Sharing Art Camp Beyond Portland

Grace Institute has a long history of celebrating cultures and traditions through art with children and families in Portland. GI’s work abroad started with The Rings for Haiti Project in 2010, during the summer that Art Camp’s focus was the Caribbean.

GAC glass artist, Deb Galaty, put into motion combing the action of making beautiful art with helping the children and families in Haiti after the devastating earthquake that year. Campers and staff raised $11,000 for Mercy Corp’s Relief Program in Haiti selling unique camp-made glass rings. In the making of these beautiful colorful one-of-a-kind artful rings, children realized that….

• Once they crafted their ring, they may never see it again
• We would most likely never meet the people we would be helping
• The people we would be helping would never know who helped them
• That someone might buy the little piece of art they made
• You’ll never know how much help you will be contributing to somebody you will never see

The same could be said about sharing the totality of art camp itself. In 2012 and 2014,  teams of GAC artists and counselors went to Kenya and Peru, respectively, to collaborate with local organizations and share the experience of Grace Art Camp. One year after GI’s trip to Casa Chapi, in the high altitude of the Colca Valley in the Andes, two art camps emerged in Chivay and the nearby city of Arequipa!
Images of those two camps can be viewed HERE!