About
The Riverside Arts Center is a regional anchor for creative practice and learning. Home to galleries, artist studios, and a school that showcases the art of our time, RAC serves as a hub for artistic exploration and community engagement. Since 1993, the Riverside Arts Center (RAC) has been providing Riverside, its surrounding suburbs and the city of Chicago with vital arts programming. We host exhibitions, arts classes, special events, and celebrations of creativity. Located in the heart of Historic Riverside, IL, the RAC includes the Freeark Gallery + Sculpture Garden, The FlexSpace, and a variety of studio spaces, including a renowned clay studio that has a full range of electric, raku and stoneware kilns.
our mission
The Riverside Arts Center strives to be the epicenter for contemporary art in the near west suburbs of Chicago. Through exhibitions, education, artist studios and public events, the RAC is an advocate for the vital role the arts play in nurturing community, and amplifying diverse experiences, ideas, and backgrounds.
Equity
Riverside Arts Center is committed to equity & inclusion in all our programming, including our classrooms and exhibition spaces. Through art, RAC connects a community of artists, art lovers and students that extends from the residents of Riverside to greater Chicago and beyond. We treasure the diversity of the people we touch. We pledge to continue developing our program to serve and welcome everyone.
“Art invites us to know beauty and to solicit it from even the most tragic of circumstances. Art reminds us that we belong here. And if we serve, we last.” --Toni Morrison
Exquisite Corpse Gala
2024 FALL GALA FOR THE RIVERSIDE ARTS CENTER (RAC)
Thank You!
On October 19, 2024, the Riverside Arts Center hosted the Exquisite Corpse Fall Gala. Inspired by the collaborative surrealist art game originating in France, this unique evening of creativity and imagination included locally made hors d'oeuvres and cocktails, music, a silent auction featuring art & exclusive items from area artists and businesses, and live exquisite corpse drawings by talented community members.
Together, we raised more than $26,000 to ensure that the arts are thriving and accessible in Riverside! Your incredible support ensures that artists like the 107 artists we exhibited and the 900 community members touched by RAC’s work this year can thrive and continue to engage in the arts! Our gratitude for purchasing tickets and sponsorships, buying raffle tickets, bidding on auction items, making in-kind donations, and, most of all, believing in the power of the arts to nurture our community!
Click here for more information and photographs of the evening.
Exhibitions
RAC exhibits a variety of work including painting, sculpture, ceramics, photography, video, installation and more.
Membership
By becoming a RAC member, you’re not only investing in the success of the Arts Center, but also the quality of life in our community. Memberships are a contribution to RAC and are fully tax-deductible. Join today!
“An experience like nothing else”
