Artistic Murals Selected to Brighten Rogers Park Underpasses

Posted: 8/2/2012

Dear Neighbor,

Twenty artistic murals will be added to the walls of CTA and Metra underpasses in the 49th Ward over the next year.

The "Art=Rogers Park Underpass Murals Project" was one of the funding proposals that received voter approval in the Participatory Budgeting election last April in which I gave the 49th Ward residents the power to determine how I would spend the 49th Ward's capital budget allocation.

A few weeks ago, I put out a call to artists to submit proposed designs for 20 underpass murals and embankments. The artists were required to either live in Chicago or have a studio located within Chicago. Over 150 proposed mural designs were submitted for consideration and a blue-ribbon panel of respected public art experts selected by the PB49 Arts and Innovation Committee evaluated the mural submissions and made recommendations to the committee. The panel consisted of:

Lynn Basa of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and well-known public artist;
Juan Angel Chavez of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a noted Chicago muralist;
Kathleen Paluch, co-director of Rogers Park's Greenleaf Art Center.
To view the proposed murals that were selected, scroll to the bottom of this email or click on the attachment below:

PB49_2012_Mural_Winners.pdf (3324 KB)

Each winning artist will receive a stipend of $5,400 to execute their murals and will be assigned an underpass wall on which to paint their mural. The following underpass walls are slated to receive a mural:

CTA Underpasses

Chase (north and south walls)
Estes (north wall)
Greenview/Sherwin (all walls)
North Shore (north and south walls)
Rogers (north and south walls)

Union Pacific (Metra) Underpasses

Birchwood (north and south walls)
Estes (north and south walls)
Farwell (south wall)
Morse (north wall)
Rogers (south wall)
Touhy (north and south walls)

Most of the underpasses will be painted this summer and fall and the remainder next spring.

Congratulations to the winners and many thanks to the over 150 artists who submitted proposals to the competition. It's a testament to our community that so many artists wished to have their work displayed in the 49th Ward.

Sincerely,

Joe Moore

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