The Museum of Latin American Art just launched an exhibition entitled “Artful Healing,” composed of community artwork curated by high school students.
Located in the Port of Learning Gallery, the exhibit hosts work from a wide range of artists with various backgrounds, ages and abilities.
Alongside MOLAA’s Education Programs Coordinator, Nalini Elias, and Curator of Education, Gabriela Martinez, high school students Keila Rivera, Valerie Duarte, Stephanie Hernandez, Sebastian Castle and Crispin Jay Salapare hand selected each piece from over one hundred submissions.
Upon their first draft of the setup, the students said they realized they had thought too broadly.
“We had to literally go back to the drawing board,” said Rivera, an 18-year-old Wilson High School senior. “We drew out a tree map of what healing meant to us and focused on how the piece related back to the artist.”
The exhibition is composed of paintings, sculptures, photography and multimedia that touch upon different aspects of the healing process. Some serve as a snapshot of a striking moment that caused the artist pain; others portray the process of coping through the creative process.
The curators also created several interactive spaces, including a “healing tree” that allows the viewer to write how they heal on a leaf and tape it onto a branch alongside other leaves with healing inscriptions.
Stephanie Hernandez, an 18-year-old Lincoln High School senior and fellow curator, said healing from the artist’s’ perspective was important.
“But [it is] also how the viewer can heal from these pieces in either the aesthetic or the artist’s story, and just knowing you’re not alone,” she said.
They each said how important the community was in their efforts to create this interactive space. They said they wanted to highlight voices that would not otherwise be given space to be seen.
Keila said her favorite piece was by Dennis Lauterwasser, an artist with the Arts Association for the Disabled of Long Beach. His painting, entitled, “Today is a circle, All the days Are,” is filled with tufts of rainbow colors. Keila said his story and painting amaze her.
“Art for him is a form of therapy, including physical therapy,” she said. “He has limited mobility and he paints every day. He’s very spirited.”
The young curators said they all had ties to the artwork in different ways and that participating in the development of the exhibition has given them a new perspective on the creative process. They collaborated on the curation as a group, learning from each other and sometimes coming into MOLAA at eight o’clock in the morning and not leaving until six o’clock at night.
“There is so much more to consider than just your own opinion,” Valerie Duarte, 17, from Harbor Teacher Prep Academy, said. “Working with others, it makes a big difference.”
The young interns worked on the exhibition while juggling high school classes and other community projects.
Stephanie said that a lot of people have been astonished when they realize high school students organized such an event.
“It’s kind of like they’re questioning our abilities,” she said, “but then again, what we are doing is extraordinary and revolutionary.”
The exhibition encompasses the themes of understanding, process, connections and growth. It will be on view through May 29.