South Side Community Art Center (George A. Seaverns Jr. House, Charles Comiskey House)

“The lone continuously operating survivor of over 100 community art centers established under the Works Progress Administration's Federal Art Project, it has provided instruction for generations of youth and the opportunity for its audience to see exhibitions of the works of the most prominent African- American artists of the twentieth century.”

“Its outreach to forms beyond the visual arts has included musical, theatrical, and literary forms of expression, providing a comprehensive curriculum of arts education. Through its teachers, its students, its ambitious exhibition schedule, and its permanent collection, the South Side Community Art Center has made important past achievements and significant contemporary works accessible to the public.”

“The original owner of the house, George Seaverns, Jr., was a prominent figure in Chicago's business community from the 1890s through the 1920s. At one time an officer of the Board of Trade, Seaverns commissioned the house to be built and lived here for 13 years.”

“The interior conveys a sense of simplicity and abstraction of form within the context of the original house. z The original architect of 3831 S. Michigan Ave. was L. Gustav Hallberg, a native of Sweden who emigrated to the United States as a young man and established a prominent practice in Chicago.”

“The remodeling of the South Side Community Art Center brought into sharp focus the differences between traditional design and the New Bauhaus approach. Its interior conveys a sense of simplicity and abstraction of form within the context of the original house. vol The first floor was extensively altered at that time.”

“By removing the walls separating the original living on room, library, and dining room, the entire south half of the first floor has been opened into a single gallery.”

“Two community art centers were established in Illinois under the auspices of the Federal Art Project-- one in East St. Louis and another on Chicago's South Side. Peter Pollack, a photographer and the owner of a North Michigan Avenue art gallery that had been the first commercial gallery in the city to exhibit the work of local African-American artists, was the staff member of the Illinois office of the Federal Arts Project who was responsible for the organization of the South Side Community Art Center, and became its first director.”

“Other painters in the first exhibition were Raymond Gabriel (dates unknown) and Eldzier Cortor (1916-), two artists who were committed to the South Side Community Art Center during its first decade.”

“The first director of the Center, Peter Pollack, as well as a couple of board members were white, but most board members were business people and others of prominence in the African-American community.”

“Among the actors who worked with the South Side Theater Project and went on to some reknown were Jimmy Payne and Harry Belafonte. Associations with Famous Artists Many prominent artists spent significant portions of their careers at the South Side Community Art Center.”