Art Histories is a Red Line Service program in which participants with a lived experience of homelessness, food or economic insecurity wrote art history essays. On Sunday, October 6, participants will perform their art historical essays to conventional and new art audiences. These encounters create platforms for audiences with different skills and expertise to meet and learn from one another.

Soup and hot drinks will be served.

Food for this event is generously provided by Zac Green, head-chef of Marz Community Brewing Taproom.

Red Line Service connects people with a lived experience of homelessness to cultural webs. By being introduced to these artistic experiences and communities cultural, intellectual, and spiritual belonging is created. Unlike other models of service, which maintain inequality and exclusion through a ‘giver of privilege’ and ‘recipient in need’ framework, Red Line Service creates interdependent communities of mutual care through art, in which social inclusion is forged. Red Line Service is premised on the evidence-based research that social inclusion is one key factor in pursuing, securing and retaining housing. 

Tender House Project works to realize the latent potential of Chicago’s iconic yet overlooked bridgehouses, proposing that this hidden infrastructure is a cultural asset that will breathe needed life into the Chicago River.

In collaboration with Togetherism, a two-month festival of artists groups curated by Public Media Institute, eight  Chicago-based groups will creatively activate the Michigan Avenue bridgehouse and surrounding riverwalk areas.

Exhibited work will feature design proposals from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago’s Master of Architecture program and design proposal submitted by the public. The result contributes toward a city-wide strategy of highlighting the Chicago River as a cultural corridor. With 70 bridgehouses spanning 13 miles of the Chicago River and having direct access to 15 neighborhoods, these underutilized buildings will be vital to fostering a connected and culturally celebrated Chicago.