orphans and art

african collaborative pieces from november 07

these are pictures of a series of collaborative paintings i did for a show at the urban artworks gallery in alpharetta, GA back in november of 07. the whole show was a benefit for heart for africa and the show was called "faces of hope."

my wife and i got to go to kenya with heart for africa in july of 07 and we headed up art education programs with the orphans. one of the things we wanted to do from this trip was to bring back some art from the children and be able to sell them at the show in order to raise more money for them.

now i've been in some conversations with worldvision and other organizations about selling art made by children. it's a good idea... i think it hits the heart... but i just don't think it works. why? well because i don't think people wanting to buy art are going to fork out a lot of money on something that looks similar to the work in their kids classroom. maybe i'm wrong... but i don't think i am.

so how do we solve this?

i was showing a bunch of other pieces at this show. these panels that these kids had painted on were just sitting around my studio as i was making other work for the show. in this process of just being there, i had this idea. if people were going to buy my work because they liked it (along with a number of other reasons), then what if i could add my purchasing momentum to their work? i was there. i had them make these pieces and i took their picture. i'm wrapped up in this story as it is.... so why not add my interpretation to these kids and their story?



so i matched up the paintings and their pictures, and i painted on them. an instant collaboration.... from over 10,000 miles apart.

and that's where these paintings came from.

we would like to do more of this someday. get more artists involved and do a giant collaborative show with the orphans. we'll see what transpires.....