Opening up access for all students and providing employment for teaching artists
Hyde Park Art Center, the renowned non-profit hub for contemporary art located on Chicago’s vibrant South Side, is proud to announce that its entire online Summer class term and children’s Creative Camp will be operated under a ‘contribute-what-you-can’ model, enabling its art offerings to be truly accessible to all, while still supporting employment and pay for the Art Center’s teaching artists.
Some 40+ classes for youth, families, and adults, including the Art Center’s popular Creative Camps, remain by necessity in the virtual space; among Summer class highlights are certain to be Art in Motion, in which families work together to create art that moves, including pop-ups, puppets, and mobiles; Artful Journaling, providing a therapeutic, creative outlet for expression during this uncertain time; Watercolor for Older Adults, providing new skills along with much-needed social interaction for older adults; and a Spanish language class, Tejer con Materiales Reciclados (Weaving with Recycled Materials).
Hyde Park Art Center’s eight-week Summer term takes place June 22-August 16, 2020; class and camp registrations are now being accepted by visiting https://www.hydeparkart.org/.
“Thanks to the Joyce Foundation and other supporters, we’ve been able to prototype a ‘contribute-what-you-can-model’ on a small scale over recent class sessions. Knowing the financial uncertainty and loss of connection the COVID crisis exacerbated for so many in our community — not only our families but also for our 50 Chicago teaching artists who’ve lost other revenue streams — we wanted to make sure and do our part to make opportunities available. The Board immediately and without hesitation opted to continue implementing the ‘contribute-what-you-can’ program for 100% of our virtual classes this Spring and Summer,” explained Kate Lorenz, Hyde Park Art Center Executive Director.
The ‘Contribute-what-you-can’ model, also referred to as ‘Community-supported,’ invites students and families to contribute what they are able in place of a set tuition price. The suggested tuition donation goes directly to cover costs associated with the program and any contribution more than the suggested donation helps also cover the costs of fellow students and families for whom tuition would be cost-prohibitive.
The Hyde Park Art Center, at 5020 S. Cornell Ave., is a hub for contemporary arts in Chicago, serving as a gathering and production space for artists and the broader community to cultivate ideas, impact social change, and connect with new networks. Since its inception in 1939, Hyde Park Art Center has grown from a small collective of quirky artists to establishing a strong legacy of innovative development and emerging as a unique Chicago arts institution with social impact. The Art Center functions as an amplifier for today and tomorrow’s creative voices, providing the space to cultivate and create new work and connections.
