Exhibitions & Collections
Illinois Art Station boasts a premier gallery space for the exhibition of artworks created by IAS young artists and guest artists whose work inspires children, youth, & their families. Exhibits rotate roughly every 6 weeks. See below for more information on our current and past exhibitions!
Current Exhibition
We Are The Latinos en BloNo: Nuestras historias en palabras y fotograf
September 16 – November 4, 2023
Over time, Yolanda Alonso has learned why the Latino community was often not connected or involved in the place they now live. Latinos en BloNo seeks to establish a bridge for the Latino community and become an effective tool to help overcome the culture shock of living in a place with a different language and culture.
In January 2023, Latinos en BloNo began a new phase of publication by sharing serial interviews in three parts to meet and recognize outstanding Latinos in the region with the slogan: We Are the Latinos en BloNo. The interviews allow us to learn from the interviewees’ migration stories and their experiences in a new country as well as everything that comes with it: language, customs, food, and different activities.
Now, thanks to the space provided by Illinois Art Station, the interviews have gone from digital to physical publication. We will continue to share amazing stories from the Latino community through the Latinos en BloNo project through words and photographs. We Are The Latinos en BloNo: Our Stories in Words & Photographs.
Latinos en BloNo es un blog en Instagram y Facebook. Un proyecto que nació en Abril 2022 con la idea de ser un puente para la comunidad latina de Bloomington-Normal, Illinois.
Con el paso del tiempo, Yolanda pudo conocer numerosas razones por las que la comunidad latina no logra conectar muchas de las ocasiones en el lugar que ahora vive, por lo que Latinos en BloNo busca ser un puente para la comunidad latina y una herramienta efectiva que ayude a superar el ‘shock cultural’ que supone vivir en un lugar con un idioma y cultura diferente.
En enero 2023 Latinos en BloNo inició una nueva etapa al compartir entrevistas seriadas en tres partes para conocer y reconocer a latinos destacados de la región con el slogan: “We Are The Latinos en BloNo”. Las entrevistas han permitido aprender de las historias de migración de los entrevistados y su experiencia en un país nuevo con todo lo que eso conlleva: idioma, costumbres, alimentos y actividades diferentes.
Las entrevistas ahora han pasado de la publicación digital a la física gracias al espacio que nos brindó Illinois Art Station, para seguir compartiendo con la comunidad el proyecto de Latinos en BloNo y las historias de su comunidad con la exposición: We Are the Latinos en BloNo: Our Stories in Words & Photographs. (We Are the Latinos en BloNo: Nuestras historias en palabras y fotografías).
Past Exhibitions
Things Are Art, Too!
August 5 – September 9, 2023
Summer at Illinois Art Station is a beautifully busy time for all ages. As educators, we hope to teach our friends and visitors how to grow and develop through the arts. And as young artists, we hope that you learn how to navigate your world through the visual arts and make it special as only an artist can.
We spent time Summer 2023 thinking about how artists help design the things we use and utilize every day — and then reenvisioning how we create and interact with them.
ARTerrarium
June 24 – July 29, 2023
Welcome to the Illinois Art Station ARTerrarium, IAS’s newest immersive and interactive exhibit!
Have you heard of a terrarium before? Terrariums are little glass homes for small plants that are far from their natural habitats. They can be a great way to grow several small plants from the same ecosystem in a way that we can enjoy them with minimal extra care.
There are two main types of terrariums. Our ARTerrarium is an Open Terrarium that needs you and your young artists to help take care of its artastic self.
Visit Illinois Art Station any Saturday through July 29 during Saturdays at the Station to gently and lovingly move, make, and shape our gallery-sized ARTerrarium in your own vision.
#3YearsIn3Lines: A Resiliency Collective Project
May 6 – June 17, 2023
Illinois Art Station invites you to experience its newest community-curated exhibit and program series, #3YearsIn3Lines: A Resiliency Collective Project.
Sponsored by Illinois Humanities, and produced by Illinois Association of Museums (IAM) and NAMI Illinois, the Resiliency Collective was initiated to invite the public to participate in humanities-focused dialogue about mental health topics.
Illinois Art Station (Normal), alongside Casa Michoacán (Chicago, West Chicago, Carbondale), and the West Chicago City Museum (West Chicago), welcome you to our virtual and physical spaces throughout the month of May 2023 to process, observe, and express in a creative, supportive space.
#3YearsIn3Lines is the contribution of Illinois Art Station and its McLean County partners (including Creative Healing Art Therapy, Just Words Consulting Group, LLC, and the Department of Psychology at Illinois State University) to the Resiliency Collective.
#3YearsIn3Lines is a continuation of the regional collecting efforts of the McLean County Museum of History and its community partners to capture and curate the pandemic experiences of McLean County residents. #3YearsIn3Lines asks statewide participants to reflect on their pandemic experiences, create works of art (both visual and written) inspired by those experiences, and contribute those visual and written works to this collecting and exhibiting project. Artworks submitted may be included and/or featured in the exhibition at Illinois Art Station from May – June 2023. Submissions by McLean County residents may be archived in perpetuity by the McLean County Museum of History at the discretion of staff as part of its COVID-19: The McLean County Experience collection.
Those wishing to contribute to the project can submit their artworks and works of poetry at bit.ly/3YearsIn3LinesSubmission or bit.ly/3Years3Linesespañol
Residents throughout McLean County and the State of Illinois are invited to attend a virtual #3YearsIn3Lines: A Collective Artmaking Experience workshop on Thursday, May 18 from 6:00-7:30 p.m. CST. Registration is required for this FREE to attend, public Zoom program. Adults, older adults, teens, and families are welcome to participate. Register today at: bit.ly/3YearsIn3LinesVirtualWorkshop
Spread Love, Not Germs: An Exhibit of Love for Essential People
March 25 – April 22, 2023
Essential Workers are people who do critically important jobs that help other people live their lives. These workers are Doctors, Nurses, Pharmacists, Caregivers, Farmers, Grocery Store Staff, Delivery Drivers, and others we rely on to feed and take care of us.
Countless Essential Workers work hard every day to help keep us healthy and safe as they risk their own health and safety to do their jobs.
Though we can never thank these people enough for the work they do, one small token of appreciation was a worldwide art installation that brought everyone together at a time when we needed to stay apart and showed our Essential Workers how thankful we were for everything that they did and still do for us.
The Hearts in the Window movement began in March 2020 in Prince George, British Columbia, Canada when a woman named Bailey Grose started a community-wide scavenger hunt. She first asked a few families to participate, but within three days she received photos from more than 700 families eager to show love for their neighbors and Essential Workers everywhere. Bailey’s Hearts in the Window idea went “viral” and spread all over the world as a way to share messages of hope, gratitude, and love during unprecedented times.
GUEST @ IAS: A Home For Monstars by Starlight-Jaxsun of Monster Girl Brigade
February 18 – March 11, 2023
Be our GUEST!
Illinois Art Station welcomes artist Starlight-Jaxsun (they/them) of Monster Girl Brigade as our first GUEST artist of 2023! A Home For Monstars is a show about identity and self expression through loving oneself. It’s about magic, monsters, love, and a home each of us carries in our hearts.
“I’ve always viewed my art as a diary,” says Starlight-Jaxsun. “I create pieces that are colorful, eye catching, monstrous. Pieces that will draw in as many people as possible through the use of color, subject matter, and humor lots of time. I use bold, neon, vivid colors to combat social injustices, personal trauma, and as a bridge. I want my work to help at least one other person out there that’s feeling similar or how I did in my past. I want it to be a bridge back to their own self for that person. A bridge of realization that they aren’t alone in their feelings.”
Follow Starlight-Jaxsun on IG @monstergirlbrigade
Itsy Arts On Location: The Exhibit
January 7 – February 11, 2023
Itsy Arts On Location (formerly Itsy Studio: In the Community) is Illinois Art Station’s longest running program. This early learning, outreach series has traveled to libraries and schools around Bloomington-Normal since 2018 – as long as IAS has been offering community education – to provide transformative, hands-on experiences in the visual arts to our youngest artists and families.
From Fall 2019 through Spring 2022, Itsy Arts On Location was offered in partnership with PNC Grow Up Great® and supported by funds granted by the PNC Foundation.*
In that time, IAS educators and researchers visited Brigham Early Learning Center (Unit 5), Sarah Raymond School of Early Education (District 87), and Heartland Head Start to facilitate art making lessons focused on the exploration of six major emotions: Happy, Sad, Mad, Excited, Surprised, & Calm. Between the three sites of early learning, IAS art educators engaged weekly with more than 400 three- to four-year-olds in 2019-21 (excepting peak COVID in 2020-21) and almost 200 four-year-olds in 2021-22.
Itsy Arts On Location: The Exhibit was displayed at Normal Public Library from December 16 – 31, 2022.
String Theory
November 19 – December 31, 2022
String theory isn’t only for physicists. Here at Illinois Art Station, we have a theory too. Art is at its best when people feel connected to it. One way to feel connected to art is to look at it. Another way to feel connected to art is to make it. In this collaborative installation exhibit, you get to do both! Will you help us create an interwoven artwork that connects us all?!
Aniversario de Papel / Paper Anniversary
23 de septiembre – 29 de octubre de 2022
Del 15 de septiembre al 15 de octubre, celebramos las culturas, contribuciones y la creatividad de las comunidades latinx,* hispanas y latinas/o/e-identificativas de todo el mundo. Lo que hoy conocemos como el Mes de la Herencia Hispana-Latina se alinea con los aniversarios de independencia de varias naciones latinoamericanas. Para celebrar el aniversario de papel (1 año) de IAS y nuestra colaboración con Conexiones Latinas del Condado de McLean, ¡les presentamos esta exhibición de papel inspirada en el arte!
From September 15 to October 15, we celebrate the cultures, contributions, and creativity of Latinx,* Hispanic, and Latino/a/e-identifying communities around the world. What we know today as Hispanic-Latinx Heritage Month aligns with the independence anniversaries of several Latin American nations. In celebration of IAS’s paper (1 year) anniversary and our collaboration with Conexiones Latinas de McLean County, we present to you this paper art-inspired exhibit!
*Illinois Art Station usa “Latinx” además de Hispano y Latino/a/e para representar las identidades de género no binario, no conforme, y las personas que amplían el género, así como las vidas de las personas indígenas, brasileñas y otras personas que no hablan español.
*Illinois Art Station uses “Latinx” in addition to Hispanic and Latino/a/e to represent the identities of non-binary, gender non-conforming, and gender-expansive people, as well as the lives of Indigenous, Brazilian, and other non-Spanish speaking people.
We Need a Bigger Boat
June 25 – August 13, 2022
During the week of June 13-17, 2022 local youth from the ages of 6 to 16 were invited to participate in an Empowerment Through Art Camp here at Illinois Art Station. The goal of this camp was to provide participating youth with an opportunity for self-expression through the visual arts. In that week, campers explored the art of Mark Bradford and Bethany Collins and many more practicing and past artists. We Need a Bigger Boat was inspired by Bradford’s Mithra (2008) and Collin’s practice of erasure poetry. Empowerment Through Art Camp was made possible by the Illinois Prairie Community Foundation Mirza Arts & Culture Grant.
Stuck Together!
May 4, 2022 – June 8, 2022
Stuck Together is a collaborative installation. This means more than one artist contributes to the final artwork and it is created for the space in which it is located. So, who are the artists in Stuck Together? You are!
IAS Art Educator Showcase
November 10 – December 31, 2021
Featuring artworks created by IAS art educators as part of their lesson planning process, this exhibition highlights the important work of our art education team and their artistic talents.
Featured Exhibitions
Designing Discoveries
October 27 – December 18, 2022 at University Galleries at Illinois State University.
Designing Discoveries, celebrating 40 years of Design Streak Studio at ISU, featured the branding created by Design Streak Studio students and faculty for Illinois Art Station in 2018.
Design Streak Studio is a research based social innovation lab focused on human-centered service design. It strives to facilitate an interdisciplinary environment promoting discovery, and experimentation engaging in experiential and service learning. In collaboration with various organizations, Design Streak Studio-lab combines the process of design thinking and making — conducting ethnographic research and collecting quantitative data to create new and authentic solutions to society’s complex problems. The studio-lab is committed to producing solutions of exceptional quality, and embracing design aesthetics to find a balance between form and function. Each project is valued for providing long term sustainability with a strong emphasis on morality and social justice.
Virtual Exhibitions
Fear + Comfort
October 5 – November 21, 2021
Teen artists in IAS’s fall 2021 Arts in Action program examined their personal fears as well as those things that bring them comfort. The works of art in Fear + Comfort are a reflection on these examinations.
