Chicago Reader: Inside the vibrant, joy-filled world of Arts of Life

An artist in paint-splattered black clothes puts the finishing touches on a busy, vibrant acrylic scene on an oversize canvas. Nearby another artist—a face mask tucked beneath her chin—leans over a comic-like illustration, carefully coloring in the black outlined drawing with green marker. At another group of tables, an artist is cutting up pieces of cardboard for use in a sculpture while a colleague to his right finishes up a pristine marker illustration featuring saturated blocks of green, yellow, orange, and gray. Other artists mill about the studio; some are wrapping up pieces or preserving the day’s work on their storage shelves.

It’s a typical Monday afternoon at the West Town location of Arts of Life (AoL), a progressive art studio founded 25 years ago. The bustling space exemplifies Arts of Life’s simple yet visionary mission: to provide artists with intellectual and developmental disabilities “a collective space to expand their practice and strengthen their leadership.” Here, artists have the autonomy to make the work they want to make, to develop their artistic voices and creative practices alongside their peers, and to further their careers through a number of professional opportunities. All decisions are made collectively, and the program is open to all applicants, whether or not they have previous artmaking experience.

“A lot of what we’re trying to do is to help the artists just have confidence in their own ideas,” said Tim Ortiz, AoL’s program director. “They’re not taught that in other places. And people in this population—they don’t learn to spend time on things that are their own. That’s what’s different here. . . . A lot of what we do is just encourage people to try. We try to notice what their interests are creatively and help them to take those things further.”

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