Sherman, TX -- Disaster or good news is often only a phone call away.
A phone call from El Salvador earlier this month announced the opening of a Center of Art for Peace in Suchitoto, El Salvador (http://www.centroartex.org/). It also carried an invitation for Texoma artists to return with art shows they created after previous visits to El Salvador; the Center of Art for Peace was offering their exhibits a home in the Center's Recovery of Historic Memory museum. http://www.centroartex.org/).
Quickly, a Texoma "Semana Santa mobile seminar" which had been planned for March was transformed into a service trip, and the invited artists started fundraising to finance the delivery of their art and be present to help build the exhibit space. While the exhibit space is prepared, the art exhibits will tour in San Salvador and Segundo Montes, El Salvador.
The Texoma LISTEN seminar, sponsored by Texas Cultural Alliance and Cherubim Media, will be the first to stay overnight at the Center of Art for Peace's hostel, which is still under development. The donations they're collecting to equip the Center include brightly colored twin sheets needed for the newly constructed hostel where they will sleep, and financing for simple chairs and art supplies
SHERMAN SHOWS TO FIND HOME IN SUCHITOTO
Sarah Sparks Duran of Denison has invested in Grayson County many ways over the last seven years, from working with teenagers at Juvenile Alternatives to serving coffee at Starbucks. What most of her neighbors don't know is that Duran is an accomplished artist, and has used that talent to work with young people in El Salvador in four trips over three years, including an entire summer at La Colima filling in for Presbyterian missionaries on furlough in the U.S.A.
A telephoned invitation from El Salvador earlier this month now has Duran rolling up half a dozen of her huge paintings for shipment to Suchitoto. Her senior art show from Austin College in Sherman generated offers to buy her paintings, "but I couldn't sell them; I knew they were supposed to go somewhere else, because I created the artwork while I was processing my El Salvador experience and my own life stories."
Rania Batrice, of Lubbock, has had a 2-year invitation for her El Mozote photo exhibit to tour El Salvador, but needed a home base from which it could circulate.
Brianna Burnett, also of West Texas, will also send a photo exhibit.
Burnett helped found the non-profit "BLUE HAT PROJECT" (http://www.bluehatproject.org/) four years ago, a non-governmental organization which holds a ONEWORLDBEAT concert every year to benefit an "under the radar" arts and education group in El Salvador.
Burnett and Batrice will send their art, but with graduate school looming in the autumn, they can't afford the cost of delivering it personally.
LOCALS ORGANIZE SEVERAL SERVICE PROJECTS
Austin College freshman Jesse Travis, of Dallas, is working on grant applications to purchase equipment and supplies for the Center of Art for Peace...items needed so they can start classes which will include textile arts, thanks to a couple sewing machines rebuilt by Mrs. Jerry Sue Massenburg of Denison...the 8th location in El Salvador where people have learned to sew because of donated machines sent by Mrs. Massenburg.
Mrs. Massenburg's machines are already working in six Salvadoran co-ops established after the fatal 2001 earthquakes. A 7th co-op has completed training and organizing th in Morazan province, and will start in March when Massenburg-rebuilt machines arrive.
"Co-ops are not just about income," says Dr. Henry Bucher, who led the first post-earthquake delegations to El Salvador in 2001. "They are about mentoring, and building confidence. The first co-op, built with HERALD DEMOCRAT help, has now generated 8 university students on scholarship... youth who accompanied their moms to work at the co-op, and learn to sew for themselves and run a business during that process."
COLLEGE STUDENTS TURN SPRING BREAK INTO SERVICE PROJECT
Sherman resident and social worker Allison Bean is hoping to collect and deliver donated scholarships for the music school run by Grupo Morazan, a band which visited Sherman in 1999 on its way to a national concert tour that eventually included the United Nations, the White House, and the U.S. Capitol steps.
Turning away from options for better paying jobs in the city, the musicians returned to their rural Christian Base Community and music school because "for children born into families who lost everything in the war, there are few resources...but music can be an instrument of both joy and education."
In a telephone call with El Salvador last night, Meymis Guevara, whose life was saved by local cardiologists and volunteers, said, "We want to give kids on our community what others gave us."
Austin College senior Henry Owen also is organizing a project for the Paco Cutumay music school run by "Grupo Morazan." Other students are working on projects for a teenage-run participatory radio station in Santa Marta, "Radio Victoria," where Austin College sophomore "Kate" Hudson volunteered last summer.
Robert Quiring (AC '06) works as a youth pastor in Allen, and now is also organizing a project to video-tape the story and testimony of Rufina Amaya, survivor/witness of the massacre at El Mozote and an inspiration to many people because of her faith and courage. "A lot of people have invested in my vocational search, and now I want to give back. Few religion majors and seminarians can go to El Salvador to hear her story, but with a video that she helps create, we could bring her story to them."
Other Texans have been collecting medical supplies all month.
"We are thrilled to have so many items donated already," said Cat Bucher of Sherman. "Now we just need a few more couriers who can take the items to El Salvador. It's cheaper to TAKE them as personal luggage than to ship them, and pay customs. We have seminarians, pastors, and citizens who could go with us in March, but need help with airfare." Through Texas Cultural Alliance, a Texas-based nonprofit which partners in educational exchanges, donors can receive tax deductions.
Mrs Bucher will lead the first group down March 10. Besides delivering donations, much of their focus will be participating in ceremonies commemorating the 25th anniversary of the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero, shot while blessing communion elements because he had delivered a homily asking all soldiers to "lay down your arms."
Dr. Henry Bucher will lead the second group to El Salvador March 19-26. The Buchers are on the national council of the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship, which is part of the Fellowship of Reconciliation.
The March 19-26 delegation will do physical work on the Center of Art for Peace in the morning. Afternoons and evenings, they will participate in seminars about non-violence and "wellness recovery" in the midst of trauma. "CAPACITAR International (www.capacitar.org) is the world leader in starting programs for helping societies enduring current traumatic stress," says Mrs. Bucher.
Sarah Duran, exudes, "it's almost like this is going full circle. The art was inspired there, and now it's going home."
Fellow AC alumns Batrice and Burnett take it one step further. "Maybe we can keep the circle going... maybe, by learning how to build a Center of Art for Peace in El Salvador, we'll learn to dream of a similar project for Texas."