Jessica Patterson is a Chicago-based visual artist and creative entrepreneur behind JessTimeless L.L.C. Her work is known for its bold colors and cartoon-inspired style, using imagery of women to explore shared human experiences, mental health, and self-confidence. Through community-centered projects, workshops, and live painting, she creates art that is both expressive and accessible, encouraging reflection, healing, and connection.
JessTimeless is inspired to pursue art to process her emotions, share relatable stories, and create space for honest conversations—especially around mental health and identity. Growing up, art became a language that allowed her to express what words couldn’t and to celebrate Black culture and resilience. Creating art showed her the power of visibility and representation, and it continues to fuel her passion for uplifting others through creativity.
Caress Sahura is a naturally gifted, multi-hyphenated artist who has graced some of the hottest stages in and around Chicagoland. She is a singer/songwriter, performer, maker, makeup artist, and mother who discovered her love for performing at the tender age of five and began singing and dancing at school musicals and assemblies. She was later introduced to the works of Iconic poets Maya Angelou and Nikki Giovanni, which prompted her love for the art style. Caress immediately began reciting poems and competing and placing in young author & performance competitions. Throughout her childhood and adult life, she has explored creativity in various art forms including painting, makeup artistry, singing, songwriting, and formulating botanical body care products.
“Art to me is therapy. Being expressive is therapeutic, especially as a performing Artist. I love being on stage. It gives me so much joy!”
Caress hopes to continue pursuing her passions by boldly sharing her music and creativity with the world. You can follow her musical journey at @caresssahuramusic . You can check out her body care products at @sahura.botanica.
Glenida Hampton is a Nutrition and Culinary Arts teacher in District 209 at Proviso West High School. Art has been a part of her life for as long as she can remember, whether through painting, drawing, admiring architecture, or even something as simple and meditative as crocheting. Creativity shapes how Glenida sees the world, and she views life through an artistic lens.
Big Fine Anderson is a Forest Park–based fire and flow artist whose work lives at the intersection of movement, ritual, and embodied storytelling. She has lived in Forest Park for the past seven years, and it is also deeply rooted in her childhood. Through fire, flow arts, and somatic movement, she creates performance experiences that honor the body as both instrument and archive—exploring presence, power, and transformation as living art forms.
She was drawn to the arts through the body first—through movement, rhythm, and the need to express what words could not hold. As a Black woman, fire and flow became a way for her to reconnect with ancestral memory, resilience, and personal sovereignty. Growing up in the Forest Park, Maywood, and River Forest area and graduating from Trinity High School in River Forest, she brings to her work a lived experience, a sense of community, and the belief that art is not separate from life—it is how we remember ourselves and one another.
Big Fine is an active part of the Chicago Full Moon Jam community and regularly hosts fire safety workshops and beginner flow workshops. To her knowledge, she is the first Black female powder fire-breather and powder fire-breathing instructor currently practicing, and her work is rooted in education, safety, and expanding representation within the fire arts.
Photo credit: @opticsbyced.ll (IG)