Allen Vandever

Chicago, IL

Allen Vandever is a contemporary, multimedia artist based out of Chicago, as well as founder and president of Childhood Fractured, a humanitarian nonprofit organization working to end child sexual abuse through contemporary art.

Allen is a contemporary artist, activist, entrepreneur, risk taker, and story-teller. He has mastered many skills and fought for many causes. These include working previously for Greenpeace, holding art initiatives for children, and being a founder of Risque Business – an improv group that performed at colleges and high schools around the country doing skits on healthy lifestyles and choices. He started VARAW (Violence Acquaintance Rape Awareness Week) at Northern State University and helped organize and run Teen Institute, a summer camp for teenagers to learn how to be peer-helpers. Allen also started his own religion during college, Allisum, really more of a philosophy, and worked for a women’s spiritual magazine, The Chalice. Moreover, he has comforted the dying through his years as a hospice worker. As a servant for the human condition, Allen has discovered the unity of art, beauty, and love in his life & mission.

In essence, Allen has always created innovative art events to challenge the value and meaning of art. Vandever lives life to the fullest, incorporating art into every thing he does. He truly makes art his life — or would it be life his art?