Monopoly, played on the real streets of Chicago
Contributor
Ooh, sometime back last year, a street artist going by the name of Bored apparently took to the streets of Chicago and planted Monopoly-inspired boardgame bits on the pavements — right down to the dice, the player token pieces, and even Chance and Community Chest cards. Wish we were there then.
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Chicago airport hires sheep, donkeys and llamas as lawn care
Contributor
Pilots beware! You’ll now need to keep a sharp eye out for stray sheep, donkeys and llamas when touching down at the Chicago O’Hare Airport. These herds of friendly animals are all part of the new natural lawn care system employed to maintain the 120 acres of airport land. The airport even hired shepherds to keep track […]
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Goats hired to take care of landscaping at Chicago airport
Contributor
If you’re headed to Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport in June, watch out for a herd of, er, goats. Slated to provide “sustainable vegetation management grazing services” in a two-year $100,000 contract awarded to a Chicago-based company, they’ll be grazing on weeds and invasive plants on the 120 acres or so weedy grounds there. The arragement […]
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Stunning photo portraits of Chicago by Jon Damaschke
Reader Find
Jon Damaschke is a Chicago animator-turned-photographer whose work blows us away. He has an incredible vintage aesthetic, which is easy to love, and a unique photographic perspective. Considering how amazing his work is, it’s stunning that he’s only been pursuing photography for a few years.
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Invaders 1938: the debut album from Chicago’s Terrible Spaceship
Reader Find
Chicago’s Terrible Spaceship have just released their debut album, Invaders 1938. The Chicago Tribune says that the band is ‘equally influenced by Danny Elfman, Portishead and Orson and H.G. Welles’. And who are we to disagree.
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Photographs of Chicago warehouse fire encased in ice
Contributor
So this is what fire looks like under single-digit temperatures. An empty warehouse in Chicago was recently ensnared in a massive blaze that had a third of Chicago’s firefighting force spraying water at the scene. They ended up covering affected areas — including surrounding buildings and cars — in ice. Even icicles formed on the fire hoses.
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Colourful urban art by Chicago’s Chris Silva
Reader Find
Being a street artist himself in Chicago, Chris Silva loves to collaborate with people using found objects and colorful murals to create amazing art that reflects its urban setting. Of his work, he says: ‘I am interested in the visually poetic, employ ambiguity in my work and strive to express the essence rather than the details. I see opportunities in accidents, enjoy unusual combinations of materials, the unpredictable outcomes of collaboration and the general adventure of the creative process’.
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Time-lapse video of Chicago cityscape
Reader Find
There is something incredibly familiar and also utterly unique about the flood of timelapse videos we currently see, a complex network of actions all forming an intricate visual ballet. I vote for a channel dedicated to streaming the best of these 24/7, a throwback to the backdrops we used to see on CNN. Like having […]
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Cityscape Chicago: a time-lapse video by Eric Hines
Contributor
Eric Hines, a photographer/time-lapse cinematographer from Indiana, has recently completed a personal time-lapse piece consisting of over 30,000 still photos shot incrementally between July and October this year around downtown Chicago. The Windy City has always been on my list of cities to visit since I can remember, and this video has shown me again […]
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New music by Chicago’s The Sometimes Family
Reader Find
What sets Chicago’s The Sometimes Family apart from other groups in this new soul era is their aim to bring back the vocally driven tune: the collaborative, harmonic group sound. Drawing inspiration from a variety of sources, including the Fifth Dimension, the Staples Singers, the Jackson 5, and the Friends of Distinction, The Sometimes Family […]
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Yearbook: eclectic repurposed designs in Chicago
Reader Find
It’s Sunday. You’re fifteen minutes west of downtown Chicago. And you’ve realized your life is a hollow, empty shell that can only be made right with a desk-top anvil, a sculling oar, and some Foolish Crow Habanero Hot Sauce. Fortunately, you’re also in River Forest, and the newly opened Yearbook has everything you need.
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Best coffee in Chicago? The La Colombe Cafe
Reader Find
Warehouse district! Restaurant corridor! Warehouse district! Restaurant corridor! Either way you look at it, Randolph and Halsted in Chicago is one of the best areas to store your … whatever, or find the newest and best places in the city to eat. But even better than that, you can spend a long and quiet afternoon sipping what is undoubtedly the best coffee you’ve ever tasted served by the friendly and eclectic staff.
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Gallery Provocateur: showing erotic art in Chicago
Reader Find
Chicago used to be well-known for its many small theaters, which offered almost week-long incursions into the arts. But things change, and so does the city. In this case, Gallery Narcisse has transformed (and transported) from one part of the city to another, becoming Gallery Provocateur, voted Best Little Gallery in Chicago 2012. Provocateur, difficult […]
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Chicago’s Bittersweet Cafe serves tasty works of art
Reader Find
Is rap music ‘music’? Is pop art ‘art’? Here’s another insoluble: suppose a pastry chef uses flour, water, sugar, chocolate, frosting, and other yummy fixins to create a cake. When the cake is presented, is it a piece of art?
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Rotofuji Gallery: the funnest place in Chicago
Reader Find
According to Krusty the Klown, the funnest place on Earth is Tijuana. But the funnest place in Chicago is the Rotofugi Gallery. Whether you pronounce is with a hard ‘g’ or a ‘j’, the Rotofugi Gallery is the city’s focal point for all things vinyl toy, low brow, and otherwise disrespectful.
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