Repairing homes as a form of public art, Tonika Lewis Johnson helps Chicago neighborhood reinvest in the disinvested

CHICAGO -- Segregation. Redlining. Land sale contracts, where real estate speculators in the 1950s and ‘60s sold homes to Black families on rent-to-own contracts for double — or more — what the property was worth. Artist Tonika Lewis Johnson has been highlighting these decadeslong injustices against the Black community in projects such as “The Folded Map” and “Inequity for Sale.”

Now, Lewis Johnson is working on “unBlocked Englewood,” an effort in the 6500 block of South Aberdeen Street in Chicago's Englewood neighborhood to showcase the transformative power that emerges when a community unites to heal and uplift.

Partnering with the Chicago Bungalow Association, Lewis Johnson is working with residents along that one block to beautify and revitalize 22 vacant lots and 24 residential buildings, and aiding about 75 residents in the process.

While Lewis Johnson, an Englewood native, was working on “Inequity for Sale” — erecting land markers in front of the Englewood addresses that were involved in land sale contracts’ documenting stories of residents who endured the discriminatory practice, and creating a map connecting family names to the homes listed as land sale contracts and the amount of money