Evanston Artist Named 'Chicagoan of the Year'

You may not know who Indira Johnson is, but you've probably seen her work. 

The Evanston artist created 100 Buddha sculptures and placed them around the city of Chicago and Evanston, as part of a project designed to promote nonviolence.

That project, called Ten Thousand Ripples, garnered Johnson a nod as one of Chicago Magazine's 2013 "Chicagoans of the Year."

Earlier: Buddha Sculptures Promote Peace in Evanston

"This is the first time that a visual artist has received this honor and it is a testament to the Ten Thousand Ripples Public Art and Peace Initiative and the power of the arts to transform public spaces, communities and lives," Johnson wrote in an e-mail to Patch. 

For the project, Johnson installed ten "emerging Buddhas" in Evanston and nine other Chicago-area organizations in partnership with the Chicago arts organization Changing Worlds. She solicited input from residents of each area on where to place the Buddhas, then encouraged community groups to start discussions around a theme related to peace. In Evanston, that theme was “bridging differences.”

“My whole idea is that, for each of us, peace means different things,” Johnson told Patch in February.  

The concept of “peace” can seem like a big, scary idea, she said. Her goal was to get people to think about small ways they could bring about peace on a local level—a goal that dovetailed with Evanston’s community-wide discussion of nonviolence following the deaths of several young men to gunfire last year.

Community projects in Evanston included a drumming circle and arts activities in Twiggs Park and the creation of a woven loom between two trees in Grey Park. 

“The whole idea is the community has to be engaged in the process,” Johnson said in February.  “In some ways, I think of it as a call and response.”