On a Roll: Mobile art program aids refugee community

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Asfaw Hubtewold had heard about museums throughout his life in Ethiopia, but the 78-year-old refugee never visited one until he came to live in the United States in 2005.

Hubtewold is now one of a dozen refugees participating in the Art Trunk program at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts in Nashville. An art trunk is a mobile education kit delivered in a rolling trunk that contains poster-size reproductions of artwork, related books and lesson plans for three activity sessions. New art trunks are designed for new exhibitions, and the program pairs learning about and making art with visits to the museum. Some of the refugee-made art even makes it onto the walls of the Frist.

Nashville is one of several cities where refugee populations have burgeoned in recent years. Refugees differ from immigrants in a fundamental way. They fear persecution in their home countries for ethnic, religious or political reasons. When someone is given refugee status in the United States, the government’s goal for him or her is to become self-sufficient quickly. The Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), part of the Administration for Children and Families in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, provides grants to refugee-assistance organizations like Catholic Charities, which partnered with the Frist Center for the Art Trunk program.

“Refugees are used to being considered disposable people,” says Eskinder Negash, who directs ORR for the Obama administration. “It is our job to restore dignity, hope and humanity to these individuals.”

There are many circumstances that cause people to flee their homelands, circumstances familiar to Ali Said, a participant in the Art Trunk program. Compelled to leave his native Somalia by “a very ugly civil war,” Said explained that people were persecuted because of their tribal background. “So many died trying to get to Kenya,” he says. Said made it to the United Nations refugee camp in Kenya in 1993 and came to the United States in 2004.

Anne Henderson, director of education and outreach at the Frist Center, says the Art Trunk program helps refugees like Said respond to art at the Frist Center—and helps them tell their stories. “The works of art created by the participants reflect their different cultures and nationalities. They are also building bridges of understanding between their past lives and their new world,” Henderson says. “Each participant is also gaining a new skill. They may be learning how to make a print or experimenting with pastels or creating an illuminated letter.”

At the same time, Henderson feels the community at large benefits by seeing refugee art at the museum. “It fits into our mission of helping people look at their world through art,” she says.

Communication, expression, connection and healing are some of the themes used in the Art Trunk program, which was designed for a generic audience of learners. But Henderson believes museums need not develop an educational outreach program strictly for refugees in order to reach them. The key, she says, is finding the right partner.

“When you identify organizations that are already engaged with those populations, then the creativity can come,” she says. “Catholic Charities already had their Refugee Elders program in place, so we were able to add something to their program that benefited both partners.”

Jennifer Escue, a social worker with Catholic Charities Refugee Services, which is in its third year partnering with the Frist Center on Art Trunks, thinks it’s an especially good match for her clients. “Art as a medium is very useful because it crosses language barriers,” she says. “It lets people say what they want to say without the vocabulary.”

Escue explains that they keep the trunk for several weeks and then are treated to a docent-led tour at the Frist Center. “We learn about the art or the artist, then the clients start doing their own work, and then we visit the museum,” she says. “There’s a hands-on section at the museum that the clients love.”

When an Art Trunk arrives from the Frist Center, Escue and her staff modify the vocabulary and some of the concepts of the lessons to better serve their clients. “If a reference is made to Picasso, for example, our participants might not have that background,” Escue says. Once simplified, Escue considers the trunks to be a valuable tool in teaching English to refugees. “With the lessons, you’re doing a lot of listening, which is very important to English comprehension. You’re also able to introduce new vocabulary about the art,” she adds.

In addition, Escue thinks the Art Trunk program allows for more relaxed communication than a traditional English as a Second Language class. “There’s not that pressure to be correct all the time,” she says.

Escue believes the most valuable outcome of refugee elders’ participation in the Art Trunk program is the opportunity to talk about their feelings and share their stories. “Sometimes, so much of healing comes from just being able to tell your story to someone, to have someone hear you,” she says. “It is especially important to tell your story with an older population who had a position of value in their country.”

With the Frist Center, Escue and other social workers are able to give the refugees a space where they can use art to express their stories and feel validated.

“Our country was not a peaceful country when I came here,” Hubtewold said of Ethiopia. “There was no freedom of expression. My children saw that, and they had the opportunity to come to this peaceful land. Later, they sent for me.”

The Frist Center, Hubtewold says, is a very beautiful place to learn. “We used to farm in Africa. Children would draw pictures of the animals. So in Ethiopia, we think drawing is only for children,” he says. “Then, here in the elders program, I get to know the value of making art.”

Hubtewold produced a self-portrait as one of the activities in the art trunk developed for the visiting exhibition “Chuck Close Prints: Process and Collaboration.”

Negash sees a natural link between refugees like Hubtewold and the museums in their new communities. “Refugees are living museums,” Negash said. “There are so many untold stories, whether from the Balkans or the Sudan.”