Join us today, Tuesday, April 23rd at 7pm to try your hand at silkscreen printing! We’ll have ink, screens, printing paper, and resources on silkscreen printing. If you’re feeling brave, bring in a t-shirt, apron, or other piece of fabric to print on. Try making art prints, greeting cards, or anything else you can think of! This event is free and open to the public, suitable for ages 12 and up. We’ll see you there!
American Artworks Gallery, located at 7314 W. Madison in Forest Park, is a local artist’s haven. With lots of floor and wall space to showcase local talent, the gallery has been doing just that for the past few years.
Inside the gallery, you can find locally made jewelry, paintings, sculptures and teapots, among countless other works of local craft. Supporting the gallery supports the location as a small business, but also the local craftspeople who created these works.
We believe local businesses are part of what makes a community great. If you want to suggest a business to spotlight, email Maureen of the Reference Department!
Interested in art? Come to a free, stimulating lecture on the artwork of Pablo Picasso at the Forest Park Public Library! Presented by Jeff Mishur of Art Excursion, the lecture will feature in depth discussions of the period from an art history perspective, and an emphasis on the works of revolutionary painter, Pablo Picasso.
Register online and we’ll see you Tuesday, February 12th at 7pm!
Katherine Avenue by Larry Sultan is a work of modern art photography. The book brings together three of Larry Sultan’s best known series. Made principally in the San Fernando Valley, these works Larry Sultan explored the domestic landscape of his childhood and adolescence by photographing and re-presenting photographs of his parents, their home, their friends and neighbors, and their experience of the American Dream.
Wandering further behind this Californian fabric, he photographed in suburban homes serving as sets in the pornographic industry. His work culminated in a series of tableau of Latino day labourers undertaking prosaic tasks on the peripheries of these suburban sites - the kind of places where, growing up, he would find his own sense of space and freedom.
This book, and many others, are unique to the library’s collection. Come out and see what you can find!
Come to the library on Thursday, December 6th at 7pm for the gallery opening celebration for the Walther Lutheran High School in Melrose Park. Local talented artists in the area will have their own work on display in the Austin Room.
Join us for the opening reception, snacks, and great artwork from local teens!
Textile and knitting art has become super popular lately, and our reoccurring Beginner’s Knitting course can help you jump into the fun! Meet new friends, techniques, and share ideas for projects from wall art to wearables. This class is an amazing freebie offered by the library. This 6 session course that meets each Saturday will jump start beginners techniques like casting on, purling, finishing, and more- all under the encouraging eyes of experienced knitters.
Sign up online to join the class, and we’ll see you starting Saturday, October 20th at 3pm.
Join us on Tuesday, October 16th at 6pm for a free screening of the documentary, World of Z.
His art has been compared to da Vinci, his writings have been compared to Bukowski, and his life has been compared to Van Gogh. Considered an “insane genius” by those who know him, Zbigniew Fiks is a manic-depressive outsider artist, revealed in this stunning portrait of mental illness and creativity. The film follows Z’s three-year bipolar cycle, exposing his wild fluctuations from madness to reclusive depression. Interwoven throughout are his personal home videos, films and audiotapes. Interviews with friends and family add to his personal history. His poetry is a product of his illness, illustrating Z’s truly unforgettable story.
Winner of Best Documentary at the Hollywood Film Festival, World of Z is screening at the library for one night only- don’t miss it!
Sometimes the Reference office feels like the work of Alicia Martin, sculpture artist. See and learn more here.
Graffiti World by Nicholas Ganz
Graffiti has long been a ubiquitous aspect of the urban landscape, since anonymous, largely unsung spray-can art first hit city walls in New York and Philadelphia in the late 1960s. As hip-hop culture spread from America, graffiti became a worldwide phenomenon, emerging in the 1980s as the symbolic artistic language of young people everywhere.
Arabic Graffiti by Pascal Zoghbi
Without regional borders or constraints, ‘Arabic Graffiti’ references the use of Arabic script in urban context. It showcases artists, graffiti writers and typographers from the Middle East and around the world who merge Arabic script and calligraphy styles with the art of graffiti writing, street art and urban culture. The project offers many different, diverging and at times contradicting ideas and approaches to treating this sensitive tradition with contemporary vision.
The Faith of Graffiti by Norman Mailer
Photographer Jon Naar has enhanced the original with thirty-two pages of additional photographs that are new to this edition, along with an afterword in which he reflects on the project and the meaning it has taken on in the intervening decades. It stands now, as it did then, as a rich survey of a group of outsider artists and the body of work they created—and a provocative defense of a generation that questioned the bounds of authority over aesthetics.
The Ceramics Bible by Louisa Taylor is full of great ideas for ceramic sculptures and functional art. This book is full of techniques and a guide to materials used to create the perfect ceramic creations for your home.
Rethinking Digital Photography by John Neel is a highly visual guide to explaining camera settings, composition tips, and different methods of capturing the perfect digital image.
Trash-to-Treasure Papermaking by Arnold E. Grummer is loaded with ideas on how to turn junk mail into recycled coasters, accumulated business cards into letter stationary, and scrap paper piles into paper tulip bouquets.
