Help Equines through Art
Horses hold a special place in both the American heart and American art.
Though not native to our continent, horses resonated with the great painters of the early American West — George Catlin, Karl Wimer and Frederick Remington — as symbols of primal power. Look in many middle schoolers’ notebooks or any art gallery, and you’ll see the tradition continues.
Horse-crazy teens reared on National Velvet, The Black Stallion, My Friend Flicka and Misty of Chincoteague grow up to be horsewomen, horse-rescuers and, like Jane Smiley, writers of their own horse novels.
Now Freedom Hill Horse Rescue of Calvert County is counting on the time-honored pairing to inspire young artists and celebrate the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals’ Help a Horse Day.
To illustrate the positive side of horse rescue, Horses in Our Hearts calls on student artists pre-school through 12th grade to depict horses in their medium of choice: drawing or paint; prints, photos or computer-generated images; collages, ceramics, sculpture and other 3-D art.
“We hope this contest will help promote the arts, encourage students to participate in activities that give back to the community and help raise funds to build the rescue’s educational outreach and equine-assisted learning programs,” said Freedom Hill Executive Director Kristy Alvarez.
Artists from Artworks@7th in North Beach will judge the various age categories, awarding ribbons to the top four and cash prizes to the winner in each age category.
“It is Artworks@7th’s honor to partner with Freedom Hill for such a worthy cause,” says artist Carmelo Ciancio. “To marry compassion for our fellow creatures while supporting our future artists is a noble endeavor we are happy to be a part of.”
Winners will be displayed at Artworks@7th for one month. See more of the young artists’ work at Freedom Hill’s 2nd Annual Ponypalooza in Owings April 23.
Mail entries by April 15, 2016 or drop them off at Artworks@7th, Annmarie Garden in Solomons or Greenwell Foundation in Hollywood.