LINCOLN PARK — Efforts to create a community mosaic through the Lincoln Park Cultural Center and the Chicago Public Art Group get a boost Thursday when Victory Gardens Theater plays host to a fundraiser for the project.
The $40 event includes a reception with wine and cheese and food and drink from local restaurants beginning at 6:30 p.m. at Victory Gardens Biograph Theatre, 2433 N. Lincoln Ave., followed at 7:30 p.m. by a performance of the company's new production "A Wonder in My Soul."
Written by ensemble playwright Marcus Gardley and directed by Artistic Director Chay Yew, "A Wonder in My Soul" uses music, poetry and dance to tell the story of childhood friends who become owners of a hair salon, then have to grapple with possible relocation in the face of gentrification and crime.
The Lincoln Park Cultural Center, 2045 N. Lincoln Park West, intends the community mosaic as a way to celebrate the area's art and culture from ceramics and woodworking to kickball and dancing. Still a work in progress, it's hoping to arrive at a final design from three public workshops held at the Cultural Center last year, in conjunction with the Chicago Public Art Group's Sonja Henderson and Mirtes Zwierzinski, as well as a final setting for the work.
It's been boosted along the way by Mayor Rahm Emanuel proclaiming 2017 the Year of Public Art, with projects in every ward.
