Art at the Center

Weary Blues

Visitors to the Center’s Café will have the opportunity to experience Weary Blues . The piece is a look at resilience, beauty, and the power of abstract forms translated into silkscreen panels on fabric. The work is named after the iconic Langston Hughes poem and carries forward a legacy of Black creative expression. 

Museum | Cafe 

City of the Big Shoulders

Bradford’s City of the Big Shoulders is a monumental painting enveloping the 3-story west wall of the Our Story Atrium in the Museum. The painting maps Chicago through an embrace of fragmentation and perspective, collapsing landscape into memory and compressing history into a story of pressure, power, survival, and hope.

Museum | Our Story Atrium 

Be the Change!

Tyanna J. Buie’s Be the Change! is a large installation that uses screen-printed images and hand-applied ink. The art, initially inspired by President Obama’s first election, focuses on themes of hope, change, and the importance of civic engagement. Buie's piece was influenced by her own memory of participating in Chicago’s annual Bud Billiken Parade as a young adult, standing with a group supporting "Obama for Senate."

Forum | Democracy in Action Lounge

This Land, Shared Sky (in collaboration with Marie Watt)

This Land, Shared Sky is a multimedia textile installation between artists Nick Cave and Marie Watt. This dynamic piece unites Native and Black traditions through beaded nets and jingle elements. Cave, best known for his soundscapes, will incorporate textiles with elements of movement and sound.

Museum | Main Lobby

Hem of Heaven

Durrett's Hem of Heaven is a vibrant reimagining of Harriet Tubman’s shawl. The freestanding sculpture is made from thousands of handmade, ceramic tiles, intricately woven together to symbolize strength, community, and collective effort.

Forum | Harriet Tubman Courtyard

Memory Landscape (Nairobi, Chicago, Honolulu, Jakarta), 2025

Finch’s Memory Landscape (Nairobi, Chicago, Honolulu, Jakarta), 2025   is a tile wall mural installation inspired by memories of places from President Obama's formative years. The colors for each location, including Honolulu, Jakarta, Chicago, and Nairobi, were selected personally by President Obama. 

Forum | Lower Lobby 

To See What They Could See

Gate’s piece, created in honor of Hadiya Pendleton—a 15-year-old Chicago student who marched in President Obama’s second inauguration parade and was tragically killed a week later due to gun violence— stands as a symbol of community, strength, and civic action. Gates’s installation reflects on the power of collective resilience and honors the everyday individuals whose lives and practices sustain and enshrine movements for justice and change. 

Forum | Hadiya Pendleton Atrium

Quintessence

Heikes’ Quintessence is a group of seven-pointed bronze stars placed on one of the outer courtyard walls. The artwork shows the many sides of American identity and asks people to think deeply as the sun shines and moves across the rough surfaces of the stars.

Courtyard 1

Book Bird 

Sculptor Richard Hunt, shaped by his life on Chicago’s south side and role in the Civil Rights Movement, explored the meaning of freedom over his career. Book Bird, his final work, captures a bird bursting from the pages of an open book, evoking the freedom found in reading and learning. Before his passing, Hunt hoped that people would see the piece “as something that encapsulates the progress one can make through reading and study.”

Library | Library Reading Garden

The Balance of Power 

All Together

All Together , a large digital mural, shows 11 thematic scenes made from thousands of small dots. Each dot symbolizes the journey from individual to collective action and the ripple effect of democratic participation. Together, they show the beauty that can come from working together to create change.

Museum | Level 3 Democracy 101 Gallery

Museum | Level 5 Imagine Your Impact

Sky of Hope 

Sky of Hope is a massive ceiling painting that overlaps thousands of hand-stamped words. Each word comes from a speech President Obama gave honoring Civil Rights leaders. Layers of stamps create a burst of color above, turning the room itself into part of the artwork.

Museum | Sky Room 

Pass it Forward (in collaboration with Dorian Sylvain) 

Artist Sam Kirk has partnered with Dorian Sylvain on a collaborative mural that celebrates the cultural legacies of Chicago's South Side, blending vibrant narrative imagery and community history to honor the neighborhoods that shaped the Obama family. Born and raised on the South Side, Kirk’s public art practice shares a longstanding commitment to creating art that honors community power and collective imagination. 

Home Court | Main Court

Seeing Through the Universe

Lin, one of President Obama’s favorite artists, has created the stunning Seeing Through the Universe , a stone sculptural water feature. The sculpture is an upright oculus piece that mists, and a flat “pebble” piece that fills with water and cascades over.  

Outdoor Grounds | Ann Dunham Water Terrace

The Cool Blue Wind 

Weem’s The Cool Blue Wind is a photographic collage printed on silver and gold metallic paper accompanied by original music. The images in collage reference Obama’s historic 2008 victory and the freedom found in the organized improvisational nature of jazz. The associated soundtrack, centers jazz, collective memory, and democratic participation.

Museum | Sky Room Vista

Uprising of the Sun

Ethiopian-American artist Julie Mehretu created a monumental installation on the Museum's north side. Incorporating many styles, Uprising of the Sun is a stirring response to President Obama’s speech at the 50th anniversary of the Selma march. Her work invites us to look through layers of glass, just as we look through layers of history, to truly see how change happens.

Museum | Exterior of the Museum

Reading Circles/Weaving Dreams/Seeding Futures

Reading Circles/Weaving Dreams/Seeding Futures is a mural that depicts moments of civic life within a public library. Centered on the library as a place of dreaming, storytelling, and shared histories, the work offers a living portrait of community in action. 

Library | Main Reading Room

HOPE

Piersons's new piece is a dynamic sculpture spelling HOPE. The installation is made from found letters that reference Americana and echo President Obama’s defining campaign message.

Museum | Entry Pavillion 

Torch Song 

Saar’s Torch Song is a towering cast bronze figure inspired by the Statue of Liberty and embodies the soul of Chicago’s blues heritage. As the bronze figure raises a gilded flame in song, she becomes a beacon of resistance and truth, igniting viewers to challenge the status quo and expose injustice.

Outdoor Grounds | Women’s Garden

Receive

Smith’s Receive is the largest of the artist's bronze sculptures with moon and stars. In keeping with Smith’s previous work, Receive celebrates our shared connection to the cosmos, offering hope, orientation, and solace in the heart of the museum. 

Museum | Main Lobby

Pass it Forward (in collaboration with Sam Kirk)

Artist Dorian Sylvain has partnered with Sam Kirk on a collaborative mural that embodies the spirit of our connection to the past while reimagining our future through the eyes of the next generation. Sylvain’s extensive background in scenic design, public mural painting, curation, education, and community planning, explore the relationship between historical erasure and art as a tool of liberation and resistance.

Home Court | Main Court

This Land, Shared Sky (in collaboration with Nick Cave)

This Land, Shared Sky is a multimedia textile installation between artists Nick Cave and Marie Watt. This work unites Indigenous and Black traditions through beaded nets and sculptural jingle elements. Watt has spent more than two decades creating works that bridge Indigenous history, culture, community, and memory.

Museum | Main Lobby