Asheville School Art Students Make Lifelong Gifts for Syrian Refugee Children

Art students at Asheville School have joined the Memory Project, a charitable nonprofit organization that invites art teachers and their students to create and donate portraits to youth around the world who have faced substantial challenges, such as neglect, abuse, loss of parents, violence, and extreme poverty. Given that youth in such situations usually have few personal keepsakes, the purpose of the portrait project is to provide children in need with meaningful mementos of their youth. The project allows art students to practice kindness and global awareness while enhancing their portraiture skills.

Students at Asheville School are participating as part of their studio art courses. To do this, the students receive photos of children who are waiting for portraits, and then work in their art classroom to create the portraits. Once finished, the Memory Project delivers the portraits to the children at the Syrian refugee camps. The hope is, as so eloquently described by the organizers of The Memory Project, “We want the portraits to help the children feel valued and important, to know that many people care about their well being, and to act as meaningful pieces of personal history in the future.”

The Memory Project is a nonprofit organization headquartered in Middleton, Wisconsin.  Since the project began in 2004, more than 160,000 American art students have created portraits for children in 55 countries.

View the artwork by the Asheville School students here.