Over the last three months individuals and families across Chicago's neighborhoods, from Rogers Park to Roseland, have been asked to express and contribute their visions for the future of the city through homemade election-style yard signs.

Project organizer Daniel Tucker has been distributing blank yard signs purchased from a local sign maker and encouraging a diverse range of engaged and active Chicagoans to write or draw depictions of the kind of long-term goals they have for the city that are often not addressed through the limited and visionless dialogues that occur around elections.

The organizer expressed his opinion on this election and how it relates to this public art project by saying "Despite this election's historic nature very little of the candidates proposals suggested concrete plans that significantly departed from the privatization and business centered policies of the current Mayor Daley. The greatest significance of this election season has not been in the candidate’s words but in the opening up of local residents imaginations about who can lead this city and in what direction. That Chicago's collective political imagination was so constrained and stifled by Mayor Daley’s over-extended time in office was one of the worst side effects of his tenure. This project is about moving on and hearing from hard working residents about where they think we should all go together."

Thus far the signs have ranged from the direct and issue-based to much more utopian visions. The Thasiah family of the 40th ward expressed their idea that a good school in every neighborhood is the key ingredient they would like to see in Chicago's future. Carolyn Thomas of the urban agriculture organization God’s Gang in the 9th ward made a sign with her family reading “A Bird in Every Yard, a Kindle for Every Mind, Peace in Every Heart” reflecting her multi-faceted approach to community organizing that lies at the intersections of animal husbandry, agriculture, education, technology, and non violence.

In addition to facilitating the sign making for other individuals and families throughout the city, Tucker has been making his own signs every week and putting them out in parks and snow piles in neighborhoods throughout the city.

Despite the results of today’s election, the project will continue through April and will see dozens more people putting out their yard signs expressing their visions for the city. As the Midwest spirals in political turmoil this project attempts to shine lights towards better and more liveable futures.

A limited edition book featuring photos of the project taking place throughout Chicago will be released on May 16th; the day the next mayor takes office. The book will feature an essay by the organizer and a piece by Micah Maidenberg of Progress Illinois on the political landscape in Chicago that gives this art project its timely context.