By now, the nation is familiar with the Chicago’s outsize homicide rate. But it was laid bare in startling detail on a 4-foot-by-6-foot piece of fabric as part of a project called "Untitled (Homicide Quilt)," a quilted map of Chicago with the names of each of the city's homicide victims from last year stitched into the neighborhood where a life ended, the Chicago Tribune reports.
Some neighborhoods, such as West Ridge and Lincoln Square, have few to no names. But others, such as South Shore or Englewood on the South Side, have 20 to 30, the Tribune says.
"I really hope it sparks conversation and awareness," Monica Fuentes, 32, a Pilsen resident and one of 15 artists who worked on the quilt, told the Tribune. "It's showing an unfortunate reality."
The project was revealed for the first time Saturday night at a Craft/Work exhibit at Beauty & Brawn gallery, 3501 W. Fullerton Ave., in the city's Logan Square neighborhood.
It was created by Craft/Work co-founders and artists Nora Renick-Rinehart and Rachel Wallis, who worked with a group of about 14 artists, many from a craft group called El Stitch y Bitch, for about three months.
"Last summer, with the national conversation on Chicago's violence, we wanted to do something that touched on that," Wallis told the Tribune. Using RedEye Chicago's online homicide tracker, Wallis compiled a list of 415 homicide victims, their ages, neighborhoods and how they were slain, she told the paper.
Read more at the Chicago Tribune.