VCU joins Caver Community in opening of outdoor portait exhibit

By Malorie Burkett

RICHMOND, Va. – The Carver community near Virginia Commonwealth University is the focus of a new outdoor portrait exhibit, “In Peace and Harmony: Carver Portraits.” The exhibit will feature the works of American photographer Wendy Ewald and students from George Washington Carver Elementary School.

The exhibit is a multifaceted portrait of the Carver community -- 15 large-scale photographic banners, each measuring 10 by 8 feet. The banners will be displayed this spring in various outdoor locations throughout the neighborhood.

The opening of the outdoor banner installation will take place during “Celebrate Carver,” a celebration of the Carver community, Saturday, May 8 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the Smith-Peters Community Park on Catherine Street.  The celebration will include food, music and walking tours of the banner installation.

The project is a collaboration of the Hand Workshop Art Center (HWAC), the Carver-VCU Partnership, Carver Elementary School, the Children’s Museum of Richmond and VCU’s Creative Writing program.

“This project really highlights the strengths and amplifies the voices of our youth within the community,” said Leah Lamb, coordinator of the Carver-VCU Partnership. “It’s exciting to see the community work together on a project that celebrates our youth in such a positive light.”

Ashley Kistler, HWAC curator, initiated the project and worked with Laura Browder, VCU associate professor of English, to approach the partnership to help HWAC bring Ewald to Richmond and connect with the Carver Elementary School and neighborhood.

During several visits last fall and winter, Ewald, assisted by three graduate students in VCU’s Creative Writing Program, worked with a group of third, fourth and fifth graders at the school.  They developed the photographic banners which display images and text that portray the students' perceptions of self, community and home.

In addition to the outdoor banner exhibit, Ewald’s work will be featured at two nearby exhibitions. A traveling exhibit of interior banners, “The Arabic Alphabet,” which Ewald produced last year at the Queens Museum of Art in New York, will open Friday, May 7 at 5 p.m. at the Children’s Museum of Richmond, 2626 W. Broad St.  “On Site/Artists’ Projects: Wendy Ewald,” an exhibit featuring new work by Ewald and the students at Carver, along with selections from the artist's earlier projects, will open at 6 p.m. that day at HWAC, 1812 W. Main St.

Wendy Ewald is a senior research associate at Duke University's Center for Documentary Studies and an artist-in-residence at the university's John Hope Franklin Center. She has worked with children and adults around the world for more than 30 years, and has received many honors in recognition of her creative practice including grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, Andy Warhol Foundation and the Fulbright Commission. 

For more information, call 827-1904, or visit http://www.handworkshop.org/exhibitions/index.html#ewald.