NonProfit Spotlight: Paint, Love, and Grow By Bill Crane
As I occasionally fret about the larger and seemingly more intractable challenges facing our nation, I am often heartened by the hard work, progress, and ingenuity I witness demonstrated by community nonprofits. Driven by lean staff and volunteers, these modest enterprises face down challenges ranging from homelessness to mental illness and addiction, offering assistance, aid, and at the very least a thoughtful ear and warm, helping hand. Missions, resources, and staffing models vary. Still, I continue to be routinely touched and impressed by their passion and commitment to task, their desire to help and improve others’ lives, and so often by the selflessness and often low incomes that accompany doing this work. We recently spent a beautiful, breezy fall afternoon learning and playing with a community arts organization, Paint Love, where they believe that art impacts everything. Paint Love aims most of its programs and efforts at helping and supporting children, including teen girls removed from sex trafficking, children fleeing domestic violence, and those referred from counseling centers for children facing abuse and homelessness. This includes refugees and new immigrants. Founded in 2014, Paint Love has already connected with more than 15,000 unique and individual children, and they recently relocated their studio to Legacy Park on Columbia Drive in Decatur, on the campus of the former United Methodists Children’s Home, and across the street from Columbia Seminary. Executive Director Laura Shaw says, “Art is our vehicle, but the
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soul of our work is showing children that their voice matters, that their ideas are important and that their actions can make a difference in shaping their future.” A small but diverse staff includes a licensed clinical social worker, a certified yoga instructor and movement specialist, and artists from various disciplines. And not surprisingly, the organization also has an aptly named Department of Kindness. During our visit, an artist named Antar Fierce, who began graphitizing his hometown of Brooklyn, New York in 1985, demonstrated for the children the right and wrong way to tag and use aerosol paints, the history of graffiti, and its evolution into an art form, including massive murals in most major urban centers. Each class member was given a small canvas to work on and was allowed to contribute to a larger banner with the phrase Paint Love running from end to end. During the exhibition, my younger daughter Olivia and I happened to get to know Antar’s daughter, Debra. Olivia found a new friend, and I had to smile as I watched Debra create two of her own two small pieces of art in graffiti that read “Teasing is Mean” and “It’s NOT OK to Tease.” There was no prompting, messaging, or a single suggestion made on what the children should paint, express or write. This is just what came from Debra’s paintbrush, and, to some extent, from her heart. Like many other nonprofits, the organization does more with less, recycling and reutilizing paint trays and other art supplies. Donations in kind are of course, always welcome (https://www.gopaintlove.org/ donate), but if you have some time and could use a few more smiles on your face as well as in your heart, you might want to make an appointment and visit with the team or possibly volunteer. Paint Love community programs are open to the public and area residents, often at little or no cost (https://www.gopaintlove.org/community). For me, it was a nostalgic afternoon. I was born at the end of the block, across the street on Inman Drive, behind Columbia Seminary. Continued on page 20
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