5 Artists To Meet On The Beverly Art Walk

CHICAGO, IL - With so many great artists descending on the neighborhood this weekend for the Beverly Art Walk, it will undoubtedly be difficult to pick out which ones to see (although with seven hours, stopping to see all of them is certainly a possibility). More than 200 artists will display their works at 60 venues throughout Beverly and Morgan Park with a number of local businesses turning into art galleries for the day.

Since it might be difficult to get to all of them, we've picked out five at random to highlight here. Some are well-known while others may not have been on the radar for regulars of the Beverly Art Walk.

Dawn Liddicoatt: Liddicoatt is a multidisciplinary artist, though her focus is hand-built ceramics and figurative sculpture. She enjoys experimenting with texture and color, and often incorporates textiles to this end, impressing textiles into clay, tying onto or weaving into completed ceramic pieces, or embedding into a painting. She enjoys integrating found objects to add interest and meaning. Liddicoatt is inspired by the healing power of nature, and often invokes the ocean in her work. She also is particularly interested in social justice, and uses her work to explore, document, and expose social justice issues. Her Lynch Pots, a visual representation of police killings by race and state, have been exhibited at the Hyde Park Art Center, The Beverly Arts Center, and the Hairpin Gallery.

Saturday's location: Fabula pop-up gallery on 95th Street at Hamilton

Preston Thomas: A mix of fine arts and street photographer, Thomas captures striking images and often delivers them with his insightful stories and musings.

Saturday's location: A pop-up on at RMH Design at 1804 W. 103rd Street called "Surface+Texture"

Annie Novotny: Novotny teaches in the fashion department at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, also working to become an art therapist. Her work is a mosaic of small embroidered tapestries. Novotny has spent the past year as an art therapy intern at Jesse Brown V.A. hospital, and has documented her experiences of working with Veterans experiencing PTSD, by utilizing a confessional-like process of hand embroidered "snap shots." Each piece captures a moment of connection that Novotny wanted to memorialize in cloth in order to better understand her role, and the complex trauma she witnessed in her time at the V.A.

Saturday's location: "Planet 104" pop-up gallery at 10408 S. Western Ave.

T.C. English-Dumont: An oil painter, his works are beautiful studies of the human figure, tinged with mystery and pathos.

Saturday's location: The "Fabula Gallery" pop-up at 95th and Hamilton

Dorothy Straughter: Straughter presents her "American History Quilts," a series of homemade quilts that each tell their own story from a particular part of American history. She picked up quilting just a little more than three years ago and has since been featured at numerous prominent art galleries throughout Chicagoland and has shared interesting bits from her historical research related to the quilts in several talks and discussions as well. All of Straughter's quilts, now more than 40 of them, are the result of historical research. She's touched on different topics, all of which having to deal with some part of history.

Saturday's location: Cork & Kerry, 10614 S. Western Ave.

These are just five of the many talented artists that will show their work in the neighborhood on Saturday, which will mark the fifth annual Beverly Art Walk. Continue to follow Patch on Thursday as we will release the "Beverly Art Walk Survival Guide," a list of all the artists and where they will be.

Photos: Dorothy Straughter, Preston Thomas, Dawn Liddicoatt - All provided