U.S. artists Spencer Finch and Lindsay Adams have been commissioned for two new installations at the Obama Presidential Center, which is set to open in early 2026 in Chicago.
The forthcoming building project, which has cost more than $200 million, is currently under construction at a 19-acre campus in the Midwestern city, where Barack and Michele Obama have a separate namesake foundation. The former spent several years in the city as a law professor at the University of Chicago and as a community organizer before moving into politics.
Finch, who is based in Brooklyn, will create a 70-foot-long tiled mural for the Forum building’s lobby, drawing from various places referenced in the the former President’s memoir Dreams from My Father. Adams, who is based in Chicago and an alum of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, will adapt a 2024 painting of hers into fabric panels that are planned to be installed in the Center’s public café.
In a 2014 profile of Finch for ARTnews, Hilarie M. Sheets wrote that Finch uses “scientific methodology to try to pin down the ineffable qualities of light and color, perception and memory, ultimately to expose how they fall short.” Meanwhile, Adams recently opened a new solo exhibition at Sean Kelly gallery of colorful vibrant abstractions.
Decisions related to the art commissions are led by Louise Bernard, who oversees the the center’s planned museum as its director, working alongside curator Virginia Shore, who previously served as the chief curator and acting director of the US Department of State’s Office of Art in Embassies. (Bernard was previoulsy the director of exhibitions at the New York Public Library.)
The two have been building a broader collection of an estimated 20 public artworks, including other high-profile commissions Julie Mehretu, Richard Hunt and Maya Lin.
