Abena Joan Brown

Last updated
Abena Joan Brown
Abena Joan Brown.jpg
1995 Black Theatre Alliance Award Ceremony
Born
Abena Joan Phillips

(1928-05-08)May 8, 1928
Chicago, Illinois
DiedJuly 12, 2015(2015-07-12) (aged 87)
Chicago, Illinois
NationalityAmerican
Other namesAbena Brown, Abena Joan P. Brown
OccupationArts patron
Years active1960-2011
Known forFounding the Creative Arts Foundation of Chicago

Abena Joan Brown (1928-2015) was an African-American businesswoman and theater producer who founded the Creative Arts Foundation in Chicago to enable black artists to work. Known as the "mother of Chicago's black arts community", she received honors and awards for her work in both theater and social programs. Brown was inducted into the Chicago Women's Hall of Fame and interviewed as a subject of the archival program The HistoryMakers.

Contents

Early life

Abena Joan Phillips was born on May 8, 1928 [1] [2] in Chicago, as the only child of Lueola Reed. [1] [3] She began studying dance when she was three years old and performed in church from childhood. [1] After she was discovered skipping school, Phillips was sent to a Catholic boarding school by her mother. [4] She began her tertiary education as a dance major at the University of Illinois and completed her bachelor's degree at Roosevelt University. She then went on to complete a master's degree in social work at the University of Chicago, [1] after challenging the university to open its doors to black students. [5]

Career

Brown began her career as a social worker and became the Program Services Director at the Harriett M. Harris YWCA of Metropolitan Chicago. [1] [6] She was actively involved in the creation of such organizations as National Association of Black Social Workers during the Civil Rights Movement. [1] [4] Brown's vision was unapologetically Afrocentric and she was driven to create organizations that featured and nurtured the black community. [7] [8] In 1969, [9] [10] Brown and Okoro Harold Johnson, who had met while they were students at Roosevelt University came up with the idea of creating a talent organization for black actors. Together, they along with Al Johnson and Archie Weston Sr. [11] created Ebony Talent Agency (ETA), [9] as an agency to discover and place performers. [11] ETA was franchised by both the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists and the Screen Actors Guild and later evolved into the Creative Arts Foundation, offering training and theater performance opportunities. [9] In 1982, she quit her position at the YWCA to focus her energies full-time to the creation of ETA. [1]

After several years without a permanent home, the group found a permanent location in an abandoned factory in 1978 and began renovations of the space. Over the next decade, with numerous fundraising events, including a National Endowment for the Arts grant, the group staged performances and completed the additions of office and classroom space, a gallery, a library, and a 200-seat modern theater in South Chicago. [9] Brown served as CEO of the organization and continuously worked to expand the organization, spearheading the purchase of additional land in 1995 and again in 1998 to improve both the courses they could offer, as well as showcase works written and performed by black artists. She also pushed efforts to create a children's theater, summer camps and training to inspire children to become involved in the arts. [12]

In addition to her work at ETA, Brown spoke at many events advocating for the arts in and around Chicago. [8] She retired in 2011 after 40 years at ETA. [13] Brown died on July 12, 2015, in Chicago. [6]

Legacy

Brown, who was called by the Chicago Sun-Times, the "mother of Chicago's black arts community" [5] was inducted into the Chicago Women's Hall of Fame in 1991 [6] and in 1995 received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Black Theater Alliance of Chicago. [14] She received the Governor's Award for the Arts, African American Arts Alliance's Paul Robeson Award, as well as many honors from local organizations. Regionally, she received the Hazel Joan Bryant Award from the Midwest African-American Theatre Alliance [15] [16] and was nationally recognized in 2001 as an interviewee for the black history archive project known as The HistoryMakers. [4] In 2011, a section of South Chicago Avenue, between 75th and 76th Streets, was renamed in her honor. [17]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cook County, Illinois</span> County in Illinois, United States

Cook County is the most populous county in the U.S. state of Illinois and the second-most-populous county in the United States, after Los Angeles County, California. More than 40 percent of all residents of Illinois live within Cook County. As of 2020, the population was 5,275,541. The county seat is Chicago, the most populous city in Illinois and the third most populous city in the United States. The county is at the center of the Chicago metropolitan area.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gwendolyn Brooks</span> American writer (1917–2000)

Gwendolyn Elizabeth Brooks was an American poet, author, and teacher. Her work often dealt with the personal celebrations and struggles of ordinary people in her community. She won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry on May 1, 1950, for Annie Allen, making her the first African American to receive a Pulitzer Prize.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Woodfield Mall</span> Shopping mall in Schaumburg, Illinois

Woodfield Mall is a shopping mall located in the northwest Chicago suburb of Schaumburg, Illinois, United States, near the interchange of Golf Road and Interstate 290. The mall is the largest shopping mall in the state of Illinois, the second largest being Oakbrook Center in Oak Brook. It is also one of the largest shopping malls in the United States. The mall features the traditional retailers JCPenney, Macy's, Nordstrom, and Primark.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Township High School District 211</span> School district in Illinois, United States

Township High School District 211 is a school district located in Cook County, Illinois, and is the largest high school district in Illinois. District 211 serves the communities of Hoffman Estates, Inverness, Palatine, and Schaumburg, and portions of Arlington Heights, Elk Grove, Hanover Park, Roselle, Rolling Meadows, Streamwood, and South Barrington in the northwest suburbs of Chicago.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chicago Southland</span> Suburban region of Chicago, Illinois

The Chicago Southland is a region comprising the south and southwest suburbs of the City of Chicago in the U.S. state of Illinois. Home to roughly 2.5 million residents, this region has been known as the Southland by the local populace and regional media for over 20 years. Despite this relatively recent term, some older native Southlanders and current local advertisements colloquially refer to the Southland as the Southside, meaning on the southern side/border of Chicago as extended into the suburbs since some of them previously lived on Chicago's Southside but moved to the suburbs during post WWII white flight.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elizabeth Ann Doody Gorman</span> American politician

Elizabeth "Liz" Doody Gorman is a Republican member of the Cook County Board of Commissioners from 2002 until her resignation in 2015 to accept a job in the private sector. Gorman served as Chairman of the Cook County Republican Party from 2007 to 2008, and was the Orland Township Republican Committeeman, until she was defeated by Cindy Katsenes in 2022.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Judith Jamison</span> American dancer and choreographer (born 1943)

Judith Ann Jamison is an American dancer and choreographer. She is the artistic director emerita of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.

Jamie Foster Brown is the former owner and publisher of Sister 2 Sister magazine, which ran from 1988 to 2014. Newsweek called it the "African-American version of People magazine." As an entertainment journalist, Brown wrote a regular column in her magazine, called "Meow", and through it and her interviews with celebrities, she became the first nationally known black female gossip columnist.

Angela Jackson is an American poet, playwright, and novelist based in Chicago, Illinois. Jackson has been a member of the Organization of Black American Culture (OBAC), a community that fosters the intellectual development of Black creators, since 1970. She has held teaching positions at Kennedy-King College, Columbia College Chicago, Framingham State University, and Howard University. Jackson has won numerous awards, including the American Book Award, and became the fifth Illinois Poet Laureate in 2020.

ETA Creative Arts Foundation, founded in 1971, is an African-American theatre and art museum in Chicago.

Julieanna L. Richardson is an American Harvard-trained lawyer and the founder and executive director of The HistoryMakers, a nonprofit preserving archival collections of African-American video oral histories.

Kaitlyn Black is an American actress known for her role as Annabeth Nass in The CW comedy-drama series Hart of Dixie.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2016 United States House of Representatives elections in Illinois</span>

The 2016 United States House of Representatives elections in Illinois were held on November 8, 2016, to elect the 18 U.S. representatives from the state of Illinois, one from each of the state's 18 congressional districts. The elections coincided with the 2016 U.S. presidential election, as well as other elections to the House of Representatives, elections to the United States Senate and various state and local elections.

Krista Franklin is an American poet and visual artist, whose main artistic focus is collage. Her work, which addresses race, gender, and class issues, combines personal, pop-cultural, and historical imagery.

The Chicago Women's Hall of Fame was created in 1988 by the Chicago Commission on Women to recognize the endeavors of women to improve their socio-economic and political quality of life in the City of Chicago, United States. The awards were distributed each August and photographs and biographies of the inductees were placed in City Hall to inspire others to aim for excellence. August was chosen to commemorate the passage of the 19th Amendment, which occurred on August 26, 1920.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Muriel Tuteur</span> American labor activist

Muriel "Manny" Tuteur (1922-2016) was an American labor activist who was a charter member of the Coalition of Labor Union Women and a founding member of the Chicago Day Care Council. She was the director of the Amalgamated Day Care and Health Center from 1969 to 1983, the first union-sponsored day care center in the United States. During this time, she was one of the founders of the Chicago branch of the Coalition of Labor Union Women and served as its president from 1978 to 1982. From 1983 to 1994 she served as the Assistant Director of Education and Political Action for the Chicago branch of the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union (ACTWU). When ACTWU merged with the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union (ILGWU) to form Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees (UNITE), Tuteur served as the Assistant Education Director for the Chicago and Central States Board until her retirement. She received many awards and honors during her career, including the Hannah G. Solomon Award from the National Council of Jewish Women in 1988, and was an inductee into the Chicago Women's Hall of Fame in 1989.

Joan Livingstone is an American contemporary artist, educator, curator, and author based in Chicago. She creates sculptural objects, installations, prints, and collages that reference the human body and bodily experience.

Rose Weaver is an American actress, singer, director and writer in Rhode Island. Weaver is described as a "major figure in Rhode Island entertainment," and she is known for her role in the film Poetic Justice.

Freida High Wasikhongo Tesfagiorgis is a painter, art historian, and visual culturalist who focuses on African American, modern and contemporary African art, African Diaspora, and modern European Art and Primitivism. She is Professor Emerita, Departments of African-American Studies, Gender & Women’s Studies, and Art, University of Wisconsin-Madison. In 2021 she was the recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 31st Annual James A. Porter Colloquium on African American Art at Howard University.

References

Citations

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Cage 2015.
  2. ↑ The HistoryMakers (pt. 1) 2001.
  3. ↑ Illinois General Assembly 2015.
  4. 1 2 3 The HistoryMakers (pt. 2) 2001.
  5. 1 2 Mitchell 2015.
  6. 1 2 3 Kensey 2015.
  7. ↑ Hartman 2015.
  8. 1 2 Jones 2015.
  9. 1 2 3 4 Chicago Public Library 2016.
  10. ↑ Daily Herald Suburban Chicago 2001, p. 100.
  11. 1 2 Reese 2012.
  12. ↑ Daily Herald Suburban Chicago 2001, p. 101.
  13. ↑ Kleiman 2011.
  14. ↑ Black Theater Alliance 2002.
  15. ↑ Black United Fund of Illinois 2015.
  16. ↑ Orland Park Herald 1998, p. 55.
  17. ↑ McAllister 2011.

Bibliography

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.