At the Igazgyöngy (“Real Pearl”) Foundation in Eastern Hungary, hundreds of Roma children learn to express themselves through art classes. The Real Pearl Foundation runs drawing, painting, sculpture, handiwork, and dancing lessons for the children, most of whom come from impoverished families.
An estimated 700,000 Roma live in Hungary, most of them in economically disadvantaged areas in the southeast.
The Real Pearl Foundation aims to give students a chance to escape poverty. Many of its students come from families with jobless parents and homes lacking sewage or running water.
In Real Pearl’s classes children paint pictures of fairytale birds and colorful houses. Many enter their work into international competitions.
Istan Otvos, a 15-year-old Foundation student, won a prize last year at an international art contest in Portugal. This fall he hopes to attend one of Hungary’s best secondary schools. According the Nora Ritok, Real Pearl’s founder, students win hundreds of prizes each year.
Ritok says that the goal of the classes is not for every student to become an artist. Instead, she says, it’s more important to “help them develop their personalities in a way that builds self esteem… and could strengthen their will and give them a goal in life.”
In addition to the art classes, the Real Pearl Foundation assists families with financial advice, community development activities, and monthly grants based on their children’s school attendance.
The foundation also involves parents in its activities. In one project, teachers taught local mothers needlepoint, and asked them to embroider patterns based on their children’s drawings. In another, they taught a carpentry workshop for village men. The goal was to encourage creativity and introduce parents to a possible new source of income.
According the Ritok, changing the parents’ future is key to changing the child’s.
Ritok has high standards for her Foundation’s work. She won’t be satisfied if her students win art prizes, or if one or two attend college. The “real success,” she says, comes when hundreds of them achieve positive goals.
To see examples of students’ work, please visit the Real Pearl Foundation’s online gallery.
Creative Commons Love: Josh Kenzer on Flickr.com
