Our section might be called Arts+Entertainment, but great exhibitions aren’t mere tonics. They should challenge your way of thinking, and maybe even send you off with a knot in your stomach. Why don’t we know the name Camille Claudel? Is race really a fixed category? How much nonrecyclable waste do you create — and are you willing to confront just how much?

To say that some of the museum openings coming up this fall are “confrontational,” then, isn’t a dig — it’s a compliment to the highest degree. A few to run toward, not from:

“Chasing Eclipses”: Mark your calendars: the next solar eclipses pass through North America are on Oct. 14 and April 8, 2024. (For the second of these, Chicago is just off the path of a total eclipse, with the moon covering 95% of the sun.) Exciting stuff — but you have to wonder what on Earth people thought millennia ago, back when there was less understanding of what an eclipse was, much less a tourism industry built around it. The Adler Planetarium answers all that and more in this exhibition showing until the April eclipse. Through April 8, hours every day 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. except 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. Weds. at the Adler Planetarium, 1300 S. DuSable Lake Shore Drive, basic entry $8-19; adlerplanetarium.org

A drop in the ocean: This summer, the Museum of Science and Industry unveiled a humbling immersive exhibition about plastic pollution’s stranglehold on ocean life. The visuals and storytelling are stark, but it’s not just a doom-and-gloom lecture. “The Blue Paradox,” which started as an enthusiastically received pop-up exhibition in London, outlines how you, as a consumer, can alter your daily habits to soften the hit against marine ecosystems. Open run, hours 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily at the Museum of Science and Industry, 5700 S. DuSable Lake Shore Drive; tickets $15-26; msichicago.org

Race in medieval and early modern Europe: Race has been anything but a static concept — not to mention one inherently tied to culture and place. Newberry Library’s latest exhibition explores this fluidity through a public programming series and a trove of sources from Newberry’s collection: manuscripts, Renaissance costume books, maps and travel books from Europeans and Indigenous perspectives, jewelry, religious and ceremonial objects, plays and more. “Seeing Race Before Race” runs through Dec. 30, hours Tues.-Thurs. 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., Fri. and Sat. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., at the Newberry Library, 60 W. Walton St.; free; newberry.org

Runs in the family: The latest installment of the Chinese American Museum’s Spotlight Series features father-daughter artists Adrian Wong and 5-year-old Clementine Reid Wong. Wong is a professor at the School of the Art Institute; Reid Wong is, as her bio puts it, “a degree candidate at Drummond Montessori School (kindergarten, ‘24).” The Wongs created the works on view together to answer two daunting questions: “What makes a thing Chinese?” and “What makes us Chinese?” In doing so, they also touch on “Chinoiserie,” the Western art craze derived from Orientalist motifs — or, in Reid Wong’s words, “Chinesey Things.” “Chinoiserie (Chinesey Things)” runs through Oct. 22, hours Wed. and Fri. 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., Sun. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., at the Chinese American Museum of Chicago, 238 W. 23rd St.; suggested donation $5-$8; ccamuseum.org

On her own terms: “We are in the presence of something unique, a revolt of nature: a woman genius,” wrote art critic Octave Mirbeau of Camille Claudel (1864-1943). However, as tends to happen to women in male-dominated fields, the sculptor’s work has been overshadowed by the more salacious details of her life — such as her affair with her famous teacher, Rodin, or her struggles with mental illness in the last decades of her life. The retrospective “Camille Claudel” at the Art Institute offers a necessary corrective. From Oct. 7 to Feb. 19, 2024, hours 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Fri.-Mon., 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Thurs., closed Tues. and Weds., at the Art Institute of Chicago, 111 S. Michigan Ave.; tickets $26-32; artic.edu

Open House Chicago: One of the city’s most celebrated harbingers of fall returns with more than 170 sites across 20-plus neighborhoods, presented by the Chicago Architecture Center. Peek into a mix of Open House favorites — such as the Pullman House Museum and Riviera Theater — and buildings rarely open to the public, like the Edgewater Beach Apartments and The Forum in Bronzeville, once a legendary cultural venue. Also worth flagging: the National Cambodian Heritage Museum in Lincoln Square and Walt Disney’s birth house in Hermosa, both included on this year’s list of official site partners. Open House Chicago, multiple locations, hours 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Oct. 14-15; free; openhousechicago.org

They’re creepy and they’re kooky, mysterious and spooky …: Sorry, wrong Addams. But Jane Addams’ Hull-House apparently isn’t without its own skin-crawling reputation, landing on some lists of the most haunted places in the U.S. As has become a yearly tradition, the Hull-House Museum seizes on this reputation by offering hourlong evening ghost tours. A museum educator will facilitate — and make sure you don’t wander off into the house’s notorious attic. (Seriously. Don’t.) “The Haunting of Hull-House,” tours 6-8 p.m. Oct. 13, 20 and 27, Jane Addams Hull-House Museum, 800 S. Halsted St.; $10 per person; more information soon at hullhousemuseum.org

An exhibit on rye: The Illinois Holocaust Museum deviates from the solemnity of its usual programming with “I’ll Have What She’s Having,” a lively dive into the history of the Jewish delicatessen. Original neon signage, menus, advertisements, uniforms, photographs, and pop-culture clips abound, but you’ll have to grab that post-visit pastrami elsewhere, sorry. From Oct. 22 to April 14, 2024, hours 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Weds.-Mon, at the Illinois Holocaust Museum, 9603 Woods Drive, Skokie; $6-18, free the last Friday of every month; ilholocaustmuseum.org

Tiffany at the Driehaus: Florals in fall? Now that’s groundbreaking. The design museum dusts off its collection of Louis Comfort Tiffany lamps in a co-exhibition alongside emerging Chicago floral artists, who will design installations accompanying the stained glass lamps. Elizabeth Cronin of Asrai Gardens curates. “From Glass to Garden: Tiffany Inspired Floral Designs” runs Nov. 30 to Jan. 7, hours 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Thurs.-Sun., Weds. 11 a.m.-3 p.m., closed Mon. and Tues., at the Richard H. Driehaus Museum, 40 E. Erie St.; admission $10-20; driehausmuseum.org

Knowing Picasso: The Spanish artist can sometimes feel larger than life, especially if you’re walking through Daley Plaza. But the intimate exhibition “Picasso: Drawing from Life” at the Art Institute illuminates Picasso the man — brilliant and brutal — as told through a survey of figurative works depicting, or inspired by, his inner circle. Some of Picasso’s more unflattering likenesses see the artist hoisting himself by his own petard. From Nov. 11 to April 8, 2024, hours 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Fri. -Mon., 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Thurs., closed Tues. and Weds., at the Art Institute of Chicago, 111 S. Michigan Ave.; tickets $26-32; artic.edu

Hannah Edgar is a freelance critic.