Traveling Museum Challenges The Norm By Engaging Communities
The Floating Museum Creates Temporary, Site-Responsive Museum Spaces Highlighting The Cultural Potential Of Each Throughout Chicago’s Neighborhoods
"The river is a backbone of this city and we want to help recast it as a cultural space," explains Jeremiah Hulsebos-Spofford, one of the Co-Directors for Floating Museum. Floating Museum is an arts organization based in Chicago, IL and creates temporary museum spaces throughout the many great neighborhoods in Chicago. They attempt to partner with artists from different communities with cultural institutions such as the Chicago Park District and different museums in the area. For one of their projects, they floated a barge filled with sculptures and exhibitions down the Chicago River.
Floating Museum started with Hulsebos-Spofford and Faheem Majeed, another Co-Director. "We were Grad students at UIC (University of Illinois-Chicago) and started talking about the idea of floating a museum on the river," recalls Hulsebos-Spofford, "This was in 2008-2009. Then we started the organization in 2015." The inspiration for the organization is from the city where they reside - Chicago. "Chicago, like many cities, aggregates a lot of its resources, economically and culturally, to the downtown area. So we starting thinking about having art projects popup in unexpected places and expanding the notion of downtown," he says.
Floating Museum has many associations with the founder of Chicago - Jean Baptiste Point Du Sable, both as an inspiration in their mission as well as their close work with the DuSable Museum in Washington Park on the South Side. "We originally planned the River exhibit as a floating version of the DuSable Museum," Hulsebos-Spofford says, "But ended up adding a lot of original art, too."
Point Du Sable, the man, had the first permanent settlement in Chicago in the 1780s, at the mouth of the Chicago River, and was of African descent. Though not known where he came from, evidence points to him coming from Haiti. He started a trading post, first in what is now Michigan City, Indiana, then moved it to Chicago. He was not recognized as the founder of the city until the 1930s when African-American groups campaigned for him to be honored as the founder. Since that time, he has had several institutions named after him - a school, museum, harbor, park, and a bridge.
The park is an interesting story, which Floating Museum was hoping to add to. In 1987, Mayor Harold Washington, the first Black Mayor of Chicago, announced the park and set the site for just north of Navy Pier on the lake. It is still being developed 30 years later. It was basically sat on for about a decade and then the Chicago Park District planned to lease the land to a parking lot developer. This was received with much condemnation and outcry, so the plan was put on hold. Then a skyscraper development firm was supposed to build a giant skyscraper, called the Spire, on the other side of Lake Shore Drive. They promised to give millions of dollars to developing the park. Unfortunately, the skyscraper was never even close to being finished and left the site with a big hole in the ground (which still is there today), leaving the park to sit as it was.
During this whole fiasco, the park’s land was found to have a contamination of radioactive thorium, left over from a Light company in the early 20th century, which needed to be remediated before a park was built. The land was rectified for millions of dollars in 2012, but the park is still not built. "We were hoping to bring a statue to commemorate the park with our barge," explains Hulsebos-Spofford, "But it didn't happen."
The park may still be on hold for quite some time, but Floating Museum is not- they have initiated and participated in a variety of projects throughout the city. A particularly interesting exhibit was one in collaboration with the Calumet Cultural Center on the southeast side of Chicago. “We worked with the cultural center and Calumet Historical Society to come up with an exhibit,” Hulsebos-Spofford says. Floating Museum found that the historical society had a bunch of really interesting artifacts and information about the steel mills that used to be in the area, basically a rich understanding of labor in Chicago. “They had all this awesome stuff, but no one was coming to see it,” he says, “So we wanted to help them show it.” They ended up making a temporary pavilion and hosted a BBQ. In the pavillion, they displayed artifacts from the historical society. From this, Floating Museum started a collaboration with SkyART, a non-profit that provides free art education to youth. “We started working with them and continue that collaboration today. It really is a great group of artists,” Hulsebos-Spofford says.
So what’s next for Floating Museum? “We are planning a summer exhibit on the Green Line, with temporary galleries along the route,” Hulsebos-Spofford says. The Green Line is a Chicago Transit Authority L train that goes from the south side of the city to the west side. “We think that the “L” is like the river because it is a great way to see the city and it is a public, social space,” he says, “We are really looking forward to it.”
Andrew Malo
A graduate of Northeastern Illinois University in Education, Andrew has taught for the past decade in Chicago, New Mexico, and Japan. He enjoys tinkering with trucks and motorcycles, woodworking, reading and computer programming.
Make Sure To Stay At:
Chicago Northwest KOA, where you can have fun at Donley's Wild West Town next door, visit the Illinois Railway museum, see Santa's Village Azoosment Park, visit Six Flags Great America, cool off at Magic Waters near Rockford or in the their own crystal clear pool.