Lumpen (1990 – present)
Our longest-running project, Lumpen Magazine is a news and culture magazine featuring the work of emerging and established artists and writers. It features editorials, interviews, and reviews focused on current events and emerging cultural trends. Published monthly until 1998, it is now quarterly.
Quarantine Times
The Quarantine Times is an expanded publication project designed by Public Media Institute and partners to provide direct pandemic support to creative workers in Chicago, via the commission of new works.
Launched in March 2020, the initiative intends, first and foremost, to get funds quickly into the hands of precarious community members. It also exists to commission, disseminate, and archive work that documents the lives and reactions of Chicago artists in this historic moment. Lastly, it holds our communities together around daily prompts and conversations, even as we can’t physically gather.
The project will compile all artists’ online contributions into a physical publication and released at a celebratory gathering, when we can finally be together again.
The Quarantine Times is organized through the model of a newspaper or daily feed and has multiple outlets on the web, social media, and over the radio via WLPN 105.5 FM.