For over 38 years, Centro Romero has been a community-based organization that serves the refugee immigrant population on the northeast side of Chicago. Their interrelated programs include the Youth Learning and Leadership Program, Family Services (encapsulating the Domestic Violence Prevention Program, the Public Benefits Program, and the New Americans Initiative), Adult Education, and Legal Services.
Centro Romero’s Youth Learning and Leadership Program provides intensive after-school programs for academic support, recreational and cultural activities for children. During the Fall 2022 and Spring 2023 semesters, the Management Studio team partnered with the Youth Leadership Program to lead a series of visual and performance art workshops. These workshops culminated in an exhibition and performance titled Our Center: Individual Expression of Centro Romero’s Youth Leaders.
Our Center: Individual Expression of Centro Romero’s Youth Leaders is an exhibition of visual and performance art created and driven by Centro Romero’s Youth Leadership Program. The high-school-aged students dug into a series of visual arts workshops to create pieces driving toward the theme of Individual Expression. Meanwhile, the middle-school-aged students developed a short sci-fi thriller play performed on April 22, 2023, at 2:00pm. Our Center features work created and curated entirely by the program’s Youth Leaders including ceramics, painting, print-making, recordings of the performance, and set pieces created for the play. This program was developed to give students a wide range of arts practices to explore and present in their own vision in order to provide them a space to speak rather than be spoken of.
Centro Romero’s Youth Learning and Leadership Program provides intensive after-school programs for academic support, recreational and cultural activities for children. During the Fall 2022 and Spring 2023 semesters, the Management Studio team partnered with the Youth Leadership Program to lead a series of visual and performance art workshops. These workshops culminated in an exhibition and performance titled Our Center: Individual Expression of Centro Romero’s Youth Leaders.
Our Center: Individual Expression of Centro Romero’s Youth Leaders is an exhibition of visual and performance art created and driven by Centro Romero’s Youth Leadership Program. The high-school-aged students dug into a series of visual arts workshops to create pieces driving toward the theme of Individual Expression. Meanwhile, the middle-school-aged students developed a short sci-fi thriller play performed on April 22, 2023, at 2:00pm. Our Center features work created and curated entirely by the program’s Youth Leaders including ceramics, painting, print-making, recordings of the performance, and set pieces created for the play. This program was developed to give students a wide range of arts practices to explore and present in their own vision in order to provide them a space to speak rather than be spoken of.
The Halls After Dark (2023)