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Events
ArtCorps staff will
be conducting site evaluations in Central America May 15 through May
28.
ArtCorps will be speaking at the following conferences
this spring and would love to have you stop by.
Grantmakers
Without Borders' 7th Annual Conference on Social Change Philanthropy June 7-9,
2007 in New York City
United Nations Association of Greater Boston
Women's Forum Dinner on September 19, 2007 on Boston's North
Shore. Details to come. |
Contact Info
ArtCorps
www.artcorp.org
+1 (978)
927-2404
artcorps@nebf.org
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About Us
ArtCorps is an international volunteer program--like
the Peace Corps but for artists. Through community arts
projects, artists educate and inspire people to participate
actively in improving the environmental, health, and social
conditions in their communities.
 This month's newsletter tells of artist Cristina León
Lara and her prolific work with Fundación Hermano Mercedes
Ruíz (FUNDAHMER) in El Salvador helping women develop the
confidence to fight for gender equality, addressing gang
violence, building trust between communities, improving
sustainable agriculture practices, and more. Cristina is from
Cartagena, Colombia where she has worked with a variety of
nonprofits, and has also lived in Germany with her husband the
past few years. She is a visual artist and specializes in
painting, art education and art therapy.
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Woman to Woman: How they see me vs. Who I
am
 Cristina helps participants take
responsibility for expressing their opinions and taking action
upon them. In addition to the project described below,
Cristina is integrating rival communities using games,
allowing youth to express their own concerns about violence
through theater, painting giant blankets that illustrate
lessons in sustainable agriculture and encourage students to
discuss what they see, and more.
"I drew a table,
because my family and my community treats me like an
object."
Through the Project Woman to Woman, the
Hermano Mercedes Ruíz Foundation (FUNDAHMER) trains women in
communities surrounding San Salvador, El Salvador in
sustainable agriculture, economic justice and health
alternatives. The education workers saw that fear limited the
women's achievement, so I prepared an easy art therapy
activity that gets participants to respond quickly. Talent and
drawing ability don't matter; the important thing is to break
through fear and open up.
I give cardstock to each
woman and ask them to divide it in two parts. The outside part
is for "how they see me"--they are to illustrate how they
believe other people see them, what others think of them. On
the inside, they are to draw what they believe themselves to
be. The drawings can be objects, animals, pure color,
geometric shapes, anything.
 I was afraid that lack of a good work space was
going to make the activity difficult, but it was the opposite!
Some women drew on their seats while sitting on the ground.
They concentrated on their drawings the whole time. Only 4 or
5 women did not draw immediately--some had children and waited
for their friends to finish and help look after the children
before drawing, but others did not understand the task or were
only able to draw very simple things. Next time, I am going to
sit down individually with a few of them.
Of course
not everything they drew was positive; one drew me a table
because she feels like an object in the eyes of her family and
community. Some cried because they could not express what they
wanted to or because their drawing was so deeply meaningful.
 We were successful in getting
the women to speak openly, express their feelings well, and
feel happy about sharing. Speaking about their drawings, the
women let go of some shyness and felt they discovered new
things about their friends. They allowed themselves to believe
in their own ability to succeed in the Woman to Woman program
and in the value of their peers' support. FUNDAHMER expects
improved attendance and achievement in the program as a
result.
Click here to read Cristina's blog (Spanish and
German only).
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Nonprofit Partner: Fundación Hermano Mercedes
Ruíz
 The "Hermano Mercedes Ruiz" Foundation
(FUNDAHMER) requested an ArtCorps artist to help carry their
mission directly to 223 families, including 1,115 women, men,
youth and children. It is a nonprofit organization serving
poor communities, particularly in the Morazán, La Libertad and
San Salvador areas in El Salvador, led by highly organized and
qualified staff.
FUNDAHMER promotes the whole
development and education of people as well as strong social
ties between them so that people can work together as active
agents of change in their communities, searching for
alternatives to poverty and environmental degradation.
Click here to visit FUNDAHMER's website (Spanish
and Italian only).
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