A 50-foot monolith wrapped in a colorful abstract mural now towers over a construction site on Chicago's West Side, the first visible piece of a mural campus that organizers say will open to the public next summer. The project, called West Edge Arts, sits at 3216 W. Ogden Ave. in North Lawndale and was announced alongside a groundbreaking on Tuesday. If the plans hold, the neighborhood is getting a free outdoor gallery unlike anything else on the block.
According to Block Club Chicago, the 25,000-square-foot campus is planned to hold at least 30 murals arranged around an outdoor garden, plus a 6,000-square-foot enclosed glass building with classrooms, artist studios and a cafe. Construction is already underway, and a summer 2027 opening is being planned. The first featured work is Chicago artist Dorian Sylvain's “Bring It With You,” which Block Club says rises 50 feet over the building.
A Steel Beam, Textile Patterns and a Day of Paste-Ups
The Chicago Tribune reports that Sylvain, along with Kahari Black and Nick Slusinski, pasted up sections of the mural during Tuesday's groundbreaking. The Tribune describes the piece as an abstract work displayed on a 50-foot-tall cylindrical steel beam, and says finishing it will take several days. It is not portraiture, the paper notes, and instead includes geometric patterns drawn from different cultures.
Sylvain told the Tribune the mural draws inspiration from textiles, needlework, ceramics, pottery and woodwork, including Potawatomi beadwork and Czech decorative Easter eggs. She has also had a mural featured at the Obama Presidential Center, per the same report. 3Arts describes her as a studio painter, muralist, art educator, curator and community planner.
Her résumé runs deep in Chicago. She created “The Talk_BLM” in 2020 with the MacArthur Foundation and South Side Community Art Center, and she co-curated “Seeds in My Pocket” in 2021 with Pablo Serano for the Chicago Art Department, according to 3Arts. As for how long she has been at it, the sources differ: 3Arts says she has led public art projects over the past four decades, while her own website, doriansylvain.com, says she has been committed to public art projects for the past three decades.
Rotating Walls, Glass Walls and a Cafe
The Tribune reports that the murals will be spread across exterior and interior walls as well as freestanding walls, and will mostly be painted, mixing figurative and abstract work. Some will be permanent, while others will rotate. Chelsea Dawkins, senior project lead at West Edge Arts, told the Tribune that rotating murals will keep the space fresh and give people reason to come back.
Dawkins also said West Edge Arts is an exhibition space with public programming rather than a museum that collects or preserves artwork, per the Tribune. The organization has consulted Chicago muralists about preserving murals and choosing suitable brick. The building will have floor-to-ceiling glass walls so visitors can view the park and murals from indoors during cold weather.
Free Admission, Paid Artists and Career Training
The Tribune reports that the campus will be free and open to the public, and that the nonprofit pays all commissioned artists for their work and receives funding from individual donors. Organizers are also discussing making the space available to rent for events. The paper adds that Dawkins described the site as a destination for North Lawndale neighbors, people across Chicago and visitors.
Block Club reports that the space will offer career training for teenagers and young adults interested in the arts, along with classes and workshops for the public. The gallery is meant to place established global artists alongside emerging local ones. A community advisory committee was set up last year to build local partnerships, led in part by Ald. Monique Scott (24th), according to the same report.
Part of a Wider Wave of Neighborhood Art Spaces
West Edge Arts is not the only neighborhood-scale art park taking shape on the South and West sides. The Chicago Sun-Times reports that the Englewood Arts Collective, made up of 10 artists including MacArthur Genius Grant winner Tonika Lewis Johnson, turned a once-vacant lot into a sculpture park. It soft-launched in August with an 80-foot-long mural painted on shipping containers and five oversized painted drums.
Plenty remains unsettled in North Lawndale. Block Club says only that a summer 2027 opening is being planned, and the Tribune likewise reports the campus will open next summer, so no firm date has been confirmed. For now, the 50-foot monolith on Ogden Avenue is the clearest sign of what is coming.
