Art Show @ KDE!

On November 16^th, Kappa Delta Epsilon hosted its termly Art Show. In an event open to the campus, Sue Schmitz ’10 and Julia Zak ’10 joined together to collect artwork from artists from around campus. Brian Bozzello ’10 and his jazz band played music as students, administrators and faculty browsed through paintings, sprayed painted hats, and photographs. Sue and Julia also provided an arts and craft booth where visitors could paint their own picture frames with crafts glue and magazine bits.

KDE’s Art Show notably hosted jewelry from the Family Place’s JewleryO’s. Helene Mechoche and Julia Dickenson came in on Sunday to help me set up the jewelry stand. We had just sold $2,000 over the past weeks at the Christmas fair at the Tyn Church in Hanover, a holiday fair at the Hopkins Center, and another one at Kendall. For weeks, the jewelry studio at the Family Place was bustling as participants in the Families Learning Together (FLT) program scurried to prepare enough necklaces for the upcoming holiday events. They learned the value of deadlines, turning a profit, and overtime. Many women took beads and thread home to work on necklaces after their children went to sleep. At KDE, we raised $350 for the Family Place in only two hours! All the profits supported the FLT program which houses the budget/debt counseling classes that are launched this winter term.

This art show was important to my project for several reasons. Not only was it one of my first tangible deliverables, but it connected my Dartmouth world with my greater Upper Valley world. FLT participants know that I’m a Dartmouth student. Had it not been for my personal history as an immigrant whose parents too received welfare payments and paid for groceries with food stamps, they would not believe me that I knew how they felt, and that I genuinely wanted to help them. For many of my participants, Dartmouth remains a remote island of privilege. Though the bridge connected Hanover to Norwich and ultimately, Hartford and White River Junction (where the majority of my FLT participants reside), Dartmouth and Hanover remain inaccessible with the exception of the Children’s Hospital at the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. CHAD has saved many of the participants’ children, whether it had been via social work intervention where the state of Vermont has taken temporary custody or actual medical healing. Doctors at the DHMC are one of the few authorities these women listen to, and are a pivotal avenue of help.

Making jewelry for the KDE art show connected the girls to Dartmouth in a novel way. They weren’t making something for the school, but they were selling these necklaces to some sorority girls, whose lives were worlds different from their own. KDE means a lot to me, and it seemed that because of that, the FLT participants were excited to incorporate new designs. More importantly, they felt connected to the other world. Sadly, none of the participants could make it to the art show because they couldn’t find babysitting for their children, nor transportation to Hanover, but I’ve talked to Helene about car-pooling to KDE in the winter term.

The art show was also a medium for Dartmouth students to connect my stories about my Tuesday and Thursday afternoon in Norwich with a tangible image: a uniquely, beaded necklace with a silver covered cheerio. The event was advertised via blitz and Tucker. All night long, friends (even best friends) said, “Oh, so this is what you’ve been working on.” They see the pictures of young moms, that are our age, in the kitchen learning about nutrition or in the jewelry studio, learning about a business and profit strategy. While purchasing a necklace as a holiday present, the girls would take note of a yellow notecard that explains the JewelryO’s business. People started believing in the cause. It gave me hope that our budgeting/debt classes had some momentum behind them.