Harmony through art
KAUSALYA SANTHANAM
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American artist Ellen Alt on how art can help solve various problems in the world today.
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PHOTO: V. GANESAN
“I did it myself,” he says. The pride on the child’s face is unmistakeable. He and his friends at Gnanadeepam, a special school for the mentally challenged at Pammal, Chennai, have painted this colourful mural. Outsize chicks in bright yellow endearingly dwarf the humans beside them, colourful fishes swim in the blue expanse beneath hills and valleys and brown elephants with curled trunks eye you bashfully from the wall.
New York-based artist Ellen Alt in turn can take pride in helping the children at Gnanadeepam achieve this feat. “These children love the attention. They are generally not looked upon with the automatic pride as normal children are. So for them it is all the more precious to be involved in this endeavour and see their own place look beautiful,” says Ellen who specialises in community projects. “This project, which brings normal and special children together, has been sponsored by the Prakriti Foundation,” says Uma Dandapani, managing trustee of the school.
For the community
Ellen, who has a BFA in art education from the Massachusetts School of Art and a MA in studio art from New York University, is artist in residence at the Park Avenue Synagogue in New York. The artist organises community sculpture and mural projects, which focus on conflict resolution. “I work for any group in any part of the world, which wants to make a change to its environment. Problems can be solved through art, by working together. This is my first visit to India. My husband Carlos, who is a photographer, suggested we come to India on a holiday. When my good friend Naomi Ackerman, a theatre person, knew we were coming here she put us in touch with Prakriti and that’s how the whole project came to be,” says Ellen. “In the U.S. there is a movement for volunteering for projects when you travel. President Obama is very keen on these service projects since he himself was a community organiser in Chicago when he was young.”
The artist points out how she is keen that a project should be a participatory effort. “I get ideas from the participants. At Gnanadeepam, the children executed their drawings on paper. Then along with a team of helper-artists, we grouped the ideas theme-wise,” she explains.
Peace projects are a favourite with Ellen: “I love bringing people together to create an atmosphere of harmony.” The artist has conducted projects for Jews and Arabs in the West Asia and for Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland.
Do not the participants eye each other warily if they are adversaries? “It’s always a dance around politics. But once we get the design and start, we can get past politics, especially if you don’t talk. In art, colour and form are important, not politics and history,” she laughs.
One of her works was chosen to be presented to Hillary Clinton in Jerusalem on the occasion of the peace treaty between Israel and Jordan. “That was my most famous moment.”
Various institutions and multicultural groups seek out Ellen to build bridges of understanding and break down walls of prejudice and misconception. “This work is magical for me. In Florida, for instance, black housing was to come up next to a white public school and those involved did not want problems to develop, so I engaged on a project with them to generate goodwill.”
Diverse materials
Apart from community projects, Ellen works on her own creative ones in the mixed media. Collages are put together using waste materials. When you view the slides at the Apparao Galleries where she gives a talk, you are impressed with the poetry of colours and textures created using diverse unlikely objects such as wire, compact discs, X-rays and medicinal pills. “I also make use of my husband’s discarded photographs,” she adds.
The artist, who has held her mixed media exhibitions in the U.S., England, China, Israel and Russia, is now involved in a series on religion. “I also work a lot with children,” says Ellen. And how does she find the children at Gnandeepam? “Beautiful,” beams Ellen. “Everyone in India is beautiful. There is not one person whom I have smiled at who hasn’t smiled back.”
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