Building Bridges: Artmaking in New York City, Los Angeles, and Suharekë, Kosovo

Hello Fellow Culturalistas,

From May 14 to the 22nd my friend and colleague, Terry Lenihan and I traveled to Kosovo to conduct visual arts workshops with children and youth at the Fellbach-Haus in Suharekë, a small town south of
Prishtina. Prior to our trip to Kosovo we ran several different art workshops with groups of Kindergarten through 8th grade students in our respective cities, Los Angeles and New York City, to start off our project.

Fellbach-Haus Children with NYC Mural

In New York City, third grade art students from art classes at the Allen-Stevenson School designed and painted a 4’ x 15’ canvas mural depicting New York City as well as smaller 9” x 9” hybrid-animal self portraits to be shared with their Los Angeles and Suharekë counterparts. Similar arts activities were undertaken at the West Side Leadership Magnet in Venice, CA. Terry and I then brought this artwork to share with the children and youth at the Fellbach-Haus as a way of initiating an art dialogue.

Our days in Suharekë were broken into two parts –in the mornings making art with the children, afternoons with the youth. We worked collaboratively with Refki Gollopeni, an artist and resident art educator, and the children and youth. The images I’ve posted show the them designing and painting their mural of Suharekë and, as the final project, a bridge making installation symbolizing the
connections we hope to continue to build and maintain between Suharekë, New York and Los Angeles. The energy was amazing. With the assistance of Refki’s son and daughter as translators, the kids took on the assignments and worked non-stop. This kind of commitment, on the part of the children, youth and the adults involved, is illustrative of the entire programming available at the center.

Fellbach-Haus is a gathering site and an important cultural center for this community. The center provides a variety of educational activities and courses for children, youth and adults in the local area. Artists, cultural workers and other professionals drawn from the community teach these courses. During the Balkan wars, Suharekë was greatly impacted. Approximately 90% of the buildings were damaged or destroyed and a significant portion of the population lost family members and
loved ones. It has been 10 years since the end of the war and we felt and witnessed a great deal of
optimism and creative energy.

During our time in Suharekë everybody at the Fellbauch-Haus and their friends and families went out of there way to make us feel at home – not only sharing the work of the center with us, but also inviting us to their homes and what felt like endless cups of macchiatos – some of the best I’ve had
and that includes my trips to Italy. For our final evening an art opening was held for the young artists
and their families. The center put on several productions, including a play and traditional dance choreography. Afterwards, we shared food, drink, dancing and some of the most beautiful and amazing singing I’ve ever heard – traditional Albanian songs, sung a cappella, by men from the town.

We plan on returning to continue the collaboration and hope in the future, to be able to host some of
the artists from Suharekë in New York City and Los Angeles. In the meantime, the artwork created by the Los Angeles, New York City and Suharekë children and youth will be exhibited in our respective cities before being sent back to the FellBach-Haus in Suharekë.

Fellbach-Haus children working on mural

Fellbach-Haus youth with unfinished mural

Fellbach-Haus: Building a bridge

Fellbach-Haus youth building bridge installation using children and youth sculptures.

The final exhibition with all three murals and bridge installation

Cindy, Terry and the girls at the opening