A workshop artist puts the finishing touches on a mosaic; Chicago, Ill.

Eight years ago Monica Haslip traded in her corporate-marketing gig for a career that combined her formal arts training and a desire to work with children. For nine years, she had worked at companies such as Johnson Publishing Co., Black Entertainment TV and the IL Insurance Exchange. A native of Alabama, Haslip had studied art as a child and longed to share her talent.

She bought an abandoned building on Chicago's South Side for $24,000 and put $250,000 into renovations. After two years of rehabbing and construction, Haslip, 37, opened the Little Black Pearl Workshop. At LBPW, inner-city kids learn art and entrepreneurship by designing products that they sell when they complete LBPW's Arts=Smarts program.

Children do not have to have any previous art training to become a member, and the program receives private and state funding. The LBPW has 12 full-time staff members serving between 750 and 1,500 kids annually.

Little Black Pearl Workshop
Monica Haslip, Executive Director
4200 S. Drexel Boulevard
Chicago, IL 60653
Various art pieces and home installations are available — the work of young artists at the Little Black Pearl Workshop.
773-285-1211
www.blackpearl.org