Resident Artists Make Peoria Their Temporary Home

Located on Washington Street, just South of the Mac Arthur Hwy bridge, Prairie Center of the Arts is housed in a 120 year old building that was once home to a rope manufacturer. The warehouse is now occupied with a large gallery space on one side, and a printmaking shop and artist studios on the other.

The Center offers residencies to artists allowing them to work with the tools in the workshop without distraction. Dawn Gettler came to Peoria from Chicago as an art resident a couple of years ago, and when she was offered the program manager job at the Center, she moved here full-time last December. “I found that I could buy a house here and afford a studio and get a job in the arts. I sort of re-evaluated what it meant to be successful, and for me that meant being able to make work and sustain a lifestyle, which I can do in Peoria,” she says. Read the rest of the story here.

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