year we see our share of breakout artists and surprising storefront gems, and 2008 promises to be no different. But 2007 left some unfinished business and we’re eager to see how these stories play out: more ›