Fourth Graders Contemplate Heroes at the Jack Shainman Gllery
Powerful women
Stuck in a frame
Colorful strokes and drips of paint
Tells a story
-Nico
Women with all different stories
from all different times and places
Colors, texture, movement, objects
and setting and all different faces
-Ziva
Joan of Arc
By Cydney Klass
Heard a voice from God she claimed,
And she fought untrained,
Joan of Arc.
Fought at nineteen
And went on to succeed,
Joan of Arc.
She forced the English to retreat,
It was quite a defeat.
Joan of Arc.
She lead the troupe,
It was a large group!
Joan of Arc.
She fought in the Hundred Years’ War,
But she might have done more,
Died at nineteen
Maybe she fulfilled her dream.
Joan of Arc.
Modern clothes
Why I don’t know
Joan of Arc.
The blood looks like fire
Because it went higher,
Joan of Arc.
She was a saint
Her image was preserved in paint.
Joan of Arc
Captured and killed,
Her life was not filled
Joan of Arc.
Long dark hair
Blew through the air,
Purple shirt, white jeans,
Black and navy blue background
Joan of Arc.
Died at nineteen
Maybe she fulfilled her dream.
Joan of Arc.
Patterns everywhere.
Where were they not?
Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc barefoot in the painting on the wall
The painting did not fall.
Joan of Arc
So young
Maybe or maybe not having fun.
Joan of Arc
Hands placed at her back
Not moving
Only staying.
Joan of Arc
Two first drafts,
And one big final one
Joan of Arc.
Hair different here
Hair different there
Joan of Arc.
Different designs and patterns
So cool.
Joan of Arc.
No drips
Not that much of a background
It was dark and empty
Joan of Arc.
The One
Dante Tejerina
Lines and stripes Stripes and lines
Carlos Vega keeps drawing
The one that is the saint of the blind
Lights a bright light to show the way
The one who looks like a normal teenager
Heads to Orleans where she will soon face a brutal decay
Stripes and lines Lines and stripes
Carlos Vega keeps sketching
The one who loses the loved one
Shows all her pain
The one in the bright red dress
Will turn into a crimson mess
Stripes and lines Lines and stripes
Carlos Vega keeps painting
The one with the pink backpack
She shows her strength to keep fighting
The one who is so smart
Will be questioned for the Christian art
The one who pushes the four wheel cart
Is showing her struggle to keep thriving
Unlike Carlos Vega she keeps working
Lines and Stripes Stripes and Lines
Carlos Vega keeps going
FIERCE WOMEN
By Emilia M. Kravetz
She’s moving her hand and feeling the pain
She has an umbrella with flowers
Her name is Vilomah
She’s opening up her studio
She makes sculptures of Jesus
Her name is Luisa
She’s lugging her cart around
She’s a homeless in the world
Her name is Nakesha
She likes to take care of disabled people
She’s with a handicapped women
Her name is Berta
She has two sisters
She looks like she’s in pain
Her name is Hope
She’s a powerful New Yorker
She was born enslaved
Her name is Sojourner
FREEDOM PAINTINGS
By Emilia M. Kravetz
The paintings were as still as some plants that were growing
Some paintings made me sad weeping, leaping, crying,
Other paintings made me happy laughing, running, kind,
Free trapped free trapped
Repeating like a heartbeat
Alive paintings hero paintings he paints anything possible
Small paintings big paintings
All different sizes
Flowers
Abstract
Women
Enjoyable
Inspiring
Magical
Carlos likes his art , I like it,
It’s wonderful
Nakesha Williams
By Ivy Van Blerkom
Stripe, stripe
And back again
To the start
So much to see
What else could it be
Curvy and straight
Stripe, stripe
And back again
To the start
More and more
What else to see?
Lines
Curvy and straight
What else to see?
Bare feet
Details, details
Dark skin
Lines
Curvy and straight
All over the place
What else to see?
Metal cart
Push past, past, and beyond
NYC
On the street
What else could she be?
An activist for illness
Has a mental illness
So much more
Helps other people
Williams College where she was
Now on the streets of NYC
Didn’t quite get it right
Heroes Of The World
by Julian
Hope very sad but not bad at all,
World’s greatest heroes, together, hand and hand,
Brush strokes all around different colors together safe and sound,
An Unfinished painting is a finished painting,
Beautiful colors beautiful personalities,
All together as one
Sad people, happy people
In a painting there can be more than one,
But still altogether living as one,
All went through violence in a period of their life,
But died as heroes,
Heroes, heroes, heroes,
So many of them on one wall all down the room and across the hall.
These are the heroes of the world safe and sound,
Living together, like earth’s gods,
Living as one
Alive Paintings
By June
A paintbrush in a hand
Painting swirls and pictures
To form a work of art
Expressions
Serious, strong, meaningful
An alive painting
Brave women
Each who stood up for herself
But maybe failed
Symbolic
But unfinished
An alive painting
Brushstrokes
In different patterns
Forming together
Colors
Swirling like rainbows all around
An alive painting
Carlos Vega
Painting a wonder world
An alive painting
In motion
Feet staying in one place
Never going anywhere
Maybe
A spark of curiosity
Will appear
Impossible
by Lila
On artwork so fine a drip of paint is divine
Many different colors waiting for another watching to see what comes next
IMPOSSIBLE
Many women that are hero on the wall looking at each other seeing that each drip of paint is divine
IMPOSSIBLE
But when I look to the ground I see all the hero’s sitting around get up heros and go walk and talk you heroes deserved more to being shot,
You have done so much to help make this a better place like being an activist or an artist in hard states
IMPOSSIBLE
Your paintings have you and your background too it’s almost like you could come out and keep going on with your heroic ways,
IMPOSSIBLE
Or even end to say….
NOT IMPOSSIBLE
All Around Paintings
By Lily Rosenthal
All around paintings, Paintings all around,
All the paintings clear as can be, but with brush strokes different, brush strokes different,
Which one first, which one
Pick and choose, pick and chose,
write and look, write and look,
Look close but do not touch,
Draw and study, draw and study,
More more o- my o- my,
Look at the little man with the mohawk, the man is small
Look at her hands, Nuwa’s hand is big,
In front of the rainbow wall that she created,
Hold the man, hold the man,
In the hoop,
Do not fall, do not,
Study him close, study him close,
Look around, look around
At all the figures in the paintings and how they are in motion,
And how they are better in person,
All around paintings, all around.
Powerful Women
By Nico
Powerful women
Stuck in a frame
Colorful strokes and drips of paint
Tells a story
From now or then
They look in your eyes
With sad with happy
Smiles or frowns
Powerful women
They were brave.
And still are now
Just normal people like you
Who change people’s perspective
Powerful women
They stood up
And made a mark
In Carlos Vega’s heart
Powerful women
Dancing in a frame
And their minds screaming out their name.
The Stripes
By Paloma
Walk into the door,
All the paintings on the walls,
And so many!
One Paloma,
Two rooms,
And so many paintings
To choose
One was Malala,
A backpack,
And
A cart
A cart that’s blue, against the many colors
Her expression was
Mixed
A combo of happy and sad
The stripes all over,
The many colors,
The small brush,
Everything separate, yet together
Pink scarf
Like pink hair
Green pants
Pink backpack
Blue cart
The backpack
It shows
School
It shows what Malala did
Wandering Through Color
By Penelope Schab
Walking into a green glass door that leads you into a new world full of color,
wandering through paintings that come alive as soon as you look,
Fighting for what they think is right,
They look alive!
So colorful,
All about famous women,
All about their history,
About to burst with color,
Doing their own thing,
Their own story,
So colorful,
But still colorful,
There shape is as they are in the moment that second,
Some are about to finish the job,
Yet some are just started,
So colorful,
Their eyes reaching for something,
That you have,
Saying I want it I want it,
So colorful,
but still bright and colorful in their own way,
About to burst with color…
BURST! go on BURST!
Shown Paintings
By Sawyer Gersh
2 rooms,
White walls,
Lots of symbols,
12 had objects,
All about women,
One huge one small,
Makes two drawings,
5 had no objects in hand,
Carlos Vega used stripes,
Little details about old life,
Most sad people in paintings,
At least one painting each side,
Made 17 hero women drawings,
Some saints some regular people,
In most paintings there were drips,
16 paintings had the color blue,
One painting looked unfinished to me,
The women almost filled the painting,
They are as big as a Giant,
One painting starts with a h,
And ends with an e,
And op in the middle,
Did great things but,
No respect in life time
Paintings
By Selah
All the artwork
All the scenes
Very delightful as I seem
Paintings
Lots of colors
Lots of lights
Lots of things I see with my eyes
Paintings
So many objects
So many symbols
Too many brush strokes
Dry drips too
Paintings
Some unfinished
Some Done
All good
Some patterned
Some not
Paintings
Too many things for my eyes
Can it stop
Paintings
Tons of emotions
Tons of feelings
My head is too weary
I feel too dizzy
Paintings
Some figures static
Some in motion
Paintings
Carlos Vega: Correspondences
Shaffer Helfer
Today, today, today.
We went walking to the subway.
The train was bumpy, and went pop, pop, pop,
And then we got off on the second stop.
We went to a gallery where the ceilings were tall,
The art was big, I was scared they would fall.
Carlos Vega, the artist, did a lot of art
And I’m pretty sure he is very smart.
His topic for the show
was strong women in the know,
Yo.
The background of them were very pink
And none of them used ink.
He used a lot of colors in the paintings in his show.
His topic was strong women in the know.
And I could see some still sink
And the place did not stink
And I forgot the link.
His topic in the show was people in the know.
Observing Painting of Hypatia
By Skylar
Looking at the painting
Noticing the painting
Feeling the vibes of the
painting
Feeling like I’m in the
painting
Like the painting is looking
Back at me
Like the painting is
Talking to me to
The colors of the painting
Shine like sparkling
water
in
The sea
The colors of the painting
Are like a rainbow is
coming
The expression on her
Face is more serious
Than a soul diving
In the deep blue sea
Her fascination in math
Is like me in a way
I am interested in
Math myself
Just a bit
Balance On
Nuwa
Part One
By Vincent Fernandes-Vogel
Thinks a thought,
Repair was made;
Through the limestones,
through the jade.
Made repair,
Repair was made,
Through the limestones,
Through the jade.
Balance on, in the hoop,
Hoop of loop,
Loop of hoop.
The wall was built to keep the sides apart,
Apart will keep the sides.
A rainbow wall,
Up in the sky,
Up in the sky,
The rainbow wall.
The time has come,
Jade of shade,
Leave behind,
Jade of shade.
Balance On
Part Two
Splish and splash,
Splash and splish,
Swish, swish, swish.
Paint as you wish,
More no more,
No more, more.
Painting heroes,
More and more.
Saints for a start,
The rest left for last.
Hidden decoding,
Decoding that’s hidden.
Discover the secret,
Hidden the secret,
The secret is hidden.
Paint on,
Paint on,
Carlos Vega.
Hope
By Will Taschler
Reds, blues, pinks, whites, blacks, yellows
The woman has a candle on a bigger plate
That represents her
Hope
She is being dramatic, her hand is behind her head
Like a waitress
she is carrying a bigger plate
Why is she putting her hand behind her head?
Why is she holding the tray?
Why is she wearing a long red shirt?
She looks like she is from the past
But her red dress looks like a modern dress
She could be going to a party or a fancy restaurant
Her expression is a frown
She is looking up at the sky
Like she is feeling hopeless
She is barefoot
Where do you think she is going?
Possibly to an outside party so her feet could feel the soft grass
She wears a flower crown around her head
That has patterns of blue, green and orange
Her red dress is as long as her
I look at the painting
It looks unfinished
With a black background and nothing else
The Amazing Sojourner Truth
By Zara Seegars
The amazing Sojourner Truth
Survived Slavery. The amazing
Sojourner Truth escaped slavery
with and alive newborn child.
The amazing Sojourner Truth
said an important statement.
The amazing Sojourner Truth
Stated “Ain’t I a woman?”
The amazing Sojourner Truth
Fought for women’s right to vote
And changed the law.
The Amazing Sojourner Truth was
an abolitionist.
The Tales of Women
By Ziva DeMattia
Each person, each story
All with their own unique glory
ALL REPRESENTING A WOMAN’S STORY
They stand tall and proud
With a voice that can be loud
ALL REPRESENTING A WOMAN’S STORY
Women with all different stories
from all different times and places
Colors, texture, movement, objects
and setting and all different faces
ALL REPRESENTING A WOMAN’S STORY
A tale can be told in many different ways,
When she stands tall and lays on the wall,
Her alive on a wall is not just a phrase
With colors of all sorts and
Drips and drops and splatter and splots!
ALL REPRESENTING A WOMAN’S STORY
They are all different,
But very much the same.
Hard times and bad times, but never them to blame
ALL REPRESENTING A WOMAN’S STORY