art days

It’s good to be able to answer the question “What can I do or bring that another person (another intern?) can not?” with an action that you really enjoy. It’s also really great to feel experiences transforming your understandings, in real time, on a day-to-day basis.

I find it rather amazing that my experiences with Sudanese youth are coming full circle through markers and cameras, despite the fact that I’m a terrible artist. In January of 2003 the youth program coordinator of Refugee Family Services told me that once I began working with refugees I wouldn’t ever stop. New to Atlanta, finding that my new University lacked both fine arts and communications departments, I was seeking some way to get my feet on the ground. I never though a monster-track advert for judging a children’s art contest would lead me to where I am, but as per her predictions (and after two years volunteering as an art teacher, then a year of research looking at refugees’ art and photography as a tool for community building, followed by teaching art in refugee and IDP camps in Uganda), here I am in Sudan teaching art to returning refugees.

Over the past week and a half, I’ve been holding daily sessions with anywhere from 10 to 25 adolescents. The objective of the engagement has evolved in parallel to their expressiveness and excitement. What began as an activity to get me out of the compound for a bit in the afternoon has grown into a support structure for our social marketing agenda for the early-childhood education work and community mobilization ideology.

Self-portraits were the first step in getting these ‘kids’ – some former soldiers, some orphaned, some attending school, all survivors of war and returning refugees – to open up and think about how visuals and pictures can help us share ideas and feelings with other people.

Experience has shown me that it’s best to embarrass myself before expecting others to do the same:






I initially found myself feeling intimidated by the age of these participants – in the past I’ve worked almost exclusively with young people between the ages of 8 and 13. Despite being much closer to me in age – ranging between 15 and 28 – the image quality and sophistication was quite similar to that of previous students. My guess is that extremely limited exposure to visual arts as well as limited participatory involvement in the arts are to blame. The biggest difference however was the sense of humour and intellectual engagement with the workshop’s agenda.





Over the next few days our subject matter evolved. The following assignment was a depiction of our respective experiences of education. For many this meant formal school buildings in Ethiopia, for others, images depicted where they found themselves before being in school, and accordingly, what school/formal education had brought to their life. Following this, we focused on how to represent the ideal school, and what educational institutions should look like. Some of these pictures really impressed me – ranging from students aspiring for masters degrees, which represent the epitome of educational attainment (snarky har har from me on this one), to images of diverse student bodies, indicating a sense of cross-cultural acceptance, unity through the equalizing structure of education, and progress over tribal differences that abound here.

If nothing else, the kids like me and it’s good to make some friends here:






Diversity at school:




We next explored how the community can support the educational development of youth – the crux of my research and interests for my summer stint in Sudan. The images and dialogue, masterfully recorded/transcribed by Bret, were nothing short of awesome; the ideas and vision that these ‘youth’ have is incredible. It’s great when you approach something thinking that you have to explain it, slowly, and repeatedly through haphazard translation, but people actually get it. Like, really, truly, get it.




They told me how the parents must come together and meet to plan how to physically support (build) the schools, provide the food at the schools, and make demands of the government for trained teachers. The images showed people coming together through opportunities like sporting events, which could also serve as a forum to resolve conflicts and disputes. I was told that the community must demand the schools be located close to homes/villages so people can attend (there is only a primary school system here; students aspiring to attend school after grade six must either return to Ethiopia – a financial impossibility for most – or attend secondary school in neighbouring Maiwut town (22 km away) - a logistical impossibility for the others). Some pictures showed the lifestyle before school in which children found themselves sitting and eating mangoes all day; with school to attend for the children, parents must take responsibility for some of the work, such as firewood collection, fishing, digging, to maintain the way of life in the community, that the youth otherwise take responsibility for.

I find myself continually humbled by the simple privilege of education.

This of course has not been problem free. The ever present ‘dependency syndrome’ I’ve written on, a somewhat natural by-product of receiving aid (i.e. living in an environment in which basic necessities - that we in the west tend to turn a blind, unappreciative eye toward – like housing, food, water, pens, soap, glasses, vitamins, can not only be obtained, but are provided for free by the humanitarian community), is making its cruel mark on this project. We’ve stalled for the past 48 hours. The participants took issue with the motive of the program; fear that I’m a researcher not offering remuneration for their service and commitment, concern that this training merits financial compensation, and general confusion as to the purpose of the work, have made me look quite critically at a multitude of factors. We met again today and I explained the voluntary nature on both of our parts, apologetically accepting the poor job of explanation I may have done, trying to justify my position by telling them of the fluid and organic development of the activity. We’re on track for a few more workshops with a big finale in the works.

Stay tuned!