Chicago, IL
A non-profit art and design center that encourages creativity as a means of economic empowerment for youth and adults.
Little Black Pearl Art and Design Center's mission is to create opportunities through the arts for youth and adults in the Chicago area. As well as exposing youth to African-American art and history, the programs work to foster entrepreneurship through marketing and selling student artwork.
Nuts and Bolts:
- Little Black Pearl was started in 1993 by Monica Haslip. Haslip, a business-woman with a passion and background in the arts, started the program in the first floor of her home in Chicago’s Oakland district.
- Haslip’s goal was to instill in children both business and art skills by teaching them to make and market functional artwork, while encouraging artistic expression through the visual arts.
- The program was initially sponsored by the Illinois State Board of Education. Interested Chicago Public School students would apply to the workshop through their school. Student and staff artwork is displayed in the workshop's online gallery.
- The art instructors are local high school students, volunteers, and a regular staff of teachers.
- Although there are fees for many of the classes at the Little Black Pearl, they do provide financial aid based on need.
Successes:
- The program became so popular that Little Black Pearl found itself having to turn students away due to lack of space. Haslip began a campaign to expand the program’s space. In 2000, the workshop received a $1.5 million Empowerment Zone grant. The workshop raised a total of $9 million to finance the new building, and ShoreBank financed the construction. In September of 2004, Little Black Pearl moved into its new 40,000 square foot facility. The city gained title to the building, and donated it to Little Black Pearl to renovate it.
- The new space tripled the size of the center, allowing them to serve more students, and expand its services to adults and neighborhood residents. The facility boasts a two-story glass atrium with courtyard space, including studios to teach ceramics, woodworking, welding, mosaics, painting, glass-blowing and much more for children, adults and families. The computer lab houses state-of-the-art equipment and provides Internet access for students and members of Little Black Pearl.
- The Kids Café, which was made possible through a grant from BankOne, provides digital technology that allows students to enhance their computer skills, music programming, and free meals for the students by the Greater Chicago Food Depository.
- Little Black Pearl was one of twelve organizations nationwide chosen by the Ford Foundation to receive a grant to support their community transformation efforts.
- The program now serves 750 to 1,500 annually.
- During its ten plus years of operation, Little Black Pearl has made great strides in empowering children and adults through the arts, both economically and creatively, and providing resources that help strengthen and transform the Oakland community.
For more information on this program: Little Black Pearl, Hyde Park Community Arts & Culture News