david lee winningham
David is a graduate from Centre College, a US News top 50 national ranked liberal arts college located in Danville, KY. He is currently teaches elementary school art in North Little Rock, AR. David was a Teach for America Corps Member in Helena-West Helena, AR. This was a very meaningful experience and it informs much of his work.
These Kids
These Kids documents my experience while teaching public school in a rural impoverished community. Everyday as an art teacher, I showed my students the processes of making art. So, here too, is revealed my entire process – the tests, studies, and pieces that led to a final wall of ceramic tile portraits. Throughout making this work, I remained focused on my responsibility to my subject. I am representing these kids, for whom I have great affection and respect.
These kids live in a small town called Helena-West Helena. It sits on the Arkansas side of the Mississippi River, and was, at one time, a prosperous place. The river-port town had a flourishing local economy, and was a cultural capital for Southern blues music. However, like most communities in the Mississippi River Delta, it is as if the river has since changed it mind – a massive force which once provided industry, boom, and resources, now gives nothing to the communities that sit on either side of its banks.
Living and working in Helena-West Helena was a very unique opportunity, unlike anything I had experienced previously. I entered a town that felt more like a developing country than the United States in which I grew up. Helena-West Helena is a community devastated by poverty. I came to this place passionate and hopeful to address the unfortunate reality that, in this country, kids who live in poverty do not receive a quality education.
Racism is a reality throughout the country, but the inequality it yields is particularly visible in the South. The overwhelming majority of kids who experience educational disadvantage due to economic standing are people of color. While numerous factors cause gaps between low-income learners and their more affluent peers, systemic racism is at the root of this disparity. During my time in Helena-West Helena, I witnessed macro and micro racial aggressions, I confronted my own biases and privilege, and I embraced a culture different from my own.
People do not know about these kids. They, as well as their beauty in the face of ugliness, is invisible to the world. Because they are black, or because they are poor, or because they live in the Delta they have been forgotten. Racism, outdated policies, and lack of resources have left these kids largely uneducated and ill-equipped for success. In our country, an excellent education is not a universal right; it is a privilege.
These Kids began with a desire to create specific work about my students and my experiences with them. On the outset, I created ornamented frames– because these kids are deserving of beauty and admiration. Ultimately though, frames could not contain these kids. Though these kids are deserving of this ornamentation, they do not need to be hidden behind a layer of flower or fancy. Their daily realities are not flowery or fancy and they do not deserve to be fetishized by such means. I then turned to papier-mâché, a medium we use in the art classroom. I hoped that by wrapping them in large-scale ornamentation I would communicate their greatness and importance. These kids are great and important all on their own. Their beauty speaks for itself. Ultimately, the only frame these kids need is one that gives context and. The audience must understand the reality that these kids face in order to truly appreciate them.
These Kids, in its final iteration, is a series of portraits - there is a portrait of every child from my first year teaching in Helena. This installation is a chance for the world to meet these kids that I love so very much and to create awareness of the achievement gap and institutionalized racism that exists in our country’s education system. Each portrait is hand drawn and painted on clay tiles. These kids and the problems they face deserve this amount of time and attention. It is often an emotional process to reflect, remember, and miss each child while creating his or her likeness. The clay is fired to maturity without glaze to highlight the beautiful brown raw color of the clay. A variety of earthenware bodies are mixed together and are fired to different temperatures to create a wide palate of browns, much like the beautiful skin colors of my students. Like any clay artifact, once fired, they are almost indestructible. The shards of clay will not fade or disintegrate; these kids are cast in stone so that they will be remembered forever.
These kids are dynamic and changing and their situations and stories are complicated and ever changing. I intend for These Kids as an installation to be adaptable and nuanced depending on location and audience. These Kids is a pile of shards on the floor or unnamed portraits lining a wall. These Kids are objects to hold and cherish or loose and forget.
These kids are our kids.
These kids live in a small town called Helena-West Helena. It sits on the Arkansas side of the Mississippi River, and was, at one time, a prosperous place. The river-port town had a flourishing local economy, and was a cultural capital for Southern blues music. However, like most communities in the Mississippi River Delta, it is as if the river has since changed it mind – a massive force which once provided industry, boom, and resources, now gives nothing to the communities that sit on either side of its banks.
Living and working in Helena-West Helena was a very unique opportunity, unlike anything I had experienced previously. I entered a town that felt more like a developing country than the United States in which I grew up. Helena-West Helena is a community devastated by poverty. I came to this place passionate and hopeful to address the unfortunate reality that, in this country, kids who live in poverty do not receive a quality education.
Racism is a reality throughout the country, but the inequality it yields is particularly visible in the South. The overwhelming majority of kids who experience educational disadvantage due to economic standing are people of color. While numerous factors cause gaps between low-income learners and their more affluent peers, systemic racism is at the root of this disparity. During my time in Helena-West Helena, I witnessed macro and micro racial aggressions, I confronted my own biases and privilege, and I embraced a culture different from my own.
People do not know about these kids. They, as well as their beauty in the face of ugliness, is invisible to the world. Because they are black, or because they are poor, or because they live in the Delta they have been forgotten. Racism, outdated policies, and lack of resources have left these kids largely uneducated and ill-equipped for success. In our country, an excellent education is not a universal right; it is a privilege.
These Kids began with a desire to create specific work about my students and my experiences with them. On the outset, I created ornamented frames– because these kids are deserving of beauty and admiration. Ultimately though, frames could not contain these kids. Though these kids are deserving of this ornamentation, they do not need to be hidden behind a layer of flower or fancy. Their daily realities are not flowery or fancy and they do not deserve to be fetishized by such means. I then turned to papier-mâché, a medium we use in the art classroom. I hoped that by wrapping them in large-scale ornamentation I would communicate their greatness and importance. These kids are great and important all on their own. Their beauty speaks for itself. Ultimately, the only frame these kids need is one that gives context and. The audience must understand the reality that these kids face in order to truly appreciate them.
These Kids, in its final iteration, is a series of portraits - there is a portrait of every child from my first year teaching in Helena. This installation is a chance for the world to meet these kids that I love so very much and to create awareness of the achievement gap and institutionalized racism that exists in our country’s education system. Each portrait is hand drawn and painted on clay tiles. These kids and the problems they face deserve this amount of time and attention. It is often an emotional process to reflect, remember, and miss each child while creating his or her likeness. The clay is fired to maturity without glaze to highlight the beautiful brown raw color of the clay. A variety of earthenware bodies are mixed together and are fired to different temperatures to create a wide palate of browns, much like the beautiful skin colors of my students. Like any clay artifact, once fired, they are almost indestructible. The shards of clay will not fade or disintegrate; these kids are cast in stone so that they will be remembered forever.
These kids are dynamic and changing and their situations and stories are complicated and ever changing. I intend for These Kids as an installation to be adaptable and nuanced depending on location and audience. These Kids is a pile of shards on the floor or unnamed portraits lining a wall. These Kids are objects to hold and cherish or loose and forget.
These kids are our kids.