Kids Share Workshops
Connecting Kids Worldwide through Writing, Art & Photography
(Please scroll down to see all the media coverage.)
February 2010
Kids Share Workshops, Inc. has been selected as the recipient of the 2010 USBBY Bridge to Understanding Award! The award is given to outstanding projects that promotes understandings of other cultures through books and reading. Kids Share Workshops will be accepting this award June 26th in Washington, DC. Thank you USBBY! http://www.usbby.org/
Artist helps children find self-expression By Raphaella Cruz/Correspondent--Wed May 13, 2009, 07:55 AM EDT
Lincoln -Empowering children is one of Kristina Applegate Lutes’ strongest passions. The former Lincoln resident is following that passion through Portraits for Charity (PFC), an organization that combines the arts and cultural awareness with a unifying goal to connect children of the world through art and writing.
“Children want and need to be heard,” said Lutes. “My goal is to be part of an important movement to empower children by sharing their thoughts with others and seeing how we are all connected no matter where you live.”
Educated at the Art Institute of Boston, Lutes has held a variety of jobs in the art field, starting at Scholastic Publishing in New York and later with Oryx Mountain Studios, a company she started with her husband Kurt while living in Colorado. There she studied and illustrated greeting cards of endangered animals.
Lutes, who now lives on a 20-acre farm in Vermont with her husband and two children, said she was inspired by the naturalist life she remembers from living in Lincoln.
“I enjoyed local farmers markets and festive events such as the harvest farms I would visit with the children,” she said.
According to Lutes, the idea for PFC came through her desire to teach art and to make the world a better place for children.
Her first project was with Ash Brittenham, a boy suffering from an incurable form of muscular dystrophy. A mutual friend volunteered to be her photographer and to help launch her workshops, which began in Ash’s classroom at Union Elementary School in Montpelier, Vt. Her first portrait, a depiction of Ash as a superhero, soon resulted.
Soon after, Lutes incorporated her lifelong interest in the Buddhist culture and the Tibetan people. Her interests, in art, children’s education, psychology and world travel, all came together in the creation of PFC’s first Kids Share workshop.
“Our Kids Share workshops guide children in narrative writing and illustration. Simple themes help children learn to express themselves in groups and to create unique pieces of artwork. The accompanying narratives are from the hearts and minds of children,” she said.
In the first Kids Share book, Tibetan children living in exile in Bylakuppe, India share their stories and artwork with children in Vermont. Six themes were selected for both the children at the Tibetan Children’s Village and those in Vermont: “Living in Vermont/Tibet,” “Things Kids Do,” “Favorite Places,” “Special Days,” “Hopes for the Future,” and “Favorite Games.”
Working with small groups in the Vermont classrooms, the workshop taught students about Tibetan cultural customs and guided them in writing a short and focused story beginning with their theme keywords. The students then created illustrations based on what they had written.
“Our goal was to inspire children to create collaborative works of art through cross-cultural sharing,” Lutes said.
Lutes assisted each student in the creation of their own superhero, incorporating threatened or endangered native animals and conveying facts about their culture. Lutes produced the initial sketches, which were then decorated with tissue art collages done by the students. The superheroes featured in “Kids Share: Tibetan and Vermont Children’s Narratives” are Speed Demon, Falcon Ranger and The Great Tibetan Snow Lion.
“We are self publishing several book dummies, for the possibility of being chosen by the right children’s book publisher and to give to the classrooms who worked with us,” she said. “Our goal is to create a series that will continue at other children’s villages worldwide.”
Work on the next volume will begin in the fall at the Upper Tibetan Children’s Village in Dharamsala, India. Lutes and team leaders will travel to India to continue more themes between Vermont and Tibetan children.
“I see our organization growing by reaching new places in the world where there are children who are living in endangered cultures and/or children’s villages,” she said. “We need support to make this a strong reality. I believe we can achieve this and are well on our way.”
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Photograph: Matt Brittenham, Ash's Dad.
March 13th, 2008
An Artistic Collaboration for Charity
by Angela Timpone
Before now Lutes worked with not-for-profit groups to create the portraits to be auctioned off for revenue for the organization. “Newton got the whole project going”, claims Lutes. Lutes, Baker, and Crowley have come together to offer school teachers and their students the Portraits for Charity workshop of the arts, writing, and photography.
Portraits for Charity was created by Lutes “to help raise money for non-profit organizations” and now she hopes to grow the organization to reach more children. In the past Lutes produced similar pieces of art using tissue paper painted by her children or friend’s children and montaging the tissue paper together into a portrait. This is the first time she has done a project within a school. Two of Lutes’s projects hang in Capitol Grounds and are to be raffled off to support the Roxbury PTO and the Roxbury Public Library.
Baker, Crowley, and Lutes have all donated their time and supplies. Lutes explained that Union School “donated the tissue paper and paint”, but the twenty-two hours of labor was free of charge. Portrait for Charity hopes to continue their workshops throughout New England with school districts paying for their travel expenses and supplies. In addition, Lutes says that she will be available for private portraits of love ones and the proceeds will go towards her volunteer work.
Newton Barker proposed the idea to Ash who said, “If he did not like the idea (of his friends creating a portrait of him) he would have said, no.” Ash, with his brown hair blowing the wind, zooms through the halls at Union school and around town in his motorized wheelchair. Around Montpelier Ash is a well known author who has penned two books before the ripe old age of eight.
Cat and the Scary Dog (2005), and The Adventures of Super Max (published 2007 by Doubleday), have received Reading Rainbow winner awards. The Adventures of Super Max is sold by Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy (PPMD) with the proceed going towards the PPMD research efforts.
Ash was diagnosed with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD), the most common form of MD, at the age of four. There are more than twenty different forms of Muscular Dystrophy with DMD only found in boys. According to the PPMD website “DMD affects approximately 1 boy in every 3,000” with a “gene-related disorders that affect muscles throughout the body.”
Kim Brittenham, Ash’s mom, explains that PPMD focuses their research efforts on finding a cure for DMD and recently the National Institute of Health awarded PPMD with a $15.4 million grant. Brittenham says that PPMD has been on the cutting edge of the latest research on developing treatments and therapies for males with DMD.
Ash’s fund-raising for PPMD will continue with the proceeds of 250 posters of the portrait created by his classmates and Lutes. According to Brittenham, Larry Brown of Brown and Son Printing of Barre has donated the printing of the poster and they will be available for purchase locally at Woodbury Mountain Toys, on the PPMD website, and through Ash.
Not only did Lutes create a realistic image of Ash and Ms. Kelly through montage, but the image that suspends overhead is Spiderman. Marvel Comics has never before allowed an organization copyright to reprint the Spiderman image until now with the permission of the printed posters.
To tie the portrait project together students worked with Baker to write about the experience of creating Ash’s portrait. During the unveiling of the portrait students read their writing projects to the crowd of teachers, students, parents, and community members. One student wrote: “Paint was splashing everywhere in Ms. Kelly’s class. Sprinkles, sparkles everywhere.”
The classroom chuckled as Ash explained that “I did not have enough time to finish my writing project because Ms. Kelly told everyone it was time to stop.” Instead of shying away from the opportunity of expression, Ash said “(but) I did enjoy painting.”
The final stage of the workshop will be the creation of a sound slide by Crowley who has spent time during the project photographing and interviewing the students. According to Crowley’s website a sound slide “is a rapid production tool for still image and audio web presentations. Ridiculously simple storytelling.”
Finally Ash explains that "It's cool to be in a painting (and) raising money for the scientists who are trying to find a cure.”
The 250 poster of the portrait of Ash will be available after March 13th for $15 at:
Project MD- www.parentprojectmd.org
Ash Brittenham and his classmates in Windy Kelly's 4th grade class at Montpelier's Union Elementary, recently embarked on a creative project to support medical research.
Together with Vermont artist Kristina Lutes, the students created a unique piece of art featuring Ash and Spiderman. The kids painted collage pieces, which Lutes later used to create the portrait, unveiling her final work to an excited class on March 6th.
Now comes the fundraising part. Larry Brown donated his services to print 250 limited edition posters of the final portrait, which had to be approved by Marvel Comics due to the presence of Spiderman. The posters will now go on sale for a $15 donation, with all proceeds going to Parent Project MD to support research for a cure for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. Ash Brittenham previously wrote a book, The Adventures of Super Max, that is also being sold to benefit PPMD.
Posters can be purchased at Woodbury Mountain Toys in Montpelier. For more information on Parent Project MD, visit www.parentproject.md.org. For more information on artist Kristina A. Lutes and the portrait project, visit www.portraits4charity.org
THE TIMES ARGUS
Kristina Applegate Lutes, artist and founder of Portraits for Charity, presents her latest painting of Ash Brittenham, left, and Spiderman to his fourth-grade classmates, friends and family at Union Elementary School Thursday afternoon. Tow hundred fifty posters of the painting will be sold to the public and all proceeds will go to support Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy. For more information go to www.portraits4charity.org
By Daniel W. Staples
ROXBURY-Portrait artist Kristina Lutes has finished a portrait of the late Jerry Garcia that will be raffled in benefit of the Roxbury Elementary School.
Final touches are also being made to a portrait of Dale Earnhardt Sr. and his son Dale Earnhardt Jr. for a raffle benefiting the Roxbury Free Library.
The two paintings will be shown at Vermont Chocolatiers, on East Street in Northfield, where tickets will be available at $5 each. The drawings will be held in mid-February.
The subjects of portraits were decided upon by the groups who are going to raffle them, Mrs. Lutes said.
The portraits, which are an amalgamation of acrylics and painted tissue on vellum, were created using photos of the subjects as a guide. Photos are not always ideal guides, as the one Mrs. Lutes used for the Garcia portrait is in black and white and the portrait of the Earnhardt was created using two separate photos of the men.
The Lutes daughter, 5 and son, 3 helped with the portraits by painting the tissue papers used as the clothing for the characters in the portraits, Mrs. Lutes said.
Mrs. Lutes, who has donated her time in the raffle effort, said that she would encourage other artists and professionals to find ways to donate services that could benefit the community. "People can be really creative and I think it's a cool concept, " Mrs. Lutes said.