Theater and opera houses
Chicago Shakespeare Theater
Located on Marine Pear, this theater specializes in William Shakespeare’s plays. The theater company is quite active and offers more than 500 performances a year. No wonder, because the Chicago Shakespeare Theater is the largest employer for actors in Chicago. The performance area at the Navy Pier has 2 stages with a seating capacity of 500 or 200 seats.
| Contact | 800 East Grand Avenue Chicago, Illinois 60611 www.chicagoshakes.com |
Goodman Theater in Chicago
This theater company was founded in 1925 and has been part of life in Chicago since then. The Goodman Theater is the oldest still active theater in Chicago. The Goodman Theater is known for both modern and classic pieces. The venues for the Goodman Theater are the Harris and Selwyn Theaters in The Loop. They were built in 1922 and later used as a cinema before being used again as a theater from 2000.
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| Contact | 170 North Dearborn Street Chicago, Illinois 60601 www.goodmantheatre.org |
Civic Opera House in Chicago
This opera house is home to the Lyric Opera of Chicago, which is considered one of the best in the country. The opera house, which opened in 1929, is built in Art Deco style and initially makes visitors who are used to European opera houses somewhat alienated, as the Civic Opera House is more like a high-rise building.
| Contact | 20 North Wacker Drive Chicago, Illinois 60606 www.lyricopera.org |
Museums and exhibitions
Art Institute of Chicago
The Art Institute of Chicago is not only an art museum but also an art college in the city of Chicago and was founded in 1866. The museum’s exhibits are housed in several buildings, of which the oldest on South Michigan Avenue. It was used as a convention center for the world exhibition as early as 1893. The museum’s collection is huge and it would be impossible to show all works of art at the same time. The collection spans 5 millennia and includes over 300,000 works of art and culture from almost all parts of the world.
So visitors can find almost everything from Chinese bronze art, African ivory carvings, ancient Roman, Greek and Egyptian works of art to more modern masterpieces. However, the museum has earned the greatest reputation with its collection of impressionists and post-impressionists. The highlights of the museum are certainly works by Pablo Picasso, Georgia O’Keeffe, Jackson Pollock, Andy Warhol, Claude Monet, Paul Gauguin, Paul Cézanne, Rembrandt van Rijn and Vincent van Gogh. From 1917, Walt Disney studied at the art college in night courses.
| Contact | 111 South Michigan Avenue Chicago, Illinois, 60603 www.artic.edu |
Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) in Chicago
The Museum of Contemporary Art in the city of Chicago was founded in 1967 and is one of the leading museums in terms of quality and quantity for contemporary art throughout the United States. The building of the Museum of Contemporary Art was designed by the German architect Josef Paul Kleihues. The building alone is worth seeing, especially the staircase installation. The museum’s collection focuses on the period after 1945 and exhibits works of art by Francis Bacon, Joseph Beuys, Christo, Claes Oldenburg, Andy Warhol and Bruce Nauman on an exhibition area of 3,600 m².
| Kontakt | 220 East Chicago Avenue Chicago, Illinois 60611 www.mcachicago.org |
Ernest Hemingway Museum in Oak Park
The Ernest Hemingway Museum in the city of Oak Park is a museum dedicated to the life and work of Ernest Hemingway. The museum is located in the Oak Park Arts Center and is just minutes from the birthplace of the writer Ernest Hemingway. The Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winner also spent his youth here. Despite its rather distant relationship with the residents of Oak Park, the city still honors the writer here today. In the museum there are all sorts of “devotional objects” such as a Corona 3 typewriter that Hemingway used.
| Contact | 200 North Oak Park Avenue Oak Park, Illinois 60302 www.ehfop.org |
Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center in Skokie
The Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center in Skokie, a suburb of Chicago, is the most important museum of its kind in the Midwest. The museum, which today has an exhibition area of approximately 20,000 m², was founded in 1981 in response to an attempt by a neo-Nazi parade in Skokie. Since 1999 the museum has been in a new building, the architecture of which alone is worth seeing. In addition to films from survivors of the Second World War, works of art about genocides around the world are shown here, which make you think.
| Contact | 9603 Woods Drive Skokie, Illinois 60077 www.Illinoisholocaustmuseum.org |
Shea’s Gas Station Museum in Springfield
The Shea’s Gas Station Museum in Springfield is located on historic Route 66 and is actually a gas station that is no longer in operation. This is where petrol pumps and signs from the old Route 66 are exhibited. Due to the large collection period, the museum revives the feeling of the past and preserves the freedom of Route 66.
| Contact | 2075 North Peoria Road Springfield, Illinois 62702 |
Chicago Cultural Center
The Chicago Cultural Center is a cultural and art center. The Chicago Cultural Center building was built from 1893 to 1897 in a neoclassical style. It used to be the city’s central library, but nowadays changing exhibitions take place here. The interior of the Chicago Cultural Center is architecturally very interesting and reminds of Venice in some places. A replica of the assembly hall of the Doge’s Palace in Venice can be found here.
| Contact | 78 E. Washington Street Chicago, Illinois 60602 |
Monuments and memorials
Black Hawk State Historic Site in Rock Island
The Black Hawk State Historic Site in the city of Rock Island in northeastern Illinois is a state park located on the site of the former Saukenuk Indian settlement. This is also the birthplace of the famous Indian warrior Black Hawk, who fought on the British side against the Americans in the 1812 war and was also active in the 1832 Black Hawk War against the Americans.
The John Hauberg Museum of Native American Life is also in the park. The museum opened in 1939 and represents the history of the Sauk and Meskwaki tribes. The museum is considered one of the largest museums dedicated to the history of the Indians. Of course, this museum also tells the tragic story of the chief Black Hawk and his tribe.
| Contact | 1510 46th Ave. Rock Island, Illinois 61201 www.blackhawkpark.org |
Monument with Standing Beast in Chicago
The Monument with Standing Beast in the city of Chicago is a sculpture by the artist Jean Dubuffet from 1984. The sculpture is located opposite the Chicago City Hall. The sculpture is made of fiberglass and has a height of almost 9 m. It weighs over 9 tons. The style of the sculpture mixes with modern urban influences such as graffiti.
| Contact | 100 W Randolph St Chicago, Illinois 60601 |
