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Lit & Luz now has a monthly show on Lumpen Radio!
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April Newsletter
Image: Zespo and Sofía Gabriel in conversation at Lumpen Radio
Lumpen Radio welcomes Lit & Luz as a new monthly show!
This April, we launched our monthly hour of Spanish-language conversations with acclaimed writers, musicians, performers, and visual artists from Chicago and Mexico on Lumpen Radio, a community radio station in Chicago's Bridgeport neighborhood.
Executive Director Sofía Gabriel was joined by Lit & Luz Chicago Artistic Director Zespo for a conversation about his work with the festival. The two discussed the inventive process of facilitating virtual and in-person collaboration between artists during the festival weeks in Chicago and Mexico City, and the joy of experiencing the creative unknowns of producing the live performances on the theater stage. They also introduced the conversation between visual artist Magali Lara and writer Margarita Saona, recorded for the Lit & Luz Podcast episode Tejer el pensamiento: arte, palabra y reparación.
Join us on the 4th Wednesday of each month from 7 pm - 8 pm to hear intimate conversations with participants of the Lit & Luz Festival, facilitators, and members of our broader community on their creative processes and the transformative power of cross-cultural collaboration at 105.5FM Lumpen Radio in the Chicago area, or tune in anywhere from the Lumpen website or app. Our next broadcast is on May 27 at 7 pm.
In this Spanish-language episode of the Lit & Luz Podcast, we delve into the recent twelfth edition of the festival held in Mexico City in March 2026, through a unique conversation with 2025-2026 Collaboration Cohort partners, visual artist Magali Lara, and writer Margarita Saona.
From the relationship between body, language, and image to writing as a tool for survival, Lara & Saona share deeply personal processes that organically engage with one another. The episode offers a look at the discoveries of collaborative work, as well as the power of art as a space for repair, connection, and transformation.
Image: Margarita Saona and Magali Lara, “Monster, revisited” / “Revisitar al monstruo”, 2026 CDMX Live Magazine Show at Museo Universitario del Chopo. Photo by Dani Felton.
SAVE THE DATE: Nov 8 - Nov 13, 2026
Image: Audience at the Lit & Luz Live Magazine Show at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago . Photo by Natasha Moustache.
The 2026-27 Lit & Luz Festival of Language, Literature, and Art, our signature cross-cultural celebration of Language, Literature, and Art, will return to Chicago, November 8- Nov 13, 2026, bringing together artists, performers, musicians, poets, and writers from Chicago and Mexico around the theme of “Edges/Bordes”. Participating artists in the festival's 13th edition will explore social, geographical, and linguistic limits through tensions at the “edge of space”. The weeklong festival programming will consider the complexities of official borders, as well as the ways in which soft and hard edges are constructed within cities and regions—and within artistic practices themselves—through language, culture, identity, and policy.
Save the date and join us in Chicago this fall!
Support the 13th Annual Lit & Luz Festival through a Sponsorship!
Image: Magali Lara presenting with the Open Practice Committee at The University of Chicago's Department of Visual Arts.
The magic of the festival could not happen each year without the generosity of our sponsors and partners. This fall, the Lit & Luz Festival will bring international artists to Chicago, introduce local audiences to creative practitioners from Mexico, facilitate community-based conversations about pressing issues through numerous events around the city, and support artists by commissioning new work that they present to new audiences, helping to grow their networks in the US and Mexico.
Sponsorship keeps these events free, making them accessible to a wider audience and connecting more Chicagoans, both in the city and abroad.
2026-27 Lit & Luz Festival Sponsors receive recognition on festival promotional materials, have additional avenues for advertising, including the opportunity to serve as the Presenting Publisher Sponsor of a festival event, complementary tickets to our signature event, the Live Magazine Show at the MCA, and more.
Interested in learning more about sponsorship? Get in touch with us at director@makemag.org.
During Lit & Luz Chicago 2025, we:
- Welcomed nearly
Commissioned four collaborative performances from the 2025-26 Collaboration Cohort and debuted the new work during the Live Magazine Show at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago with music from Damon Locks.
We presented the work of 25 artists from Mexico & Chicago.
Image: Lit & Luz 2025 Keynote Address with Marcelo Hernandez Castillo at Pueblo Unido Gallery, Centro Romero in Chicago.
This & That
Join our programming partner, the Open Practice Committee at the University of Chicago, for two upcoming artist talks featuring members of the Lit & Luz Community!
TONIGHT! Wednesday, April 29, 6 PM, University of Chicago, Logan Center for the Arts, Room 801
A conversation with visual artist and poet Edgar Calel, who will be visiting Chicago for the inauguration of the exhibition Edgar Calel: Corn Mountain of Life (Ixim Juyu K’aslem), opening at the Art Institute of Chicago on May 2, 2026. Calel will be joined by Associate Professor in the Department of English Language and Literature and Edgar Garcia (2018-2019 Collaboration Cohort) for a discussion of Calel's artistic practice and concerns.
Monday, May 4, 6PM, University of Chicago, Logan Center for the Arts, Penthouse Room 901
An artist talk with visiting artist Chantal Peñalosa Fong (2021-22 Collaboration Cohort). Chantal Peñalosa Fong is a multidisciplinary artist based in NYC. Through video, photography, sculpture, installation, writing, and performance, her body of work uncovers stories and sites beyond authorized histories. In recent projects, she connects genealogies forged through migration, labor, and displacement, interweaving the United States, Mexico, and China.
Palomar (Part 1) a group exhibition opens at the Renaissance Society featuring the work of Chantal Peñalosa Fong (2021-22 Collaboration Cohort) and will be on view May 2-June 7, 2026.
Palomar is a group exhibition about watching the sky, something that appears deceptively simple at first. Featuring 28 artists, it unfolds in two parts, each lasting 5 weeks. Some works remain in place while others come and go; this encounter in time acts like a double exposure. Gradually, the familiar act of looking up spills over into a sense of life that is more layered and complex, or even contradictory. It turns out there is a lot at stake in the space above us.
Our Executive Director, Sofía Gabriel, co-edited and contributed an article to the 157th edition of the Spanish-language magazine Contratiempo, titled “El arte, trinchera de la comunidad” / “Art, the Trench for the Community”. The issue was celebrated with a launch event at Co-Prosperity on April 23.
The evening brought together authors, editors, collaborators, artists, friends, neighbors, and steadfast allies for a night of reflection on creative spaces, mutual care, resilience, and resistance. Together, they explored how art serves as a powerful tool for seeing the world from others' perspectives and for strengthening community bonds.
Starting this week, you will be able to find this free magazine around Chicago!
Invest in cultural exchange!
Image: Gabriela Damián Miravete and Maria Gaspar, “What broken bones will we mend together now?” / “¿Qué huesos rotos sanaremos ahora?” at the Live Magazine Show, MCA November 2025. Photo by Natasha Moustache
Your support is invaluable as we continue to host free, multilingual events in the US and Mexico and facilitate cultural exchange between artists and writers in both countries.
Thank you for helping create spaces where our languages, stories, and creative visions can thrive!
PRESENTING PARTNERS
COLLABORATORS
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