A project
Background
Peruvian Girl drawn for the Memory Project.
I hoped to convey both resilience and beauty through this piece.
Junior year of high school, my Fine Arts class contributed to the Memory Project, a non-profit organization that facilitates an exchange in which high school art students create portraits as special gifts for children facing substantial challenges around the world. Our high school class was paired with a Peruvian orphanage and we each drew the portrait of a child we were paired with. To see a hand-drawn portrait of yourself is so exciting, I have seen many of my friend glean with fascination when they see themselves as the portrait subject of one of my art pieces. To gift this small moment of joy to children facing adverse situations felt so incredibly powerful.
Inspired by this project I took part in, I decided to independently contribute to a similar project as well.
My uncle is affiliated with the Samarthanam Trust, an organization in India that aims to provide a home and education for children with disabilities. I asked my uncle if he would be willing to take photographs of the children at the trust and send them to me. Over the course of my senior of high school year, I completed several portraits of these children and even got a handful of students from my high school’s art program helped as well. I gave these portraits to the children when I went to India later that year as small gifts joys - something often overlooked (granted for reasons of necessity and practicality) for children growing up in adverse socioeconomic situations. The excitement and intrigue of these children was so worth the hours of effort it took to make this project a reality.
Here is a link to the trust's website and here is a link to the trust's donation page.
PORTRAITS
Below are a few of the sketches from the project. This project would not have been possible in its entirety without the help of several students at my high school. The portraits above include work from other students who contributed to this project.
