Author: Rachel Schastok

Hyde Park | Stage & Screen

Enter Hyde Park, Stage Left

Hyde Park makes its debut as setting and protagonist in a full-length film

by 4 years ago

Alchemy

How do we think about the neighborhoods we live in? For many, Hyde Park is an idyllic gem on the lake, a case study in urban renewal, or the hub of 15,000 University of Chicago students’ frenetic energy. For filmmaker and self-declared trans-disciplinary healing artist Robert Beshara, it’s a neighborhood ready for its close-up. The neighborhood serves as both setting and protagonist in his unreleased film, Alchemy in Hyde Park. Continue reading →

Bronzeville

Back on the Stroll

“Mecca Flat Blues” at the Chicago Cultural Center

by 5 years ago
MeccaFlats4

COURTESY CHICAGO CULTURAL CENTER

Early recorded music was all about gears and humidity,” Chicago Cultural Historian Tim Samuelson declared, opening his talk on the “Mecca Flat Blues” exhibit at the Chicago Cultural Center last week. Continue reading →

Hyde Park | Music | Queer

Getting Vocal

A Hyde Park band places gender issues in the spotlight

by 5 years ago

SlurpsUp

Gene Cochrane and Kalil Smith-Nuevelle call themselves “gender politicians.” The two UofC students met last spring at a coffee shop where Cochrane was working, and quickly began friends and then bandmates. Now known as Slurp’s Up, the duo is more than eager to jump into discussions of radical gender politics with their newly released debut album, “Text Me When You Get This.” Continue reading →

Bronzeville | Lit

An Oral History of the Projects

In Bronzeville, author Audrey Petty keeps listening

by 5 years ago
JULIEN LALLEMAND

JULIEN LALLEMAND

“I come to you as a student, not as an expert or a scholar,” Audrey Petty declared, opening a panel discussion of her new book, “High Rise Stories.” The book tells the stories of several residents of Chicago’s now-demolished high-rise housing projects. In both her book and her talk, Petty, an associate professor of creative writing at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, sought to portray the impact the Chicago Housing Authority’s Plan For Transformation has had on real people. For many of those gathered at the Bronzeville Visitor Information Center last Friday night, this immensely controversial program, which has brought about the demolition of high-rise projects and the relocation—or displacement—of thousands of residents, is a deeply personal source of anger and pain.