Jim Duignan, founder and director of DePaul University’s Stockyard Institute, which brings the arts to youth in underserved Chicago communities, will be among the artists featured as part of Chicago Artists Month in October. The DePaul Art Museum exhibition, “Afterimage,” is also one of the featured events.

Chicago Artists Month is the 17th annual celebration of Chicago’s vibrant and diverse visual arts community sponsored by the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events in collaboration with more than 200 program partners. It provides opportunities to meet hundreds of Chicago visual artists at exhibitions, workshops, open studios, tours and neighborhood art walks at venues throughout the city.

“This is the first time I have been selected as an individual artist, and I am very happy to be included along with fellow artists Laura Shaeffer and John Preus,” said Duignan, an associate professor of visual arts and secondary education in DePaul’s College of Education. “There is a wonderful selection of exhibits, projects and cultural events throughout Chicago during the entire month of October, including at the DePaul Art Museum.”

As part of Chicago Artists Month, Duignan will host a daylong program, “Informal Art Education and Community Learning,” from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Oct. 20 at the Southside Hub of Production (SHoP), 5638 S. Woodlawn Ave., Chicago. Preus and Shaeffer are co-founders and curators of SHoP, a social model for local independently run cultural centers designed to creatively engage with the surrounding neighborhood through the arts. The program will include a day of exhibitions, talks, presentations and projects from teachers, youth, artists and community residents. In addition, Duignan will distribute the first in a series of primers on community projects.

“This year’s focus of Chicago Artists Month is Chicago communities,” Duignan said. “The artistic practice I am involved with considers pedagogy and the community as critical elements of the whole and has become well-represented in Chicago neighborhoods over the last few years. This is due to some extraordinary artist projects, community-based producers and the contagious energy of many alternative spaces that have populated city communities at every level.”

Barbara Koenen, director of artists’ resources for Chicago Artists Month, said of Duignan, “Jim has initiated so many important and impactful projects over the years, many operating under the umbrella of the Stockyard Institute.  His work gives voice to underrepresented communities, providing a place and a mechanism for creativity, passion and compassion, and encouraging serious examination of pedagogy.

“For SHoP, he is creating a publication called ‘A Primer on Informal Art Education and Community Learning,’ which will be a focus of the Oct 20 event,” Koenen said. “An open call for participation will surely yield a thought-provoking document and galvanize future activity at SHoP and elsewhere.”

The DePaul Art Museum’s “Afterimage” exhibition, which explores work by contemporary artists who draw inspiration from an earlier generation of Chicago artists known as Imagists, is among the featured events during Chicago Artists Month. “Afterimage” includes the work of artists Selina Trepp, who is also featured as part of Chicago Artists Month. “Afterimage” runs through Nov. 18 at the museum, located at 935 W. Fullerton Ave., Chicago.

Duignan founded the Stockyard Institute in 1995 to provide opportunities for collaborative art projects with youth, teachers, artists and residents in underserved Chicago communities such as the Back of the Yards, Austin and North Lawndale neighborhoods.

Since its inception, the Stockyard Institute has connected with more than 3,000 students and exhibited projects locally and around the world. In 2007 Duignan and the Stockyard Institute collaborated with the Hyde Park Art Center of Chicago to host the “Pedagogical Factory: Exploring Strategies for an Educated City,” which explored recent developments in critical education and social art and the relationship between contemporary life in the city and learning.

For more information about Chicago Artists Month, visit www.chicagoartistsmonth.org/.

About DePaul

With more than 25,000 students, DePaul University is the largest Catholic university in the United States and the largest private, nonprofit university in the Midwest. The university offers approximately 275 graduate and undergraduate programs of study on three Chicago campuses and three suburban campuses. Founded in 1898, DePaul remains committed to providing a quality education through personal attention to students from a wide range of backgrounds. For more information, visit www.depaul.edu.