Beautiful Papier Mache from Jacmel!

Check out the updated display board in the art room! The students at Art Creation Foundation for Children in Jacmel gifted us with a stunning array of handmade papier mache sculptures! Birds, fish, butterfly, baskets and more! When we figure out how to make this into a national program, these young Haitian artists will be happy to send your classroom Art Rewards for Hearts Sold too!

New School Year, New Hearts!

Air dried hearts in the kiln, ready to bisque fire!

Underglazed hearts, ready for a glaze fire!Finished, shiny hearts ready to go to the museum store!

Here are a few pictures of the firing processes the Hearts for Haiti go through to get ready for sale at the museum! The first quarter 6th grade art students worked hard to make lots and lots of hearts to raise money for students at Art Creation Foundation for Children. Like last year, the efforts will continue with each new art class.

I am very excited to report that I am in contact with a number of other art teachers both here in Howard County and in other states across the country in an effort to grow this project to a national level. So far, the vision includes an easy to access web page with everything an art class or any other interested group would need to self-start creating Hearts for Haiti. The school in Jacmel is interested in created Art Rewards for participating groups. Beautiful handmade pieces of papier mache artwork, created by the students in Jacmel, would be sent to groups who create and sell certain numbers of hearts. If anyone reading this is interested in getting on board or has ideas or expertise in crafting such programs, please contact me!

When in Doubt, PAINT!

Bisque-fired hearts, hand painted and varnished, August 2010

School starts again in just over a week, and all the staff there are hard at work getting everything ready. Part of that work is applying no less than seven layers of wax to the floors. As such, I don't really have access to the kiln to do glaze fires of the hearts. What to do?

There were only 2 little hearts and one ornament left at the museum when I went to visit last week! I searched my home-studio and found a small cache of bisque fired hearts. I thought I'd give it a go with just painting them to tide us over till I can get back to the kiln. I think they turned out pretty well. I used heavy duty polyurethane to varnish and protect them. After a day or so of curing-time, I was pretty convinced the paint wasn't going to get damaged, even with lots of handling.

We dropped the hearts off yesterday. It was then that Ted Frankel, the owner of The Sideshow gift shop of the American Visionary Arts Museum, informed me that he just sent a $500.00 check off to Art Creation Foundation for Children from sales of the hearts!!! Wahoooo!! I went straight home that night to start another small set of painted hearts. VERY soon, I will be back with the very generous, talented students of Patapsco Middle School, and we'll be able to fire up that kiln again!

"The Healing Power of Art" exhibit in Washington DC

"Haiti's first lady Elisabeth Preval visits the Smithsonian's Ripley Center where a display of paintings and drawings made by Haiti's children after the earthquake is being exhibited, in Washington, on Thursday, June 17, 2010. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)"

Read more at the Washington Examiner:
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/local/ap/96583869.html#ixzz0uvmbYS4Y

Today I was in Washington D.C. to once again take in the museums. I visited the National Museum of African Art specifically to see the show "The Healing Power of Art: Works of Art by Haitian Children after the earthquake. To get to it, enter The Smithsonian's Ripley Center ( the fancy kiosk-like building) between the red Smithsonian Castle and The Freer Gallery, go down 3 floors, and you're there.

I was blown away by the sequined "drapo" of the actual Haitian flag. You really must see it in person. There was a large collaborative painting on canvas by the children as well as individual works. The outreach also included the opportunity for children to engage in the performing arts, which can be very cathartic for the performer as well as the audience.

Here is the link to the show and the show summary.

New Heart Ornaments: How far does $5 go in Haiti?

photo credit: Emmanuel Midi, from "Haiti's New Demolition Business" on insidedisaster.com

(ceramic ornaments) hearts created by patapsco middle school students

Just yesterday, I dropped off more hearts to The Sideshow at The American Visionary Arts Museum. Included in yesterday's delivery were some much larger hearts that had been turned into whimsical hanging ornaments with wire, sequins, ribbon and cool beads and charms. We did this for the holiday season on '09, and they quickly sold for $5 each. I liked the metaphor of $5 being a typical weekly wage for the lowest paid adults in Haiti (and for 1/3 of the world's population.) However, I recently read an article published online by The Miami Herald that Haitian adults are being paid an average of $5 per day to help clean up from the earthquake.

Think about that for a minute....

Only five dollars for hours upon hours of backbreaking work in 100+ degree heat with no provisions of food or water or any guarantee of safety. Five months after the earthquake, the sheer quantity of concrete rubble is an enormous hurdle to reconstruction. There are precious few pieces of big, working construction equipment available. One estimate given by the Miami Herald is that there are 13 million cubic feet of rubble to deal with.

How does one deal with that?

Well, if you want to earn $5 per day, you pick up a sledgehammer, break up bigger pieces of concrete into smaller pieces of concrete, load them by hand--no gloves--in the hot sun onto the back of a regular pick up truck, then repeat ad infinitum. Add to that the reality that human remains--lost loved ones, men, women, children, citizens of Haiti--are still slowly being found via this process--and that of course, everything must stop to tend to such sad discoveries (unfortunately often this protocol doesn't even take place)---and one is left realizing that estimates of over a decade just to dig out if current procedure continues start to seem very realistic. Get an inside look here.

So it is with respect to the survivors of the quake who are toiling in this way that we decided to offer the ornaments again. It feels so small sometimes, but there is so much heart behind what the students in Maryland have been doing to try to help.

As always, absolutely 100% of the proceeds go to Art Creation Foundation for Children in Jacmel, Haiti.

A little tap-tap takes a long trip

A Tap-Tap on the streets of Haiti

A papier mache tap-tap created by the students at Art Creation Foundation for Children

Not too long ago, I came home to find a package on my front step. It was big and light, and I hoped right away that it was from Jacmel. One of the biggest thrills and also most humbling experiences I have these days is when a box of art work arrives on my doorstep unexpectedly, like a holiday surprise!

In this particular box was a papier mache tap-tap! I had long admired them on the Art Creation Foundation for Children website, and here was one of my very own, generously gifted to me by these phenomenally talented children still working together to survive and rebuild after the January earthquake.

Personally, I have always been fascinated with the ways in which private cab or bus drivers in many different areas of the world turn their vehicles into veritable works of art. You'll see it in Pakistan, India, various areas in South America, of course Haiti, and many other places too!

And who doesn't love to decorate their car? This goes beyond mere decoration. These are Art Cars, to be sure. They serve as a much needed source of income for the driver and transportation for anyone with fare who will shout ale (say "ah-lay") to hop on. I have read that the name tap-tap comes from the sound made when rapping one's fist on the metal panel to let the driver know you want off.

Jacmel is still in severe crisis after the earthquake. Life isn't anywhere near back to "normal", and even most days before the disaster, "normal" was awful for many, many people to begin with. The students at the school in Jacmel are making art every single day. Art can heal. It can help people deal with unfathomable situations. It can be a source of solace and income. It has been the way I have made sense of my own life and has given me a vocation. It opens the doors of imagination, which can be an oasis amid difficulty.

My beautiful handmade tap-tap hangs just above my kitchen window. The inside is filled with people who, in my imagination, are talking or even singing together. The top rack is loaded with good things from the market, and the whole of it is painted with beautiful colors and patterns. It is signed by Fan Fan, the young artist who created it.

When I look at it each day, I feel encouragement and hope and an ache in my heart that these talented and tenacious children are creating beauty in the face of adversity. This little tap-tap made a very long journey from Jacmel to Baltimore, and I couldn't be happier that it made the trip!

Mesi Anpil Fan Fan!
Haiti Cherie!

PS--Would you like to have your very own Tap-Tap from Jacmel? Visit The Sideshow museum store inside The American Visionary Arts Museum for a huge variety of gorgeous paper-mache sculptures, bowls and lovely birds!!

Our School Year is Ending...

Glazed hearts, created by students at Patapsco Middle School, waiting to be fired in the kiln

As the school year comes to a close, I am busy firing as many hearts as I possibly can to sell at The Sideshow in Baltimore in support of Art Creation Foundation for Children in Jacmel, Haiti.

We have had a very productive year! We raised over $1,200 through the sale of the hearts, every penny of which went entirely to the kids in Jacmel. At one dollar per heart, that means well over one thousand hearts were sold in Baltimore! That also means that hundreds and hundreds of individuals who visited the American Visionary Arts Museum saw the hearts at the register, learned about the school in Jacmel and made the decision to be a part of this "family of hope". Because that's what it comes down to, doesn't it? We all have to take care of each other.

Conditions are still absolutely deplorable in much of Haiti, and there is an astonishing amount of work yet to be done. But each individual who makes the decision to share what they have to help these vulnerable children are literally helping to build a better future for Haiti. In this case, a little really does mean a lot. My heartfelt gratitude to EVERYONE who helped us this year by buying a heart at the museum, whoever you are, wherever you are.

Don't forget Haiti--there is still so much to be done. Please consider visiting Art Creation Foundation for Children online. Click on the yellow JUST GIVE banner on the left, and make a tax deductible donation.

And to my students: you are the heroes of this grassroots project. I am so proud to be your teacher.
A thousand times: thank you!