Tune in to Lumpen Radio 105.5 FM for Sala: A Living Room of Ideas, a live radio broadcast presented by Silvia Inés Gonzalez, the administrator of POCAS (People of Color Artist Space). The program features Holly Cahill and Olly Costello in a conversation about what liberated and flourishing futures look like. They discuss the joys of community seed libraries, local foraging, and developing a deeper understanding of what decay can nurture. What needs to be composted, saved, and planted as we move toward our collective healing? What can emergence teach us about our interconnectedness to land and each other? What strategies can we adopt from the teachings of our natural environments to be rooted in collective abundance and environmental sustainability? What lessons can we learn from the art of migration, preservation, transformation, and cultivation? What seemingly “small actions” carry us closer to the sacred yearning for life, living, and preparing the conditions for the right to thrive?
Holly Cahill (b. 1976) is a Chicago-based interdisciplinary artist working between painting, drawing, fibers, sculpture, and collage. Her process-oriented abstractions gather inspiration and materials from natural phenomena that speak to issues of growth, transformation, and embodied experiences that intersect with the ways we navigate the built and natural environments. She is a current member, former director, and co-director in Chicago of Tiger Strikes Asteroid: a 501c3 non-profit network of independently programmed, artist-run exhibition spaces with locations in Philadelphia, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Greenville, SC. She has curated exhibitions, often in collaboration with others, at venues such as Tiger Strikes Asteroid, Weinberg Newton Gallery, Mana Contemporary, The Glass Curtain Gallery at Columbia College (Chicago, IL), Satellite Art Show (Miami, FL), and Scotty Enterprises (Berlin, Germany).
Olly (they/them) is a white queer illustrator, PIC abolitionist, food-growing enthusiast, and community seed saver, who is committed to participating in the creative, collective work of building a liberated and flourishing future for all of us. Through their artistic and community-based practices, they explore themes of interconnectedness, spiritual ecology, emergence, accountability, community building, Prison Industrial Complex abolition, Transformative Justice, and belonging. Olly finds direction and purpose in recognizing the power our radical imaginations have in shaping the world we live in and knows that this is one of our most essential tools. Olly hopes their work can be a small contributing part of creating our new culture, grounded in honoring the inherent value of all beings and pushing us beyond violent cultures of imperialism, white supremacy, and capitalism toward a culture of accountability, collective wellness, and abundance.
Sala is an ongoing talk series anchoring the stories of artists in Chicago through topics such as grief, labor, immigration, and movement building. The multimedia project, now in its second season, includes radio interviews, public programming, and an archival self-published zine. It is supported by Hyde Park Art Center’s Artists Run Chicago Fund as part of Art Design Chicago.
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An initiative of the Terra Foundation for American Art in partnership with artists and organizations across the city, Art Design Chicago is a series of events and exhibitions that highlight the city’s artistic heritage and creative communities.
