Where the Future Came From

Chicago is distinctive as a longstanding hub for artist-run culture. Where the Future Came From expands upon previous research into this realm by focusing on the work of women and women-identified makers and their collective efforts from the late-nineteenth century to the present. Active contributors to the city’s thriving art scene throughout its history, these artists have long defined how we create and organize collaborative work.This book documents a 2018-2019 participatory exhibition and related programming at Columbia College Chicago’s Glass Curtain Gallery. In addition to a chronology of nearly 50 artist-run spaces and projects spanning from 1880 to 2019, this volume shares presentations and essays by 30 artists, organizers, curators, and historians that offer personal as well as scholarly accounts of feminist cultural work, much of which has not been chronicled before. Where the Future Came From reveals a dynamic continuum of practices in Chicago’s artist-run culture, shaping a