My maternal Grandfather built—by hand—not only our house at 3223 Brewster, but also two duplex apartments on the property, in addition to my grandparents own home, which as a child seemed quite palatial. Their house had two stories with a grand front porch. I think it’s why I love having a front porch to this day. They had concrete steps leading to the porch and the front door. On either side of the steps were pillars you often see on the porches of rich white folks’ houses, the kind that typically has a lion on either side. My grandparents weren’t rich or white, so they never had the lions.

I loved those pillars. For as long as I can remember I would walk up those concrete steps and balance my way from the top step over to the pillar. I could see the whole world. The pillars were taller than I was for a long time. But with my grandmother distracted indoors, I would climb to stand and reign over my queendom.

As a child I would hold church on the front steps of my grandparents’ porch. Of course, I was the preacher. I would play school on occasion, and I was the teacher. But perhaps the greatest joy I experienced on the pillars was the ability to climb to the top of the stairs, balance over onto the pillars and, taking a deep breath, to jump off the pillar, onto the ground below. That was a joy like no other.

Something wonderful happened in me when I would jump off the pillars from the top of the stairs. But it wasn’t just the pillars that gave me that exuberant feeling. I learned to jump off the long green metal bench that was under the chinaberry tree in their front yard. Then the greatest of joys came when I learned how to climb into the chinaberry tree and jump out of it onto the bench, then ultimately onto the ground. Something in me would come alive, something that I had no words for as a little black girl on Brewster and Brill streets in Frenchtown, Houston, Texas.

The Art Project, Houston, has been a kind of wonderful new adventure for me, a great leap off the steps and into a new kind of ministry. The initiative emerged out of my desire to help people express their creativity and empower themselves through artistic endeavors, and it was birthed during my recovery from cancer.

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01.  Art and Healing

I’m a journaler. I journal as a means of maintaining some measure of centeredness on this big blue spinning ball we call home. I had been experiencing a little indigestion, which was quite unusual for me. During my morning devotions the Lord said, “Read your journal. Go back two weeks.” I did as instructed, only to find that I had mentioned this indigestion then as well. The Lord said, “If one of your daughters had complained of indigestion for two weeks, what would you do?”

I responded I’d take them to the doctor. The last words I heard were, “Go to the doctor, Juanita.” For some reason my husband insisted on going with me to the ultrasound my doctor, Pam Atkins, prescribed.

My little indigestion turned out to be cancer.

Both my husband and I were in shock. I experienced a kind of numbness that I have since learned many feel when hearing those six letters. I knew I had to go on retreat so I could get myself together. I was desperate to hear from God.

I checked into the Cenacle Retreat house in Houston and lay on the bed way past mealtime. Then it came to me to go to the art cove. The space was appointed with pastels, scissors, watercolor, and an assortment of art supplies, coupled with meditation suggestions for using these varied materials. Creativity became my prayer as I moved through the experience of being a cancer patient.

Nothing can prepare you to face life and death in an instant. When you hear the word “cancer,” all kinds of emotions stir the waves of your soul. For me, there was no better anchor than the practice of art making as a means to pray and emote what words seemed far too limited to express. The creative process was helping me to touch what I couldn’t express in any other way.

I could color my disappointment with God for allowing this. I could cut and paste images that reflected the mosaic of feelings from anger to melancholy. The art gave me a container for all I felt during a period when I was as tongue-tied as Moses. (And I’m rarely at a loss for words!)

I was blessed beyond measure when I learned that the cancer was operable, and my surgeon, Dr. Christopher Wood, did a masterful job in removing my right kidney. In the days following recovery the Lord spoke again to me, saying, “Take art to the homeless community.”

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02.  Making Space for Art

Because of my journey with illness and art making, I realized others needed a means for managing the stresses they were living with daily. In the very moment I heard the Lord speak during my recovery, The Art Project, Houston, was born. Christ redeems all things! Cancer gave birth to creativity, and that creativity is saving lives.

We had always hoped for a means to help transform those we served at our St. John’s United Methodist community from simply identifying as “homeless.” The Art Project gave those who participated a new name, a new way of being. Instead of living a label that carries so much shame, now these women and men are artists.

Julia Cameron, author of The Artist’s Way, writes that “People ‘heal’ because creativity is healthy—and practicing it, they find their greater selves. And we are all greater than we can conceive.”Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way, 10th ed. (New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 2002), xvii.

The Art Project, Houston, is a therapeutic art and empowerment program of the Bread of Life, Inc., facilitating the recovery and discovery of the creative self for hungry, homeless, and transitioning individuals in Houston, Texas. The project was launched on August 12, 2010, with over eighty-five artisans consisting of clients from the Bread of Life emergency shelter, Temenos Place Apartment Residents (a transitional to permanent housing program), art patrons from the community, and members of St. John’s Downtown. The Art Project, Houston, seeks to empower our city’s homeless to become hope-filled artisans who will craft their own livelihood and create lives filled with new possibilities.

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03.  The Four Es

We focus our ministry around the following four concepts:

Encounters: Opportunities for the men and women of the homeless community to encounter art through simple art activities, concerts, field trips, films, and exhibitions of art created by peers.

Experiences: Hands-on instructional therapeutic art classes facilitated by professional local Houston artists such as The Art Project Class, Art Instruction Class, Pottery Studio, and specialized workshops.

Exhibitions/Shows/Classes & Workshops: We seek and create opportunities to exhibit and sell the art created by The Art Project, Houston, participants throughout the city of Houston.

Empowerment/Education: Opportunities for participants to be empowered to become “art-trepreneurs” through entrepreneurship training, contract work, and mentoring in the area of contracts, money management, life skills, and other helpful tools that will enable them to transition into self-sufficiency.

Our aims and desires for those who participate in The Art Project are:

1. to assist the homeless in finding meaning and purpose in their lives while exploring their creative self
2. to help participants make more conscious choices and decisions as they regain power over their lives
3. to define and implement life changes
4. to get a clearer picture of their creative potential and how to use it
5. to deal with creative blocks and negative patterns
6. to enrich their relationships with others
7. and themselves through the power of an art-based community

 

The Art Project’s ultimate goal is to provide artists experiencing homelessness an opportunity to make their own trade by creating, displaying, and selling their art as a collective body through art exhibits in collaboration with those who are actively engaged in ameliorating suffering and bringing an end to this condition.