2024
2024
Our ongoing partnership with Chicago Public Schools (CPS) continues, May 1 – 12. Works by Chicago high school seniors air nightly, 8:30 – 9:30 p.m. 2024 featured students are:
Amaru Alarcon, Chicago Virtual High School
Sky Asamoah, Lake View High School
Kevannah Berry, Lake View High School
Gianna Christensen, Lane Tech High School
Camille Daley, Lane Tech High School
Jacqueline Montanez, Lake View High School
Lia Rodriguez, Jones College Prep
Jesse You, Kelly High School
Since 2022, ART on THE MART has partnered with CPS to display selected works from submissions to the All-City High School Visual Arts Exhibition and the Senior Portfolio Showcase. Students’ artwork is selected based on a score given for technical skill, craftsmanship, originality, and artist voice. An original score, composed and produced by CPS students, will accompany the projections.
Stay tuned to see the selections for 2024. Check out our CPS partnerships from 2022 and 2023, plus our 2021 collaboration with the local organization After School Matters.
This series coincides with the CPS multidisciplinary arts festival, RE·VER·BER·ATE (May 1 – 4). The four-day event provides students in grades PreK – 12 with exhibition and performance opportunities, as well as workshops, portfolio reviews, and career fairs throughout downtown Chicago.
Self-Portrait, 2024.
"The description of my artwork is a self portrait of myself using different color schemes, different shades of colors, different layers of shapes and harmonies with a colorful background. When I look at my artwork it makes me feel that I need to love myself more for who I am. And I think it is something very special for everyone when they look at themself in the mirror."
Otherworld, 2024.
"This art piece is part of my AP portfolio for drawing in which I am exploring escapism and spirituality. In this piece I am showing a sense of curiosity and wonder in a dream-like world where the character is looking up in the sky and seeing the Milky Way and wondering where her place is in the universe."
Party Over, 2024.
“Party Over is about a clown who struggles with being alone after a party. The clown represents one entertaining others as well as loneliness. The clown is masking themself, while at the same time trying to live in their true identity but sometimes fear judgment. This piece means a lot to me as I was able to express my inner feelings that others may not be aware of."
Honey, I'm Home, 2024
"This piece is the first, completely edited, and finished photograph of my career and I think it depicts exactly my art style; colorful, surreal, saturated, and relatively mundane subject matters. I didn't know much about photography until this year and it has quickly grown to be one of my favorite ways to express myself. Seeing as this is my first year with photography I am even more proud and grateful to be getting so much recognition from amazing people and programs; the support has motivated me even more to create as much art as I can."
Bathroom Mirror, 2024.
"This is acrylic paint layered on an old photograph. I was inspired by the experience of taking out contact lenses."
Late Night Shift, 2024.
"This image portrays your normal everyday worker who came home late at night due to their long hour shift. When coming home, they are greeted with their joyous dog jumping with excitement upon looking at them. To me, getting greeted like this after a long hard shift feels nice, like at home. It's a nice thought to have that someone, even if it's just a pet or a plant, is waiting patiently for your arrival because it just means that you are wanted, that you are needed.
That is what I mean by home, by going to your house and getting a warm welcome from your loved ones. Everyone should feel appreciated, and the slightest note of that appreciation can bring joy and warmth into our lives. Home should always feel that way. It should feel like a place where you are appreciated and cared for, that you are thought about when absent, that you can always feel welcomed into a place of comfort.
That is what is portrayed here in this art piece — how a girl working so hard and long got greeted by her loving dog which makes her doing all her hard work worth it. Not everyone lives with family, so that is why I incorporated a pet because who doesn't love getting greeted by someone who no matter what will love you? Not only that but it's something I know the majority of people can feel connected to. In a sense, this art piece is what I hope to have in the future when I start my career, so I am really fond of this piece."
Turtle in Net, 2024.
"This artwork represents how pollution and other man made environmental problems are ignored and worsened, because of the human obsession with beauty. I made these pieces to inspire people to help the environment even when the problems do not seem to be very serious."
Dauntless, 2024.
"An element commonly found in my paintings is portraits of people in ambient lighting. In my work, I feel that the colors have a large influence in communicating mood rather than completely relying on the subject’s facial expression. In these paintings, I particularly enjoyed using contrasting hues of highlights which brought out the life in my artwork. During this process I not only vastly grew as an artist by stepping into an area of art unfamiliar to me but also found a love for a new medium."
“We know the importance of promoting and recognizing the work of Chicago Public Schools students. We are proud to demonstrate their talent and promise.”
Chicago Public Schools (CPS) is dedicated to providing a high-quality education to all students, beginning with the District’s free full-day preschool programming for four-year-old scholars and continuing through neighborhood, magnet and selective-enrollment elementary schools that provide a rigorous K-8 education with schools that specialize in the fine arts, world language and culture, dual language, STEM, International Baccalaureate (IB), classical programs, and more. The rising District-wide freshmen-on-track and high school graduation rates reflect the hard work of the CPS community, including families, staff, and students across 635 schools. CPS celebrates the diversity of its more than 322,000 students who cite 182 home languages.