Witty Mosaics Offer a Beautiful Solution to the Pothole Problem

One Artist Is on a Quest to Improve City Streets via a Durable Ancient Craft

Back in 2013, Jim Bachor had the idea of bringing art to bear on a particularly non-artsy problem—potholes.

Outside his Chicago studio, the pavement was marred with pits and divots. Inside, his tables were full of in-process mosaics. Mosaics build images by assembling small bits of stone and glass fixed with mortar. But they’re not just gorgeous (and painstaking). They’re also as durable as any asphalt. So why not use them to fix up the street?

Bachor got to work.

Now, he’s in the midst of his fourth springtime pothole-filling …

Evening Song

My song will rest while I rest. I struggle along. I’ll get back to the corn and
the open fields. Don’t fret, love, I’ll come out all …

Sociologist Xóchitl Bada

Shaken, Not Stirred. Gin, Not Vodka.

Sociologist Xóchitl Bada studies the civic, cultural, and political participation of Chicago-based Mexican migrant hometown associations at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Before participating in a panel on what …

Immigration Attorney Carlina Tapia-Ruano

Pardon My Interruption

Immigration attorney Carlina Tapia-Ruano is the founder of Chicago firm Tapia-Ruano & Gunn P.C. and a past president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. Before participating in a panel on …

Reporter Antonio Olivo

I’ll Say It: Chicago Has Better Mexican Food Than Los Angeles

Reporter Antonio Olivo covers immigration, housing, and development for the Chicago Tribune. Before moderating a panel on what immigration reform would mean for Chicago, he admitted in the Zócalo green …

The Windy City Says Bring It On, Immigration Reform

Chicago Can Process the Paperwork, Integrate the Newcomers, and Get Them Working

What might comprehensive immigration reform look like—around the country and in Chicago, a longtime city of immigrants—if Congress passes a bill that gives the 11 million undocumented people living in …