2022 - 2023

In this body of work, Jonah Hoffman depicts vignettes of Chicago’s post-industrial landscape that invoke the city’s legacy of environmental racism. This body of work uses the polluting recycling facility, General Iron Inc., as an allegory to draw out issues that impact all of Chicago: segregation, pollution, and corruption. These paintings are composed of imagery, raw materials, and official communications that emerged from General Iron’s closure, demolition, and attempted relocation. Hoffman’s evocative depictions of this controversial recycling facility are metaphorical representations of the forces that have concentrated Chicago’s polluting industries in low-income black and brown neighborhoods.