Adam Brooks
Born 1959, New York, New York
Lives and works in Chicago, Illinois and Somerset, England
Selected Exhibitions and Performances, both solo and as Industry of the Ordinary (IOTO)
Ongoing
http://www.industryoftheordinary.com
2025
Materialities, Driehaus Museum, Chicago, Illinois
2024
Bert Green Fine Art, Chicago, Illinois (IOTO solo exhibition)
Not Just A Pretty Face, Hyde Park Arts Center, Chicago, Illinois (commission)
STNDRD, Granite City, Illinois (IOTO solo exhibition)
2023
Compound Yellow, Oak Park, Illinois (public installation)
2022
Walking Shadow: Abraham Lincoln in the Modern Imagination, Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library, the Springfield Art Association,
and the UIS Visual Arts Gallery, Springfield, Illinois
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow…, Design Museum, Chicago (organized)
Disclaimer, Comfort Station, Chicago, Illinois
To The Fairest, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, Illinois (performance)
2021
Not Just A Pretty Face, Hyde Park Arts Center, Chicago, Illinois (commission)
2020
If you've got a blacklist, I want to be on it, Arts Club of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois (IOTO solo public performance and week-long interventions)
Ordinary Relic, site specific permanent installation, Chicago Transit Authority, Chicago, Illinois
2018
Industry of the Ordinary, Cuesta College, San Luis Obispo, California (IOTO solo show)
Tourist/Refugee & Genuflect, DePaul Art Museum, Chicago, Illinois (IOTO solo installation, performance)
2017
The Subject Is Chicago, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, Illinois
History and Forgetting, Silent/Funny, Chicago, Illinois (IOTO solo performance sculpture and permanent installation for the
City of Chicago Year of Public Art)
2016
Whiskey and Kisses, Denver Art Museum, Denver, Colorado (IOTO solo performance)
The Greenlands Project, Birmingham, England (IOTO solo residency and permanent installation)
Industry of the Ordinary, Antena, Chicago, Illinois (IOTO solo show)
Industry of the Ordinary, Chamber, Milwaukee, Wisconsin (IOTO solo show)
Prayer (for Springfield), Demo projects, Springfield, Illinois (IOTO solo show)
2015
Relative, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, Illinois (IOTO solo performance)
2014
Venetiaanse Gaanderijen, Ostend Pavilion, Ostend, Belgium (project identity and principal image)
Tragedy, Missoula and Bozeman, Montana (IOTO solo performances)
2013
Guns and Butter, UIS Gallery, Springfield, Illinois (IOTO solo show)
2012
Industry of the Ordinary: Sic Transit Gloria Mundi, mid-career survey, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, Illinois (IOTO solo exhibition/residency/series of performances and collaborations, ran until February 2013) http://www.industryoftheordinary.com/html/culturalcenter.html
Memory Over Forgetting, Exposition Chicago opening night performance, Chicago, Illinois
Sight and Sound, Billboard Art Project, Richmond, Virginia
2011
Industry of the Ordinary, Watkins College of Art, Nashville, Tennessee (IOTO solo show)
Wicker Park/Bucktown Mural Project, Chicago, Illinois (long-term installation)
Mash Flob, performance series at Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois
2010
History as Idea, Nebraska State Historical Society, 1% for Art Commission, Lincoln, Nebraska (permanent installation)
2009
Modern Wing Opening, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois (IOTO solo performance)
Super Market, Northeastern Illinois University Gallery, Chicago (IOTO solo show)
Supermarketing, multi-site project in the United States, England, France, Italy and India
2008
12x12, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (IOTO solo show)
Allan Kaprow–Art as Life, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
Journeys, Chicago Public Library Public Art Commission, Chicago, Illinois (permanent installation)
Celebrity and The Peculiar, Gahlberg Gallery, College of DuPage, Illinois (IOTO solo show) (catalog)
2007
Mapping the Self, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago
Imaginary Time, Waterloo Center for the Arts, Waterloo, Iowa (IOTO solo performance)
2006
Ruby Satellite, UCR/California Museum of Photography, Riverside, California
Smoke and Mirrors: Photography and Performance, Ohio University Art Gallery, Athens, Ohio
Takeover, Hyde Park Arts Center, Chicago, Illinois
2005
PAC Edge Performance Festival, Performing Arts Chicago, Athenaeum Theater, Chicago, Illinois
2004
Pulaski Murals, Pulaski Pink Line CTA station, Percent For Art Program project, Chicago, Illinois (permanent public installation)
A More Perfect Union, The Renaissance Society, Chicago, Illinois
2003
Dropping 163 lbs:Daley Plaza, Chicago, Illinois
2001
Contextual, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, Illinois (catalog)
Doppelganger, NIU Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
En Avant, Grita Insam Gallery, Vienna, Austria
2000
Hands and Minds, Salina Art Center, Salina, Kansas (solo show) (catalog)
1999
Summer invitational, Donald Young Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
1998
DeNaturalized, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois (solo show)
1997
Adam Brooks, Robert McClain and Co., Houston, Texas (solo show)
OUT, St. James Cathedral, Chicago, Illinois (permanent public installation)
Gladys Holm Commemorative Project, Children's Memorial Hospital, Chicago, Illinois (permanent public installation)
1996
Second Sight:Printmaking in Chicago, 1935-1995, Block Gallery, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois (catalog)
Drawing in Chicago Now, Columbia College Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
1994
Adam Brooks, Rhona Hoffman Gallery, Chicago, Illinois (solo show)
Adam Brooks, Muranushi Lederman Productions, New York, New York (solo show)
Freedom Wall, Chicago, Illinois (permanent public installation)
1993
Critical Moments, University Galleries, Illinois State University, Normal, Illinois
What You Are About To See Is Real, Muranushi Lederman Productions, Art Chicago, Chicago, Illinois
1992
Adam Brooks, Dart Gallery, Chicago, Illinois (solo show)
1991
Adam Brooks, Abel Joseph Gallery, Chicago, Illinois (solo show)
1990
Designation--Adam Brooks, Iñigo Manglano-Ovalle, Treasure Smith, MoMing Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
Made, Make, Will Make, Prairie Avenue Gallery, Chicago
1989
The Insoluble Partition, EMIT Gallery, Chicago, Illinois (solo show)
Selected Awards:
City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events Grant, 2020, 2017
Illinois Arts Council New Performance Forms Artist Fellowship, 2019, 2006
Illinois Arts Council, Artist Project Grant, 2012
Illinois Humanities Council, 2005
Faculty Development Grant, Columbia College Chicago, 2020, 2018, 2015, 2012, 2005
Illinois Arts Council Visual Arts Fellowship Grant, 1997, 1990
Community Arts Assistance Program Grant, City of Chicago, 2005, 1999, 1996, 1993, 1990
Travel Grant, Museum in Progress, Vienna, Austrian Government, 1993
Selected Collections:
The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago
Bard College, Center for Curatorial Studies Museum, New York
Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, Illinois
Gabriel Mayer, Munich, Germany
Andreas Waldburg-Wolfegg, Chicago, Illinois
Peter Norton, Santa Monica, California
Victoria and Steven Burns, Los Angeles, California