Big Car

First Friday Night Market
2023-10-06 18:00 - 22:00 (America/Indiana/Indianapolis) | Tube Factory artspace, 1125 Cruft St., Indianapolis, IN, 46203, United States
Join us again for this upcoming First Friday for a wonderful evening in Garfield Park. We are celebrating local artists, musicians, food trucks and vendors by featuring them in our night market.
Come check out our creative endeavors here around Cruft Street, where you will have the opportunity to purchase local goods from amazing artists and food vendors here at the Tube.
During the winter months, the Night Market is held inside Tube Factory artspace. In the fall, spring, and summer months, vending is located outside.
If you are a local artist or maker, please contact email hidden; JavaScript is required for more information.

A FORCE TO BE RECKONED WITH
2023-10-06 18:00 - 2023-10-21 15:00 | Tube Factory artspace, 1125 Cruft St., Indianapolis, IN, 46203, United States
Guichelaar Gallery
Within the brief window of our human existence, the ability to come together, protect, and care for one another has allowed us to evolve into a complex, beautiful species. But have we lost these vital sensibilities? Collectively, we have forgotten how to connect with others, provide comfort, empathize and sustain community.
A FORCE TO BE RECKONED WITH is an exploration of the friction, the barriers, and distance between the relationships we create with one another and how they are inevitable yet necessary to our growth. Through a combination of sculptural, textile, and print work Nazarinne Ahmed & Colleen Gross explore the labor involved in cultivating these complicated, intimate relationships.

About Nazarinne Ahmed
Nazarinne is a multidisciplinary artist, whose work is the result of an obsessive search for balance, security and comfort. Through the use of textile, printmaking, and tactile processes she creates a space to process, make sense of the past and untangle the complexity of her religious upbringing, cultural and racial identity. Through her work, she examines the way these facets have shaped the manner in which she moves and makes sense of the world around her.
Nazarinne’s mother is of Caribbean descent and her father is of South Asian descent. They both immigrated to New York, where they met and started a family, eventually moving to Indiana, where Nazarinne is currently based.
About Colleen Gross
Darwin’s Theory of Female Sabotage
400 chemistry vials, 400 hollow point boat tail bullet wax castings, 800 sewing pins.
Certain types of relationships prove that our isolation is not permanent. That one person in the entire universe recognizes your humanity means that you yourself can, too.
“Female sabotage is an evolutionary theory regarding the propensity of certain females to select “burdened” males of their species for mating. This ensures that as the males die, more food and other resources will remain for females and their young.”
Colleen is a sculptor from Indy exploring the stages of grief through their personal experience with loss and seeks to create environments for people to feel understood.They investigate the fundamentals of science to aid in the process of ending negative social cycles and introducing new, more inclusive ways of being. By imbuing these concepts into sculpture, they suggest forgetting the learned and inherited ways of survival based on biological phenotypes, and instead seek connection, strength, and longevity.
Curated by Jane Sun Kim / / Big Car Collaborative’s Artist & Public Life Residency

GOLDEN MYST: Tarot Art Show by Daniela Martín del Campo & Gloomy Zauros
2023-10-06 18:00 - 2023-11-19 22:00 | Tube Factory artspace, 1125 Cruft St., Indianapolis, IN, 46203, United States
Arte Mexicano en Indiana and Big Car Collaborative are partnering to present the works by Mexican Daniela Martín del Campo & and Colombian Artist Gloomy Zauros. GOLDEN MYST represents a unique visual and spiritual experience, where chromatic limitation becomes a window to reflection and contemplation: the deep black of the ink, the shimmering gold and the immaculate white of the paper.
GOLDEN MYST is the artistic dialogue between two talented creators: Daniela Martín del Campo, outstanding Mexican children’s book illustrator, who surprises us with her ability to weave enchanting visual narratives. Her reimagining of tarot cards transports the viewer into a realm of meaning and mystery.
On the other hand, Gloomy Zauros, heavily influenced by metal engraving and etching, offers a different and fascinating perspective. His cards are meticulously crafted with fine lines and striking visual depth, inviting us to immerse ourselves in the symbolic layers of the tarot.
GOLDEN MYST is a tribute to the artistic diversity of Latin America and the richness of creative reinterpretation. Through the different techniques of Dan and Gloomy, this exhibition immerses us in a world of hidden meanings, graphic beauty and mysticism, taking us on a journey that transcends the boundaries of imagination and culture.

Golden Myst representa una experiencia visual y espiritual única, donde la limitación cromática se convierte en una ventana a la reflexión y la contemplación: el negro profundo de la tinta, el dorado resplandeciente y el blanco inmaculado del papel.
Golden Myst es el diálogo artístico entre dos talentosos creadores: Dan Martín del Campo, destacada ilustradora infantil mexicana, que nos sorprende con su habilidad para tejer encantadoras narraciones visuales. Su reimaginación de las cartas del tarot transporta al espectador a un reino de significado y misterio.
Por otro lado, Gloomy Zauros, muy influenciado por el grabado en metal y el aguafuerte, ofrece una perspectiva diferente y fascinante. Sus cartas están meticulosamente elaboradas con líneas finas y una sorprendente profundidad visual, invitándonos a sumergirnos en las capas simbólicas del tarot.
Golden Myst es un homenaje a la diversidad artística de América Latina y a la riqueza de la reinterpretación creativa. A través de las diferentes técnicas de Dan y Gloomy, esta exposición nos sumerge en un mundo de significados ocultos, belleza gráfica y misticismo, llevándonos a un viaje que trasciende las fronteras de la imaginación y la cultura.
About the artists:
Daniela Martin del Campo is a Mexican illustrator who draws from the folklore of her country to generate symbolic images. Her charming characters and scenarios hide parallel narratives that invite us to imagine mysterious outcomes. Her work has been featured in Italy, France, Japan, Mexico and the united States.
Gloomy Zauros, a Colombian artist specializes in storytelling, comic, illustration, and tattoo. His work has been recognized in France and Mexico among other countries. His imagination revolves around the oneiric and the occult, and his technique is strongly influenced by metal engraving and ink etching.
Sobre los artistas:
Daniela Martín del Campo es una ilustradora mexicana quien se inspira en el folklore de su país para generar imágenes simbólicas. Sus encantadores personajes y escenarios esconden narrativas paralelas que nos invitan a imaginar desenlaces misteriosos. Su trabajo se ha presentado en Italia, Francia, Japón, México y Estados Unidos.
Gloomy Zauros, artista colombiano especializado en narración, cómic, ilustración y tatuaje. Su trabajo ha sido reconocido en Francia y México entre otros países. Su imaginación gira en torno a lo onírico y lo oculto, y su técnica está fuertemente influenciada por el grabado en metal y el aguafuerte.

Kaila Austin- Process as Practice: Reimagining the Lost Hardrick Mural
2023-10-06 18:00 - 2023-12-17 15:30 | Tube Factory artspace, 1125 Cruft St., Indianapolis, IN, 46203, United States
As the United States continues to face its history of enslavement, oppression, and exclusion of Black Americans in museums and other arenas of power and recognition, “Process as Practice: Reimagining the Lost Hardrick Mural” is impactful and unique. The exhibit is part of an ongoing partnership between artist Kaila Austin; the Norwood community on the southeast side of Indianapolis, and the family of Indiana’s Harlem Renaissance painter, John Wesley Hardrick (1891-1968).

Mientras que los Estados Unidos continúa enfrentando la historia de esclavitud, opresión, y exclusión de los Afro Americanos en los museos y otras arenas de poder y reconocimiento, la exhibición ‘El Proceso Como Practica: Reimaginando el Mural Perdido de John Westley Hardrick’ es una propuesta impactante y única. La exhibición es parte de una colaboración entre la artitas Kaila Austin, la pequeña comunidad de Norwood en el Sureste de Indianapolis, y la familia del pintor de ‘Harlem Renaissance’ originario de Indiana, John Wesley Hardrick (1891—1968).

Over the last three years, Austin worked with the descendants of the United States Colored Troops (African-American Civil War veterans), to recover and record their family histories as their communities shift due to gentrification. Austin is working most closely with Norwood — a neighborhood less than a mile from her childhood home.

Durante los últimos tres años, Austin trabajó con los descendientes de personas de color que fueron miembros de las Tropas en Estados Unidos (veteranos afroamericanos de la Guerra Civil), para recuperar y registrar sus historias familiares después del proceso de gentrificación de sus comunidades. Actualmente, Austin está trabajando más estrechamente con Norwood, un vecindario a menos de una milla de la casa de su infancia.

In February of 2021, Austin learned that the new city morgue would be built on the Hardrick homesite, encroaching on Norwood while the neighborhood celebrated its 150th anniversary. Due to community activism from the descendants, the City canceled morgue construction. Since then, Austin and the community have worked together to reimagine the Hardrick homesite. The mural featured in this exhibit is part of that reimagining. For Austin, this entire project is work that’s transient and malleable. It changes as the research becomes more clear (or muddy).

En Febrero del 2021, Austin se dio cuenta de que la nueva morgue de la ciudad sería construida en el lugar que fuera anteriormente la casa del reconocido pintor Hardrick, invadiendo el vecindario de Norwood, mientras que se celebraba el 150 aniversario de esta comunidad. A través de esfuerzos de la comunidad organizada, se evitó que se construyera la morgue en Norwood. Desde entonces, Austin y la comunidad han trabajado juntos para reimaginar la residencia histórica de Hardrick. El mural que se presenta en esta exhibición es parte de esta reinvención. Para Austin, este proyecto es un trabajo que está vivo, que es maleable y evoluciona, y que cambia mientras que los participantes aprenden más al investigar sobre la vida del pintor.

This mural — recreated by Austin with the support of Hardrick’s family — was originally painted at Crispus Attucks High School in 1934 as part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) program. Hardrick was the only African American artist to be selected in the state. The mural depicted four foundry workers toiling in the heat. The imagery reflected Hardrick’s lived experience working at a foundry in Norwood while he created the mural. However, the principal at Crispus Attucks wanted Black children to aspire to work in professions outside of manual labor, professions that historically excluded Black Americans. For this reason, the school put the mural in the basement, never to be seen again.

Este mural, recreado por Austin con el apoyo de la familia de Hardrick, fue pintado originalmente en la escuela secundaria Crispus Attucks en 1934 como parte de un programa de la ‘Works Progress Administration’ (WPA). En ese momento, Hardrick fue el único artista afroamericano seleccionado en el estado. El mural representaba a cuatro trabajadores de una fundidura trabajando duro en el calor. Las imágenes reflejaban la vida de Hardrick y su experiencia trabajando en una fundidora en Norwood mientras que él trabajaba, al mismo tiempo, creando el mural. Sin embargo, el Director de la secundaria Crispus Attucks quería que los niños negros aspiraran a trabajar en profesiones no manuales, profesiones que históricamente excluían a los afroamericanos. Por esta razón, la escuela puso el Mural en el sótano, para que nunca más se volviera a ver.

Austin reimagined what the mural looked like by working with the Hardrick family and the descendants in Norwood. They explored his diaries and sketchbooks and looked at Hardrick’s mentors and peers — and the community that raised him. The exhibit gives us a chance to step into Hardrick’s world and see how he created the piece from start to finish. Even the title of the piece was lost. So Austin and the family are renaming the mural.

Con la ayuda de la familia Hardrick y de otros descendientes en Norwood, Austin reimaginó cómo luciría el mural hoy. Ellos exploraron sus diarios y cuadernos de bocetos y miraron los de algunos mentores y compañeros de Hardrick en la comunidad en la que él se crió. La exposición nos da la oportunidad de entrar en el mundo de Hardrick y ver cómo creó la pieza de principio a fin. Incluso el título de la pieza se perdió, por lo que Austin y la familia tuvieron que cambiar el nombre del mural.

A collaboration between Hardrick, his descendants, the Norwood community, and Austin, “Process as Practice: Reimagining the Lost Hardrick Mural” is a multi-generational approach to public art. It creates context through community engagement that gives Hardrick’s descendants agency in reimagining the life of an artwork that deserves preservation and attention due to its relevance and meaning for all of us.

Esta colaboración entre Hardrick, sus descendientes, la comunidad de Norwood y Austin, titulada ‘El Proceso Como Práctica: Reimaginando el mural perdido de John Wesley Hardrick’ es un enfoque multigeneracional hacia el arte público. Esta colaboración crea un contexto a través de la participación comunitaria que provee un medio para que los descendientes de Hardrick puedan reimaginar la vida de una obra de arte que merece preservación y atención debido a su relevancia y significado para todos nosotros.

About the Artist:
Kaila Austin is an artist and public historian from Indianapolis. She attended Indiana University, triple majoring in Art History, African American Studies, and Painting. Since 2019, she has run her own historic consulting organization, Rogue Preservation Services. For the last two years, she has been working with six Reconstruction-era African American neighborhoods to record, preserve and uplift the stories of the US Colored Troops on the Southeast side of Indianapolis. The public arts plays a major role in telling these stories and reimagining our city through a Black lens. Austin is an Artist in Residence in Big Car Collaborative’s long-term residency program on the southeast side of Indianapolis.

This exhibit is made possible by The Efroymson Family Fund, The Arts Council of Indianapolis, The City of Indianapolis, Allen Whitehill Clowes Charitable Fund and the Institute of Museum and Library Services.
Research support provided by Indiana Humanities, Wilma Gibbs Moore Fellowship, Indiana Landmarks Black Heritage Preservation Program, Power Plant Grant, Kheprw Institute and CICF’s Artist Ambassadors Program.
Exhibition Production and Organization: The Southside US Colored Troops Coalition, Big Car Staff, Aurora PhotoCenter, Osborn Design & Craft, Quincy Owens Studio, 10 East Arts, Ben Rose, Studio Auteur, Greg Rose, and Rue Stafford.

Acerca de la Artista: Kaila Austin es una artista e historiadora pública de Indianápolis. Ella asistió a la Universidad de Indiana, con triple especialización en Historia del Arte, Estudios Afroamericanos y Pintura. Desde el 2019, dirige su propia organización de consultoría histórica, ‘Rogue Preservation Services.’ Durante los últimos dos años, ha estado trabajando con seis vecindarios afroamericanos de la era de la Reconstrucción para registrar, preservar, y realzar las historias de los soldados veteranos de color en EE. UU., en el lado sureste de Indianápolis. Las artes públicas desempeñan un papel importante a la hora de contar estas historias y reinventar nuestra ciudad a través de una lente negra. Austin es parte del programa de artistas residentes en Big Car Collaborative en el lado sureste de Indianápolis.

Esta exhibición es posible gracias a el Fondo de la Familia Efroymson, El Consejo de las Artes de Indianápolis, la ciudad de Indianápolis, la Comisión de las Artes de Indiana, El Fondo Allen Whitehill Clowes, y el Instituto de Servicios de Museos y Bibliotecas.

Main Gallery
VISIT US
Wednesday -Friday 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Saturday & Sunday 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Tube is also open until 10 p.m. each First Friday.
Closed Holidays

About the Southside US Colored Troop Coalition:
The Southside US Colored Troops Coalition is founded and maintained by the descendants of African American Civil War Veterans who founded six Reconstruction era communities in Southeast Indianapolis. With over 250 descendant families still living on the lots their ancestors purchased after the Civil War, they are some of the oldest African American communities in the United States. The mission of this organization is to preserve, uplift and revitalize the communities, families and stories of these brave men who lived and died for Black Freedom.

About Norwood
The Norwood neighborhood was a Freetown founded and built by Civil War veterans in the 1860s. Survivors of the Civil War from the 28th Regiment returned to Indianapolis in 1866 as newly freed slaves. And they settled further east along Prospect Street, eventually expanding into what became known as Norwood.
Their living descendants have long advocated for the perseveration and recognition of their community. The homes in Norwood have stayed within families for generations.
Norwood’s first church, Penick Chapel AME Zion, was founded in 1889 by former Kentucky slave and Civil War veteran Rev. Sydney Penick

About the WPA
The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads. It was set up on May 6, 1935, by presidential order, as a key part of the Second New Deal.
In one of its most famous projects, Federal Project Number One, the WPA employed musicians, artists, writers, actors and directors in arts, drama, media, and literacy projects. The five projects dedicated to these were the Federal Writers’ Project (FWP), the Historical Records Survey (HRS), the Federal Theatre Project (FTP), the Federal Music Project (FMP), and the Federal Art Project (FAP). In the Historical Records Survey, for instance, many former slaves in the South were interviewed; these documents are of immense importance to American history. Theater and music groups toured throughout the United States and gave more than 225,000 performances. Archaeological investigations under the WPA were influential in the rediscovery of pre-Columbian Native American cultures, and the development of professional archaeology in the US.

Kaila Austin
El Proceso Como Práctica: Reimaginando el Mural Perdido de John Wesley Hardrick
Oct. 6—Dec. 17

Mientras que los Estados Unidos continúa enfrentando la historia de esclavitud, opresión, y exclusión de los Afro Americanos en los museos y otras arenas de poder y reconocimiento, la exhibición ‘El Proceso Como Practica: Reimaginando el Mural Perdido de John Westley Hardrick’ es una propuesta impactante y única. La exhibición es parte de una colaboración entre la artitas Kaila Austin, la pequeña comunidad de Norwood en el Sureste de Indianapolis, y la familia del pintor de ‘Harlem Renaissance’ originario de Indiana, John Wesley Hardrick (1891—1968).

Durante los últimos tres años, Austin trabajó con los descendientes de personas de color que fueron miembros de las Tropas en Estados Unidos (veteranos afroamericanos de la Guerra Civil), para recuperar y registrar sus historias familiares después del proceso de gentrificación de sus comunidades. Actualmente, Austin está trabajando más estrechamente con Norwood, un
vecindario a menos de una milla de la casa de su infancia.

En Febrero del 2021, Austin se dio cuenta de que la nueva morgue de la ciudad sería construida en el lugar que fuera anteriormente la casa del reconocido pintor Hardrick, invadiendo el vecindario de Norwood, mientras que se celebraba el 150 aniversario de esta comunidad. A través de esfuerzos de la comunidad organizada, se evitó que se construyera la morgue en Norwood. Desde entonces, Austin y la comunidad han trabajado juntos para reimaginar la residencia histórica de Hardrick. El mural que se presenta en esta exhibición es parte de esta reinvención. Para Austin, este proyecto es un trabajo que está vivo, que es maleable y evoluciona, y que cambia mientras que los participantes aprenden más al investigar sobre la vida del pintor.

Este mural, recreado por Austin con el apoyo de la familia de Hardrick, fue pintado originalmente en la escuela secundaria Crispus Attucks en 1934 como parte de un programa de la ‘Works Progress Administration’ (WPA). En ese momento, Hardrick fue el único artista afroamericano seleccionado en el estado. El mural representaba a cuatro trabajadores de una fundidura trabajando duro en el calor. Las imágenes reflejaban la vida de Hardrick y su experiencia trabajando en una fundidora en Norwood mientras que él trabajaba, al mismo tiempo, creando el mural. Sin embargo, el Director de la secundaria Crispus Attucks quería que los niños negros aspiraran a trabajar en profesiones no manuales, profesiones que históricamente excluían a los afroamericanos. Por esta razón, la escuela puso el Mural en el sótano, para que nunca más se volviera a ver.

Con la ayuda de la familia Hardrick y de otros descendientes en Norwood, Austin reimaginó cómo luciría el mural hoy. Ellos exploraron sus diarios y cuadernos de bocetos y miraron los de algunos mentores y compañeros de Hardrick en la comunidad en la que él se crió. La exposición nos da la oportunidad de entrar en el mundo de Hardrick y ver cómo creó la pieza de principio a fin. Incluso el título de la pieza se perdió, por lo que Austin y la familia tuvieron que cambiar el nombre del mural.

Esta colaboración entre Hardrick, sus descendientes, la comunidad de Norwood y Austin, titulada ‘El Proceso Como Práctica: Reimaginando el mural perdido de John Wesley Hardrick’ es un enfoque multigeneracional hacia el arte público. Esta colaboración crea un contexto a través de la participación comunitaria que provee un medio para que los descendientes de Hardrick
puedan reimaginar la vida de una obra de arte que merece preservación y atención debido a su
relevancia y significado para todos nosotros.

Acerca de la Artista: Kaila Austin es una artista e historiadora pública de Indianápolis. Ella asistió a la Universidad de Indiana, con triple especialización en Historia del Arte, Estudios Afroamericanos y Pintura. Desde el 2019, dirige su propia organización de consultoría histórica, ‘Rogue Preservation Services.’ Durante los últimos dos años, ha estado trabajando con seis vecindarios afroamericanos de la era de la Reconstrucción para registrar, preservar, y realzar las historias de los soldados veteranos de color en EE. UU., en el lado sureste de Indianápolis. Las artes públicas desempeñan un papel importante a la hora de contar estas historias y reinventar nuestra ciudad a través de una lente negra. Austin es parte del programa de artistas residentes en Big Car Collaborative en el lado sureste de Indianápolis.

Esta exhibición es posible gracias a el Fondo de la Familia Efroymson, El Consejo de las Artes de Indianápolis, la ciudad de Indianápolis, la Comisión de las Artes de Indiana, El Fondo Allen Whitehill Clowes, y el Instituto de Servicios de Museos y Bibliotecas.

Scavenger Hunt with Brittany Fukushima
2023-10-07 12:00 - 14:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Join us to kick off an on-going scavenger hunt, find all the little art sculptures and more around the Circle.
About the artist: Brittany Fukushima is an Indianapolis-based painter and teaching artist who uses their practice to interpret their environment. Drawing and painting become a means to investigate the natural world, express the intangible, and to present alternate ways of seeing. Recently, they have experimented with paint making using foraged pigments. Teaching is an integral part of their process as it keeps them in community and provides fresh perspectives. Brittany currently teaches at the Indianapolis Art Center and is a graduate of Herron School of Art and Design. They have exhibited throughout Indianapolis and Chicago and their work has been featured by Butter, WFYI and Pattern Magazine.
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

MUFON presents- The Experiencer's Journey with Bill Konkolesky
2023-10-07 14:00 - 16:30 | Tube Factory artspace, 1125 Cruft St., Indianapolis, IN, 46203, United States
Accounts of those who’ve opened up about personal first-hand contact with extraterrestrials have proliferated over the past 50 years. Investigators have calculated the data points and researchers have postulated about deeper meanings for our species. What increasingly gets left out, unfortunately, is the journey of personal discovery the experiencers themselves go through. Upon close observation, it becomes evident this is the true heart of the phenomenon.
Bill Konkolesky has been the State Director of the Michigan Chapter of the Mutual UFO Network since 2004.
After a lifetime of his own UFO and abduction encounters, he’s spent the last three decades actively investigating these otherworldly phenomena, trying to make some sense of the bizarre events that have happened to him personally. What he’s discovered confronting these cosmic mysteries is that reality is far stranger than he could have ever imagined.
Konkolesky is the author of the autobiographical books “Experiencer: Raised in Two Worlds” and its sequel “Experiencer 2: Two Worlds Collide.” His personal abduction experiences have been chronicled in the SyFy documentary “Abduction Diaries,” streaming documentary “Abducted by Aliens: UFO Encounters of the 4th Kind,” television series “Alien Conspiracy: They are Here,” and the ABC news special “UFOs: Seeing is Believing.”
He has also served as consultant to Netflix’s “Unsolved Mysteries,” the History Channel’s “Hangar 1” and “UFO Hunters,” National Geographic Channel’s “The Truth Behind,” as well as the Science Channel’s “Uncovering Aliens” and “Close Encounters.”
The Mutual UFO Network is a US-based non-profit organization composed of civilian volunteers who study reported UFO sightings. It is one of the oldest and largest organizations of its kind, claiming more than 4,000 members worldwide with chapters and representatives in more than 43 countries and all 50 states.

Lunch Break Live-Cara Jean Wahlers
2023-10-10 12:00 - 13:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Wahlers is an Indianapolis based singer-songwriter and performer. Her fondness for folk music from the 60s and 70s gave her a sturdy understanding of storytelling, and she’s taken those cues to develop her own unique style of writing – a revealing balancing act of personal experience and inevitable human truth.
She has released an album called “Goodnight Charlotte” withcollaborator and cellist Grover Parido and plays in the Indianapolis and surrounding areas both solo and as a duo.
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Drum Circle with Rob Funkhouser
2023-10-11 13:00 - 14:00, 2023-10-25 13:00 - 14:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Come join Rob Funkhouser from Rhythm Discovery for a drum circle on the Circle!
For this activity, participants will get the opportunity to learn how to express themselves on hand drums and explore the basics of playing with other people. Working with Rob, participants will begin making sounds on the instruments and learn some basic rhythms inspired by traditional music.

SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

John Wesley Hardrick mural live painting
2023-10-11 15:00 - 18:00 | Tube Factory artspace, 1125 Cruft St., Indianapolis, IN, 46203, United States
Artist Kaila Austin will have a series of live painting sessions of the John Wesley Hardrick mural open to the public at Tube Factory artspace: October 11, 3-6pm, October 25, 3-6pm, November 1, 3-6pm, November 8, 3-6pm and November 22, 3-6pm. She will also be at SPARK on the Circle at Monument Circle painting the Harwick Mural on October 13, 2-5pm. The exhibit will run through December 17 with Tube Factory artspace’s regular business hours Wednesday-Friday, 9am-6pm, Saturdays and Sundays 9am-3pm.

As the United States continues to face its history of enslavement, oppression, and exclusion of Black Americans in museums and other arenas of power and recognition, “Process as Practice: Reimagining the Lost Hardrick Mural” is impactful and unique as it explores both history and the potential for our future together. The exhibit which opens October 6, 6-10pm at Tube Factory artspace is part of an ongoing partnership between artist Kaila Austin, the Norwood community on the southeast side of Indianapolis, and the family of Indiana’s Harlem Renaissance painter, John Wesley Hardrick (1891-1968). Austin will first exhibit the first stages of the mural at Re:Public, October 1, 11am-4pm & October 2, 12-2pm then again 3-6pm.
Over the last three years, Austin worked in Indianapolis with descendants of African-American Civil War veterans — known as the United States Colored Troops — to recover and record their family histories as their communities shift due to gentrification. For this project, Austin is working most closely with people from Norwood, a neighborhood less than a mile from her childhood home.
In February of 2021, Austin learned that the new city morgue would be built on the Hardrick homesite in Norwood, all while the neighborhood celebrated its 150th anniversary. Due to community activism from the descendants, the City canceled morgue construction. Since then, Austin and the community have worked together to reimagine the Hardrick homesite. The mural featured in this exhibit is part of that reimagining. “This entire project is work that’s transient and malleable. It changes as the research becomes more clear or muddy,” Austin, who remains a resident of the near southside as part of Big Car Collaborative’s long-term artist residency program.
This mural — recreated by Austin with the support of Hardrick’s family — was originally painted at Crispus Attucks High School in 1934 as part of the Works Progress Administration program. Hardrick was the only African American artist selected in the state. The mural depicted four foundry workers toiling in the heat, reflecting Hardrick’s lived experience working at a foundry in Norwood. However, the principal at Crispus Attucks wanted Black children to aspire to work in professions outside of manual labor, professions that historically excluded Black Americans. For this reason, the school put the mural in the basement, never to be seen again.
Austin reimagined what the mural looked like by working with the Hardrick family and descendants in Norwood. They explored his diaries and sketchbooks and looked at Hardrick’s mentors and peers — and the community that raised him. The exhibit gives us a chance to step into Hardrick’s world and see how he made the piece from start to finish. Even the title was lost. So Austin and the family are renaming the mural.
“Process as Practice: Reimagining the Lost Hardrick Mural” is a multi-generational approach to public art. It creates context through community engagement that gives Hardrick’s descendants agency in reimagining the life of an artwork that deserves preservation and attention due to its relevance and meaning for all of us.
About the Artist: Kaila Austin is an artist and public historian from Indianapolis. She attended Indiana University, triple majoring in Art History, African American Studies, and Painting. Since 2019, she has run her own historic consulting organization, Rogue Preservation Services. For the last two years, she has been working with six Reconstruction-era African American neighborhoods to record, preserve and uplift the stories of the US Colored Troops on the Southeast side of Indianapolis. The public arts plays a major role in telling these stories and reimagining our city through a Black lens. Austin is an Artist in Residence in Big Car Collaborative’s long-term residency program on the southeast side of Indianapolis.
This exhibit is made possible by The Efroymson Family Fund, The Arts Council of Indianapolis, The City of Indianapolis, Allen Whitehill Clowes Charitable Fund and Institute of Museum and Library Services.

Located in the Tube Factory main gallery
Visit us:
Wednesday -Friday 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Saturday & Sunday 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Tube Factory is also open until 10 p.m. each First Friday.
Closed holidays
About Big Car: Big Car Collaborative brings art to people and people to art, sparking creativity in lives to support communities. As a nonprofit arts organization, we utilize tools of culture and creativity to build community and social cohesion — connecting people as a way to boost quality of life. Much of our work happens on a single block where we own or co-own more than 20 properties — including a long-term affordable housing program for artists and Tube Factory — a contemporary art museum with a cafe, studios, and community space. At our campus of adaptive reuse buildings and public greenspace, we host community and cultural programs to promote social connectivity, cooperation, and creativity. We also facilitate people-focused placemaking and place keeping projects across the city and beyond through Spark. Tune in to our experimental, community-focused radio station, WQRT 99.1 FM — also streaming at wqrt.org. More information at bigcar.org.
About the Southside US Colored Troop Coalition: The Southside US Colored Troops Coalition is founded and maintained by the descendants of African American Civil War Veterans who founded six Reconstruction era communities in Southeast Indianapolis. With over 250 descendant families still living on the lots their ancestors purchased after the Civil War, they are some of the oldest African American communities in the United States. The mission of this organization is to preserve, uplift and revitalize the communities, families and stories of these brave men who lived and died for Black Freedom.
About Norwood: The Norwood neighborhood was a Freetown founded and built by Civil War veterans in the 1860s. Survivors of the Civil War from the 28th Regiment returned to Indianapolis in 1866 as newly freed slaves. And they settled further east along Prospect Street, eventually expanding into what became known as Norwood.
Their living descendants have long advocated for the perseveration and recognition of their community. The homes in Norwood have stayed within families for generations.
Norwood’s first church, Penick Chapel AME Zion, was founded in 1889 by former Kentucky slave and Civil War veteran Rev. Sydney Penick
About the WPA: The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads. It was set up on May 6, 1935, by presidential order, as a key part of the Second New Deal.
In one of its most famous projects, Federal Project Number One, the WPA employed musicians, artists, writers, actors and directors in arts, drama, media, and literacy projects. The five projects dedicated to these were the Federal Writers’ Project (FWP), the Historical Records Survey (HRS), the Federal Theatre Project (FTP), the Federal Music Project (FMP), and the Federal Art Project (FAP). In the Historical Records Survey, for instance, many former slaves in the South were interviewed; these documents are of immense importance to American history. Theater and music groups toured throughout the United States and gave more than 225,000 performances. Archaeological investigations under the WPA were influential in the rediscovery of pre-Columbian Native American cultures, and the development of professional archaeology in the US.

Found Art with Giselle Trujillo
2023-10-11 16:00 - 18:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Join Giselle Trujillo in creating a found art piece! Visitors will work in a variety of mediums to help create something unique!
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Circle Side Chats with Deedee Davis
2023-10-12 12:00 - 13:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
The Magic Circle
In October of 1900, the Fall Festivities Society of Indianapolis promoted a week-long carnival with its central focus being the Magic Circle. Monument Circle was transformed with a dizzying array of attractions, parades, performers and animals all in the glow of “electric illuminations.” Yet, despite all the enchantment, the Magic Circle Carnival was a one-time marvel in Indianapolis’ history.
Bio: Deedee Davis is a Herron-Morton resident with an interest in Indianapolis history, specifically historic residential architecture and Greenlawn Cemetery. She oversees digital collections for the Herron School of Art Library at IUPUI.
Circle Side Chats is in partnership with Indiana Humanities. Indiana Humanities is a statewide nonprofit that infuses the humanities into our daily lives. We do this by providing grants, convening discussions, uplifting humanities scholars, spotlighting humanities organizations and activities, and creating our own programs that help Hoosiers think, read and talk.
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Indy Movement Arts -Bump City & Bollywood
2023-10-12 16:00 - 18:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Bump City with Lauren Curry | October 12th, 4-5pm
Bump City is an all levels, all bodies, all genders, all good guided dance party. Be there or be somewhere else. Those are your only two choices.

Bollywood with Usha Sirimalle | October 12th, 5-6pm
Using a creative mix of technique, energy, and emotion, but most of all massive fun, Usha will teach participants poses, grace, hand and foot movements and expressions.These are all key elements of Bollywood dance, which allows participants to explore the meanings of songs and dance and act them out.Bollywood is an upbeat fusion dance class that showcases traditional Indian Dance (Bhangra), and classical and modern (influenced by Hip Hop and salsa) movement. It is one of the most lively, vibrant and rhythmic dance styles.

SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Alan Nakagawa / A.I.R. Head Book Tour
2023-10-13 12:00 - 13:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Join Alan Nakagawa as he talks about his book A.I.R. Head: Anatomy of an Artist In Residence.
Within a short amount of time, Alan Nakagawa found himself in the midst of several artist-in-residence opportunities. It started with the Getty Villa and then the Los Angeles Department of Transportation. Within a few years, Nakagawa had a half of dozen completed or in the mix. And then the emails started coming. Artists wanted to meet with Nakagawa to find out how this happened. To quote The Talking Heads: “Well, how did I get here?” Like his artwork, this book is not a straight line nor a soundbite. This book is Nakagawa’s attempt to answer that question through diary entries, sketches, ideas and concepts. A.I.R. Head is a history of one artist’s journey through his life, his personhood and his career.
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

SPARK on the Circle- John Wesley Hardrick mural painting with Kaila Austin
2023-10-13 14:00 - 17:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Artist Kaila Austin have a live painting sessions of the John Wesley Hardrick mural at SPARK on the Circle at Monument Circle.

As the United States continues to face its history of enslavement, oppression, and exclusion of Black Americans in museums and other arenas of power and recognition, “Process as Practice: Reimagining the Lost Hardrick Mural” is impactful and unique as it explores both history and the potential for our future together. The exhibit which opens October 6, 6-10pm at Tube Factory artspace is part of an ongoing partnership between artist Kaila Austin, the Norwood community on the southeast side of Indianapolis, and the family of Indiana’s Harlem Renaissance painter, John Wesley Hardrick (1891-1968). Austin will first exhibit the first stages of the mural at Re:Public, October 1, 11am-4pm & October 2, 12-2pm then again 3-6pm.
Over the last three years, Austin worked in Indianapolis with descendants of African-American Civil War veterans — known as the United States Colored Troops — to recover and record their family histories as their communities shift due to gentrification. For this project, Austin is working most closely with people from Norwood, a neighborhood less than a mile from her childhood home.
In February of 2021, Austin learned that the new city morgue would be built on the Hardrick homesite in Norwood, all while the neighborhood celebrated its 150th anniversary. Due to community activism from the descendants, the City canceled morgue construction. Since then, Austin and the community have worked together to reimagine the Hardrick homesite. The mural featured in this exhibit is part of that reimagining. “This entire project is work that’s transient and malleable. It changes as the research becomes more clear or muddy,” Austin, who remains a resident of the near southside as part of Big Car Collaborative’s long-term artist residency program.
This mural — recreated by Austin with the support of Hardrick’s family — was originally painted at Crispus Attucks High School in 1934 as part of the Works Progress Administration program. Hardrick was the only African American artist selected in the state. The mural depicted four foundry workers toiling in the heat, reflecting Hardrick’s lived experience working at a foundry in Norwood. However, the principal at Crispus Attucks wanted Black children to aspire to work in professions outside of manual labor, professions that historically excluded Black Americans. For this reason, the school put the mural in the basement, never to be seen again.
Austin reimagined what the mural looked like by working with the Hardrick family and descendants in Norwood. They explored his diaries and sketchbooks and looked at Hardrick’s mentors and peers — and the community that raised him. The exhibit gives us a chance to step into Hardrick’s world and see how he made the piece from start to finish. Even the title was lost. So Austin and the family are renaming the mural.
“Process as Practice: Reimagining the Lost Hardrick Mural” is a multi-generational approach to public art. It creates context through community engagement that gives Hardrick’s descendants agency in reimagining the life of an artwork that deserves preservation and attention due to its relevance and meaning for all of us.
About the Artist: Kaila Austin is an artist and public historian from Indianapolis. She attended Indiana University, triple majoring in Art History, African American Studies, and Painting. Since 2019, she has run her own historic consulting organization, Rogue Preservation Services. For the last two years, she has been working with six Reconstruction-era African American neighborhoods to record, preserve and uplift the stories of the US Colored Troops on the Southeast side of Indianapolis. The public arts plays a major role in telling these stories and reimagining our city through a Black lens. Austin is an Artist in Residence in Big Car Collaborative’s long-term residency program on the southeast side of Indianapolis.

This exhibit is made possible by The Efroymson Family Fund, The Arts Council of Indianapolis, The City of Indianapolis, Allen Whitehill Clowes Charitable Fund and Institute of Museum and Library Services.

Located in the Tube Factory main gallery
Visit us:
Wednesday -Friday 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Saturday & Sunday 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Tube Factory is also open until 10 p.m. each First Friday.
Closed holidays
About Big Car: Big Car Collaborative brings art to people and people to art, sparking creativity in lives to support communities. As a nonprofit arts organization, we utilize tools of culture and creativity to build community and social cohesion — connecting people as a way to boost quality of life. Much of our work happens on a single block where we own or co-own more than 20 properties — including a long-term affordable housing program for artists and Tube Factory — a contemporary art museum with a cafe, studios, and community space. At our campus of adaptive reuse buildings and public greenspace, we host community and cultural programs to promote social connectivity, cooperation, and creativity. We also facilitate people-focused placemaking and place keeping projects across the city and beyond through Spark. Tune in to our experimental, community-focused radio station, WQRT 99.1 FM — also streaming at wqrt.org. More information at bigcar.org.

About the Southside US Colored Troop Coalition:
The Southside US Colored Troops Coalition is founded and maintained by the descendants of African American Civil War Veterans who founded six Reconstruction era communities in Southeast Indianapolis. With over 250 descendant families still living on the lots their ancestors purchased after the Civil War, they are some of the oldest African American communities in the United States. The mission of this organization is to preserve, uplift and revitalize the communities, families and stories of these brave men who lived and died for Black Freedom.

About Norwood: The Norwood neighborhood was a Freetown founded and built by Civil War veterans in the 1860s. Survivors of the Civil War from the 28th Regiment returned to Indianapolis in 1866 as newly freed slaves. And they settled further east along Prospect Street, eventually expanding into what became known as Norwood.
Their living descendants have long advocated for the perseveration and recognition of their community. The homes in Norwood have stayed within families for generations.
Norwood’s first church, Penick Chapel AME Zion, was founded in 1889 by former Kentucky slave and Civil War veteran Rev. Sydney Penick

About the WPA: The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads. It was set up on May 6, 1935, by presidential order, as a key part of the Second New Deal.In one of its most famous projects, Federal Project Number One, the WPA employed musicians, artists, writers, actors and directors in arts, drama, media, and literacy projects. The five projects dedicated to these were the Federal Writers’ Project (FWP), the Historical Records Survey (HRS), the Federal Theatre Project (FTP), the Federal Music Project (FMP), and the Federal Art Project (FAP). In the Historical Records Survey, for instance, many former slaves in the South were interviewed; these documents are of immense importance to American history. Theater and music groups toured throughout the United States and gave more than 225,000 performances. Archaeological investigations under the WPA were influential in the rediscovery of pre-Columbian Native American cultures, and the development of professional archaeology in the US.

Ink Workshop with Brittany Fukushima
2023-10-14 12:00 - 14:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Join SPARK artist in residence Brittany Fukushima for an all-levels ink painting workshop. In this workshop, you’ll learn basic ink techniques and how to paint intuitively using colors handmade by the artist. See the raw materials that go into ink-making and leave inspired to create your own. All materials are provided!
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Sofar Sounds at SPARK
2023-10-14 20:00 - 22:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
WHAT’S A SOFAR SOUNDS SHOW?
Sofar transforms everyday spaces – like a rooftop or art gallery – and turns them into captivating, intimate venues for secret, live music performances, creating an immersive experience that brings guests and artists closer together. Each Sofar is small, and typically features three diverse acts, with no headliner.

SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Plein Air Painting with Brittany Fukushima
2023-10-16 16:00 - 18:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Join SPARK artist in residence Brittany Fukushima for a plein air painting session. Use painting (or drawing) as a way to observe and document your surroundings. Brittany will walk you through how to select a good composition and basic block-in strategies to begin your painting.

SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Drum Circle with Rob Funkhouser
2023-10-18 13:00 - 14:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Come join Rob Funkhouser from Rhythm Discovery for a drum circle on the Circle!

For this activity, participants will get the opportunity to learn how to express themselves on hand drums and explore the basics of playing with other people. Working with Rob, participants will begin making sounds on the instruments and learn some basic rhythms inspired by traditional music.SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Amulet Making with Rachel Leah Cohen
2023-10-18 16:00 - 18:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Throughout the Jewish diaspora, people have created small pouch amulets to hold anything with protective energy and value. These are often made with everyday materials already on hand: medicinal plants, salt, metal, stones, and symbolic objects. The recipes and the names for these amulets vary by place. In Ladino-speaking Sephardic communities, they are called “bulsika” and in Yiddish-speaking Ashkenazi communities, “baytelech.” The ingredients connect us to our ancestors, the environment, and the places we live. The pouch can be worn on the body, kept in a pocket, or hung up in the home. Come make an amulet for yourself or as a gift for someone else, as an embodied ritual of care, connection, and protection.
About: Rachel Leah Cohn is a visual artist and educator based in Indianapolis. Her muliti-disciplinary practice is concerned with themes of communication, mythology and rituals. She exhibits her work internationally and teaches at Ball State University in Muncie, IN.
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

NIGHTJAR, a poetry series
2023-10-18 19:00 - 21:00 | IN
NIGHTJAR creates an inclusive space for all by bringing together spoken-word performers and page-based poets writing in narrative, lyric, and experimental forms. Every third Wednesday, C.S. Carrier and Michelle Niemann host a reading and invite audience members to share their own poetic responses.

October featured poet-Mitchell L. H. Douglas
Mitchell L. H. Douglas’s most recent books of poetry are dying in the scarecrow’s arms and blak al-fə bet\, winner of the Persea Books Lexi Rudnitsky/Editor’s Choice Award. He is a cofounder of the Affrilachian Poets, a Cave Canem graduate, and Associate Professor of English at IUI.

Circle Side Chats with Stephen Lane
2023-10-19 12:00 - 13:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
The Drag Queens of Indiana Avenue
In 1933, Indianapolis hosted its first pansy ball with great fanfare in a jazz club along Indiana Avenue. Stephen Lane presents his graduate work at IUPUI in the contributions of LGBTQ+ people to the social and cultural development of Indianapolis.
Bio: Stephen Lane is a librarian who received his Masters in Library and Information Science and a Masters in Public History at IUPUI in 2018. He is passionate about labor history, LGBTQ+ history and Black history and how those histories intersect and intertwine. He lives in the Haughville neighborhood and serves on the Indianapolis Public Library board of trustees. Stephen enjoys riding his bike and attending art shows around Indianapolis.
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Wagon of Wonders Puppet Show
2023-10-19 16:00 - 18:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Human Size Puppets! Hand Puppets! All made by Indiana native Jenny Ollikainen, have united to tell a story about Monument Circle. Written by Big Car long term residency artist Sylvia Thomas, join us for 15 minutes at the top of the hour and puppet making in-between shows at the Wagon of Wonders at SPARK.

SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Costume Pet Parade!
2023-10-22 12:00 - 14:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Join us for a spooktacular event: The Halloween Pet Costume Parade!
Get ready to show off your furry friends in their most creative Halloween costumes! Whether your pet is a ghostly ghoul, a bewitching witch, or a superhero pup, this parade is the perfect opportunity to celebrate Halloween with your beloved animal companions!
Highlights:
– Pet Costume Parade
– Costume Contest with Prizes
– Trick-or-Treat at the Welcome Wagon
– Polaroid Pet Pictures
Prizes will be awarded in various categories, including:
– Best Costume
– Most Original Costume
– Funniest Costume
– Scariest Costume
Admission is free, and no registration is required. Just come and have a howling good time with your pets and fellow animal lovers. We can’t wait to see the fantastic costumes and share some Halloween joy with our four-legged friends.

Artist Hangout
2023-10-22 12:00 - 14:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Artist hangout is a casual networking event for artists and creatives hosted by Dai. This event will take place at SPARK on the circle on Sunday, October 22nd from 4-6 pm. During this two hour event you’ll be able to network, socialize and hangout with other creatives. Spark fellow, Dai, will also be conducting short interviews with artists to post on social media.
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Lunch Break Live with Rob Funkhouser
2023-10-24 12:00 - 14:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Rob Funkhouser is a composer, performer, and instrument builder who can never quite sit still. His work is concerned with ideas of place, memory, and pattern and he is interested in interrogating the interstitial spaces between established genres.
He holds an M.M. from Butler University in Music Composition, and most recently completed Peace of Mind, Speed of Thought for Classical Music Indy. He has released recordings, curated performances, and installed works in many places both around Indianapolis and in many other parts of the country. In 2020, he began a long-term living residency with Big Car as part of their APLR program, and served as a resident artist for Cat Head Press in collaboration with Landon Caldwell. He also serves as Education Manager for the Rhythm Discovery Center, where he runs public programming for schools and community members. He has collaborated with diverse groups including Forward Motion, Los Angeles Percussion Quartet, No Exit Theater, and Chicago-based director Ryan Gleason.

SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

John Wesley Hardrick mural live painting
2023-10-25 15:00 - 18:00 | IN
Artist Kaila Austin will have a series of live painting sessions of the John Wesley Hardrick mural open to the public at Tube Factory artspace: October 25, 3-6pm, November 1, 3-6pm, November 8, 3-6pm and November 22, 3-6pm. She will also be at SPARK on the Circle at Monument Circle painting the Harwick Mural on October 13, 2-5pm.

The exhibit will run through December 17 with Tube Factory artspace’s regular business hours Wednesday-Friday, 9am-6pm, Saturdays and Sundays 9am-3pm.

As the United States continues to face its history of enslavement, oppression, and exclusion of Black Americans in museums and other arenas of power and recognition, “Process as Practice: Reimagining the Lost Hardrick Mural” is impactful and unique. The exhibit is part of an ongoing partnership between artist Kaila Austin; the Norwood community on the southeast side of Indianapolis, and the family of Indiana’s Harlem Renaissance painter, John Wesley Hardrick (1891-1968).

Over the last three years, Austin worked with the descendants of the United States Colored Troops (African-American Civil War veterans), to recover and record their family histories as their communities shift due to gentrification. Austin is working most closely with Norwood — a neighborhood less than a mile from her childhood home.

In February of 2021, Austin learned that the new city morgue would be built on the Hardrick homesite, encroaching on Norwood while the neighborhood celebrated its 150th anniversary. Due to community activism from the descendants, the City canceled morgue construction. Since then, Austin and the community have worked together to reimagine the Hardrick homesite. The mural featured in this exhibit is part of that reimagining. For Austin, this entire project is work that’s transient and malleable. It changes as the research becomes more clear (or muddy).

This mural — recreated by Austin with the support of Hardrick’s family — was originally painted at Crispus Attucks High School in 1934 as part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) program. Hardrick was the only African American artist to be selected in the state. The mural depicted four foundry workers toiling in the heat. The imagery reflected Hardrick’s lived experience working at a foundry in Norwood while he created the mural. However, the principal at Crispus Attucks wanted Black children to aspire to work in professions outside of manual labor, professions that historically excluded Black Americans. For this reason, the school put the mural in the basement, never to be seen again.

Austin reimagined what the mural looked like by working with the Hardrick family and the descendants in Norwood. They explored his diaries and sketchbooks and looked at Hardrick’s mentors and peers — and the community that raised him. The exhibit gives us a chance to step into Hardrick’s world and see how he created the piece from start to finish. Even the title of the piece was lost. So Austin and the family are renaming the mural.

A collaboration between Hardrick, his descendants, the Norwood community, and Austin, “Process as Practice: Reimagining the Lost Hardrick Mural” is a multi-generational approach to public art. It creates context through community engagement that gives Hardrick’s descendants agency in reimagining the life of an artwork that deserves preservation and attention due to its relevance and meaning for all of us.

About the Artist:
Kaila Austin is an artist and public historian from Indianapolis. She attended Indiana University, triple majoring in Art History, African American Studies, and Painting. Since 2019, she has run her own historic consulting organization, Rogue Preservation Services. For the last two years, she has been working with six Reconstruction-era African American neighborhoods to record, preserve and uplift the stories of the US Colored Troops on the Southeast side of Indianapolis. The public arts plays a major role in telling these stories and reimagining our city through a Black lens. Austin is an Artist in Residence in Big Car Collaborative’s long-term residency program on the southeast side of Indianapolis.

This exhibit is made possible by The Efroymson Family Fund, The Arts Council of Indianapolis, The City of Indianapolis, Allen Whitehill Clowes Charitable Fund and Institute of Museum and Library Services.

Main Gallery
VISIT US
Wednesday -Friday 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Saturday & Sunday 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Tube is also open until 10 p.m. each First Friday.
Closed Holidays

About the Southside US Colored Troop Coalition:
The Southside US Colored Troops Coalition is founded and maintained by the descendants of African American Civil War Veterans who founded six Reconstruction era communities in Southeast Indianapolis. With over 250 descendant families still living on the lots their ancestors purchased after the Civil War, they are some of the oldest African American communities in the United States. The mission of this organization is to preserve, uplift and revitalize the communities, families and stories of these brave men who lived and died for Black Freedom.

About Norwood
The Norwood neighborhood was a Freetown founded and built by Civil War veterans in the 1860s. Survivors of the Civil War from the 28th Regiment returned to Indianapolis in 1866 as newly freed slaves. And they settled further east along Prospect Street, eventually expanding into what became known as Norwood.
Their living descendants have long advocated for the perseveration and recognition of their community. The homes in Norwood have stayed within families for generations.
Norwood’s first church, Penick Chapel AME Zion, was founded in 1889 by former Kentucky slave and Civil War veteran Rev. Sydney Penick

About the WPA
The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads. It was set up on May 6, 1935, by presidential order, as a key part of the Second New Deal.
In one of its most famous projects, Federal Project Number One, the WPA employed musicians, artists, writers, actors and directors in arts, drama, media, and literacy projects. The five projects dedicated to these were the Federal Writers’ Project (FWP), the Historical Records Survey (HRS), the Federal Theatre Project (FTP), the Federal Music Project (FMP), and the Federal Art Project (FAP). In the Historical Records Survey, for instance, many former slaves in the South were interviewed; these documents are of immense importance to American history. Theater and music groups toured throughout the United States and gave more than 225,000 performances. Archaeological investigations under the WPA were influential in the rediscovery of pre-Columbian Native American cultures, and the development of professional archaeology in the US.

Graffiti Knitting with Mary Jo Bayliss
2023-10-25 16:00 - 18:00 | IN
A gathering where knitting and graffiti collide! Simultaneously inspired by traditional knitting and graffiti, this ever-evolving piece combines fiber adjacent activities, coloring sheets derived from graffiti and knitting motifs, and opportunities for participants to share their creative path stories.
You are invited to come join the fun, because without YOU, Boo, this project can’t happen.
About the artist:
Mary Jo Bayliss specializes in creating environments that help people feel at ease using space, light and color to achieve these goals.
SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

African Dance with Uzuri Asad
2023-10-26 16:00 - 18:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Join Uzuri Asad, artist in Big Car’s Public Life Residency, for a dose of culture, self-care, and community as we explore rhythms from West Africa and other parts of the Diaspora. Give your body and soul a moment to reflect and progress all at once, meet Asad on the floor of the circle!

SPARK is a partnership with Downtown Indy, the City of Indianapolis, and the Indiana War Memorials Commission — and funded by the Capital Improvements Board. It is a continuation of our work last year and in 2015 on the Circle.
At Big Car, we approach our work at the Circle as a site- and community-specific socially engaged art and creative placemaking project. The SPARK on the Circle pop-up park was collaboratively designed with Indianapolis-based Merritt Chase to be a restorative public place where people of all walks of life can relax, play, socialize, and engage with art and artists in the heart of our city.

Circle SPARK Fest
2023-10-28 11:00 - 18:00 | 1 Monument Circle, South Facing Steps, United States
Have yourself a Pumpkin carving, pottery making, face painting, UBE Fest loving good time at Circle SPARK Fest!
This two-day fall festival features live music by an amazing array of local musicians, delicious food, artisan vendors, and hands-on creative activities led by Indianapolis artists. The festival, which runs from 11 am until 6 pm each day, is free to attend. And it takes place at the pop-up park on the southwest quadrant of Monument Circle that has been closed to traffic this summer.
(MC- Tennah):
10/28 Sat
11-11:45 – Nat Russell and Landon Caldwell
12-12:45 – Freetown Village Singers
1-1:45 – Naomi Pulver
2-3 Allison Victoria
3:30-4:30 – D’Classics
5-6 – Bashiri Asad
Activity Schedule (all free to participate):
10/28 Sat
12-5pm Henna with Pam
12-5pm Indy Face Painting
11-6pm Making Pottery with Stephanie Williams
11-6pm Pumpkin Carving
4-6pm Candle Making with Freetown Village
New this year: SPARK Fest’s organizers at Big Car Collaborative and Downtown Indy are teaming up with UbeFest — an event that’s all about the tasty purple yam often used in desserts in Filipino cuisine called ube. UbeFest brings more than 30 food, artist, and unique retail vendors to the Circle for the festival. Many will showcase, among their offerings, a variety of tasty ube-based treats.
