Arts & Entertainment
Community Events Focused on Arts and Healing to Feature Vic Mensa, Andre Royo
Children making art at IMAN’s grand opening of Go Green Griot Plaza, where its Arts for EveryBody event will take place Saturday, July 27, 2024. (Courtesy of Arts for EveryBody / Scout Tufankjian)
The city of Chicago and the community organization Inner-City Muslim Action Network will be hosting separate events Saturday as part of a nationwide initiative promoting arts, health and community connection.
The free events are part of the “Arts for Everybody” campaign led by One Nation/One Project, in which events across 18 sites nationwide are held Saturday to put a spotlight on the role of arts in the health of communities.
“Chicago has always been a city that has had deep roots in community, arts and artists who think of their work as operating out of healing modalities,” said Meida McNeal, deputy commissioner of cultural grants, resources and arts education at the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs & Special Events.
City of Chicago’s Arts x Health x Wellness Summit
- Where: Malcolm X College, 1900 W. Jackson Blvd.
- When: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday
- RSVP link (not required but recommended)
DCASE and the Chicago Department of Public Health will be co-hosting a creative summit at Malcolm X College, where attendees can participate in artmaking, therapeutic dance, sound and poetry workshops, chair yoga and more.
The event will feature artists, along with community and health organizations in a series of workshops, talks and performances. Actor Andre Royo, featured in “The Wire” and “Empire,” is set to give a keynote address at 4 p.m.
Saturday’s summit will also feature the cohort of artists selected last year for the city’s arts and health pilot program for creative workers, in which artists get certified as community health workers and work as an apprentice in one of the city’s mental health clinics.
Artists selected for the program also hold free art workshops at the city’s mental health clinics throughout the year. Registration opens soon for the fall session, which runs Aug. 5 to Oct. 4.
Natalia Cuevas, one of artists selected for the city’s arts and health pilot program for creative workers and who works with clients at the North River Mental Health Center. Cuevas will be showcasing an interactive piñata sculpture and facilitating screenprinting sessions on Saturday’s wellness summit event at Malcolm X College. (Courtesy of Natalia Cuevas)
One of the artists selected in the program, Natalia Cuevas, grew up in Albany Park and was placed at the North River Mental Health Center for her apprenticeship. Cuevas works with clients in collaboration with clinicians to integrate sculpture, printmaking and photography in overall mental health services.
“It's deeply collaborative and in service of the clients to be able to find different modes of expression, learning to move through emotions and trauma in artmaking,” said Cuevas, whose plan is to open a community center in Albany Park one day.
On Saturday, Cuevas will be showcasing an interactive piñata sculpture that pays homage to the history of the North River Mental Health Center, in addition to facilitating screenprinting sessions for attendees.
CDPH Assistant Commissioner of Mental Health Alisha Warren said she hopes the event can give community members an opportunity to celebrate and learn more about art workshops being offered at the city’s mental health clinics.
“Health care is often really focused on clinical health care and it’s not really focused on well-rounded wellness, when we think about healing,” Warren said. “We’re thinking about art in a different way, and we’re thinking about health care in a different way that really puts both of them together.”
Mural workshop student at Greater Lawn Mental Health Clinic. (Courtesy of Arts for EveryBody / Scout Tufankjian)
Inner-City Muslim Action Network’s Mini Festival
- Where: Go Green Griot Plaza, 63rd Street and Racine Avenue in Englewood
- When: 4-8 p.m. Saturday
- RSVP link (does not guarantee entry, RSVP and early arrival suggested)
IMAN’s event for the “Arts for Everybody” campaign is set to feature an outdoor skating rink, a communal drumming circle, live music, storytelling, dance, poetry-making, a double-dutch demo, cooking demonstrations, interactive murals and local vendors.
The event will also feature performances by Vic Mensa, aja monet, the Chicago Bucket Boys, Brittney Carter, Omar Offendum and more.
The community organization IMAN operates a federally qualified health center on the city’s South Side and runs its Green ReEntry program, which provides transitional housing, life skills education and vocational training for formerly incarcerated individuals and high-risk youth.
The outdoor celebration will be held at the newly developed Go Green Griot Plaza, a former vacant lot turned outdoor creative arts hub that’s connected to Go Green Community Fresh Market in Englewood. IMAN celebrated the plaza’s grand opening in June.
Binta Kane Diallo, associate director of arts and culture at IMAN, said she prays that attendees are able to have a story of joy on Saturday and know that they can reclaim and reimagine.
“We thoroughly believe that art is part of the way to reclaim space,” said Diallo, who will also be performing at the event alongside John Forté. “It also is central in rewriting people’s narratives and it also is central in reimagining the world as it could be.”
Event details for the two, separate community events being held in Chicago as part of the national “Arts for Everybody” campaign on July 27, 2024. (Courtesy of Arts for EveryBody)
Contact Eunice Alpasan: @eunicealpasan | 773-509-5362 | [email protected]
