Talk and Book Signing | Dorian Sylvain

About the Event

In celebration of her first solo exhibition in two decades, Raised In It!, and its accompanying publication, join us for an artist talk and book signing with Dorian Sylvain. Over the evening Sylvain discusses the arc of her creative practice and the historical antecedents—including the Great Migration, the Civil Rights era, and the Black Arts Movement—that made it possible. She also looks toward the future, exploring the broader initiative that Raised In It! begins: a future HBCU Public Arts Tour. In this dream project Sylvain envisions collaborating with students across Historically Black Colleges and Universities to create campus-based murals that center cultural memory, activism, and imagination.

Access Information

CART captioning is provided. To request additional accessibility services, please contact us at [email protected] or 312-397-4076.

About the Artist

Dorian Sylvain has proven to be an artist of exceptional inventiveness and creative range, fueled by her commitment to collaboration and community empowerment. Her extensive background in scenic design, public mural painting, curation, education, and community planning continues to explore the relationship between historical erasure and art as a tool of liberation and resistance. Mentored as a young artist by the architects of the Black Arts Movement on the South Side of Chicago, she rooted her interdisciplinary practice in Afro-centric philosophies. Sylvain understood that through her art she could create socially engaged dialogue with the public while presenting intersections between past, present, and future.

Through her Mural Moves campaign, Sylvain has mentored a new generation of emerging artists and activists, including her three sons, building a powerful collective of “cultural warriors.” Her large-scale murals aim to reimagine public space through the lens of celebration. By creating a theatrical viewing experience, she activates the built environment, triggering a new spatial experience inspired by color palettes, patterns, and design as identifiers of cultural and historical foundations. Core to her practice is the advancement of participatory art as a means of elevating neighborhood aesthetics and fostering shared understanding while nurturing the next generation of “Cultural Keepers.”

Sylvain has created and led public art projects in partnership with organizations such as the Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago Park District, the Field Museum, the South Side Community Arts Center, and Mural Arts Philadelphia. For over three decades, she has been an exhibiting member and Exhibition Designer for the Sapphire & Crystals collective. She is a 3Arts/Southwest Airlines Community Awardee and Chicago’s INVEST South/West Initiative Artist-in-Residence for Auburn Gresham, as well as a 3Arts “Next Level” awardee, a Black Arts & Culture Alliance Black Excellence Arts Exhibition Awardee, and a Surf Point Foundation Artists Resident.