With Art - We Persevere!

We have launched a new program - Love My Neighbor 2 Prevail - which brings together the healing power of the community with the long proven power of art to communicate and inspire at the times of crises.

We are continuing our Love My Neighbor curriculum program through a new format with its central message and practice being directly applied to communities in need in midst of national emergency.  In essence, the crisis is emphasizing everything the Love My Neighbor message and project are all about.  

We are combining the food distribution with outreach through children's art generated from our program, sharing the images and support messages from the children to lift the spirits of our older neighbors who are lonely in the social isolation.

This program now is more essential than ever with kids out of school, out of all organized after school programs, sports and clubs.  This program not just provides some in home activity – it gives kids the sense of participation in something important, of social responsibility and community engagement while being safe at home.

We tell kids that even in home isolation we are still a community.  We ask them what image they think can lift the spirit of another person who is lonely, who is worried, who is in need of help.  We tell them that art has a great visual power that can affect other people; that at the time of crisis people need each other even more than ever; that through art they can communicate their feeling toward other people, their neighbors.

This is what we believe the true purpose of art is and at the time like this it is needed more than ever.

With Art - We Persevere!

In Isolation - We Are Still A Community!

Thanks to the donations from FoodCycle LA and Trader Joe’s we were able to rapidly bring much needed food to one of the most difficult and notorious neighborhoods of LA county, the “Scottsdale” neighborhood of Carson, the site of our Love My Neighbor public art project.

The food situation was difficult for older people and limited ability folks over there even before the crisis.  There is no food store in walking distance. Now we were able to fill the gap when needed most and quickly  bring much needed food for the quarantined elderly folks of this long underserved community.

We are bringing food in at night and community activists and security takes them to houses in the morning. We also bring children’s art generated from our program with support messages from kids to lift the spirits of our older neighbors. 

Even in home isolation we are still a community!  By loving our neighbor we will prevail!

Love My Neighbor 2 Prevail! We Respond to National Emergency

Community fridge stacked with nutritious food for the quarantined elders of the tough “Scottsdale” neighborhood of Carson at the site of our non-profit Artward! Gallery “Scottsdale”. The homebound local elderly and limited ability folks don’t even have a grocery store in walking distance.  Think of your safety, of those around you first but if you can - think what you can do for the most at risk group, for our elders and sick. Stay safe. Stay sane.  We’ll make it.

We Will Prevail!

Love My Neighbor at the Taste of Soul 2019 with Bank of America

Our awesome Love My Neighbor Day “Scottsdale” art tent was front and center at the remarkable TasteOfSoul 2019 celebration this past Saturday thanks to my awesome partners from Bank of America Better Money Habits community volunteer team. 

The Taste of Soul Marching band parade passing by our Love My Neighbor booth

350000 people attend this annual iconic LA celebration.  

So many things were super special about it.  Bank of America team of volunteers worked their hearts out from 5am setting it up and all throughout the LA heatwave day assisting kids with my art program and giving their parents free financial advice (of course regardless of where they bank) just as they always do in our Carson based program.  It’s an amazing and real dedicated effort by a corporate player to truly make itself part of the community.  

 

 

It was amazing as always to see how kids respond to an idea of thinking about their special neighbor after learning the stories of my special neighbor that I love to portray.  

As an artist it is a special privilege to see how portraying diversity of my special Carson neighbors affects the viewers and participants of Love My Neighbor project.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another amazing part was that the long marginalized and neglected epicly troubled “Scottsdale” neighborhood in Carson that was given up on so many times throughout its 5 decades of policy failure history was now representing The City of Carson right next to the booth of Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors at the event that carries particularly special meaning for “Scottsdale’s” long time African American residents. We did it all with art.  Art is power. 

It was also great to see my good friend  Carson Councilmemeber Jawane Hilton stopping by the booth.

Love My Neighbor Day with Bank of America at the Hispanic Heritage Month Celebration in the City of Carson

The bucolic village at the foot of the mountain in the El Salvador jungle.  The incoming fire of rockets and mortar grenades.  The house hit and on fire.  The people running from it in horror.  This is the image by 13 year old Krystina depicting the story of her grandparents in our LoveMyNeighbor art tent at  the City of Carson Hispanic Heritage Month Celebration . The raw testimonial power of the image simply cannot leave any viewer indifferent.  The great communicative power of Art.

There were a number of works of a remarkably meaningful visual impact depicting personal family stories of children's’ great parents and great great parents which is the real world meaning of the strange word “heritage” that none of the kids knew the meaning of before.

I am deeply grateful to a remarkable group of Bank of America volunteers from Better Money Habits community outreach program who in the scorching heat worked with amazing dedication, non-stop and as long as needed.

Even inside my 20’ x 40’ tent it felt like broiling but Anh, Gwen, Maria, Sandy, Miguel and the whole team worked their hearts out tirelessly assisting me with kids and giving free financial advice to parents.

In our unique colaboration with the City of Carson and Bank of America we really developed a unique model when children  can experience art making in the professional setting, often for the first time in their lives.

There is no time to teach them how to make art in those setting, but it is an opportunity to give them an experience of being an artist. Once guided, the kids once and again show an amazing capacity for grasping the idea and purely on their own convert it into a viable and compelling visual image, producing content driven form which is a big thing to me in my own art.

Art is inherent in the way we, the humans, process the world.  Looking at amazingly powerful Krystina’s image proves it yet again.