ArtWavEs Nourish the Children
ARTWAVES IS…. THE CHILDREN’S PEACE FLAG MOVEMENT!
Peace Flags ripple in the wind. Each one is unique, created by children, teens, and groups who have painted their deepest dreams for a peaceful planet on silk. As the wind spreads out through the peaceful images, the breeze changes shape and the ripple effect spreads peace into the world.
Quantum magic is in the air! First, children practicing intentional creativity feel empowered. Second, Peace Flags inspire not only the maker, but also the viewer, and they enchant the culture with hope, freedom, and love! One breath, one meal, and one flag at a time, we are creating peace through ArtWavEs.
And it starts with you helping us to help kids learn early how vital the breath, their intentions, and practicing peace and art skills are in a world without war.
We who dream of a world that works for everyone are providing nutritional, social, creative, and life skills workshops to improve the lives of youth, especially those at risk for hunger and post-traumatic stress.
Do you share the vision? Have you often dreamed of doing something to help solve the problems emerging out of violence and greed? If so, you can be an essential partner by taking practical action with us to manifest the solutions: peace and generosity. How?
AWE is achieving TWO MAIN GOALS:
Goal #1: We teach youth to choose peace in their body, heart, and mind. Through good food, mindful living, Kindness Circles, Peace Arts modules, and the Peace Flag-making process, they learn visual, auditory, and kinesthetic skills that help kids integrate life experiences, accelerate learning, and feel empowered.
Goal #2: Beautiful Peace Flags made in AWE workshops by children and volunteers are being sent as gifts, acts of kindness, to people and places in the world destabilized by conflict. Everyone wins when kindness is sent to someone else. Research shows that kindness directed toward another stimulates the immune system, activates serotonin, and changes not only the receiver of kindness, but the giver and observer as well. When Peace Flags are created as gifts, they become imbued with the blessings of Aloha, loving-kindness.
WHY AWE MATTERS. THROUGH ARTWAVES, WE ...
- Prevent Child Hunger
- Share Mindful Living
- Produce Whole-Brain Educational and Art Events
- Explore Team Physics & Activate Creative Collaborations
- Encourage Community Spirit & New Local Jobs
- Make the World more beautiful and harmonious.
This year, we seek $10,000 to reach our $15,000 goal for the current Peace Flag program. We successfully produced two pilot projects already this year, and are planning new live workshops in Kona, North Hawaii, and Park City, Utah. We ask for your support to help us expand and refine our offerings
Through drawing, painting, music, dance, and other expressive arts, children awaken their heart’s passion, where they feel AWE and wonder, which changes everything.
On GOAL #1: Youth Nourishment
We teach visual, musical, movement, and storytelling arts in a community-based process to help children integrate and communicate feelings and visions for a world at peace.
We share Gratitude in schools, camps, child-friendly spaces, youth centers, and homes. We provide healthy food, life skills, and arts training in a supportive environment where kids can play, paint their passions, and connect with peers and adult facilitators. Learning how peace comes from within and expresses outwardly, they make Peace Flags for their personal enjoyment.
On GOAL #2: Global Outreach
Through this shared, community-based creative process, children and families discover how their local actions can lead to healthier environments in distant places.
We practice Kindness for others by making flags to give away, feeling the joy of working for something larger than ourselves. Once they realize how good it feels to move beyond the personal desire to become a contributor to the collective, kids change in life-enhancing ways.
These additional Peace Flags are sent to troubled communities -- war zones, cities, and sites where violence has erupted – becoming instruments of beauty and peace wherever there is discord.
If that community wants to learn how to make Peace Flags, we are creating ArtWavEs Care Packages with free video links to instructional guidance, inspired songs, and written material to help other Pacific ArtWavEs groups get started.
WHAT’S HAPPENING TODAY
In our 10 years of growth, our main mission has remained strong. As Feed the Children Kona, which evolved into Pacific ArtWavEs, our 501c3 organization, we serve children with nutrition for the body and food for the soul. Here are some of our updated strategies.
WE SEEK $10,000 TO CONTINUE OUR WORK…
- To offer two workshops serving Hawaiian and Mainland communities this year.
- To share the Aloha spirit by designing, recording, and editing teaching sections of workshops for AWE Care Packages that include these modules as well as supplies: paints, silk, and all that any group or family needs to make Peace Flags. We intend to share the HeArtWavEs Packages in select communities in 2023. We invite you to submit names and places where you think the AWE program could serve local communities!
- To network with local food growers, restaurants, and chefs to create nutritional snacks and meals for keiki and families in our workshops.
- To purchase art supplies (paints, silks, resist or gutta, and materials) to paint, frame, and hang garlands of flags for workshops and AWE Care Packages.
- To contact and send completed Peace Flag arrays to communities in conflict.
- To establish a Website and online presence for donors to select Peace Flags for their homes and offices.
- To engage training, administrative, video, and fundraising support including maintaining official 501c3 records, rental, website, and personnel contracts.
Operating on Hawaii Island, in the middle of the Sea of Peace, the Pacific Ocean, our Pacific ArtWavEs mission has already amplified Aloha blessings locally and into the larger world. We hope you’ll be on our team going into the future, amplifying the ripple effect of Peace Flags and stirring heart waves through expressive and intentional arts practices.
Can you help by making a contribution of any amount? Please know that $5 is as important as $500. Your goodwill and positive support will help keiki to develop healthy and creative skills, no matter what is happening in the world today.
The task may seem large and the challenges insurmountable, but don't think they are. We have faith in you, that you believe you can make a difference. Contribute now and be a partner in our effort. In olelo Hawaii, there is a beautiful proverb that goes, ’ʻAʻohe hana nui ke alu 'ia," which means, “No task is too big when done together by all.”
Nurturing our best dreams for peace and being encouraged to use their energies for the power of goodness, children, teens, and participating schools, clans, and families learn to take life into their own hands. With your kindness, you are choosing to be a moving force for a peaceful, non-violent, beautiful, and sustainable way forward.
Cast upon the land, water, animals, and people, Peace Flags heal everyone -- the makers, viewers, donors, and receivers. We are so fortunate to be alive at a time that we can do so much good in the world!
Mahalo for your time.
Learn more about the ArtWavEs Mission in this brief video:
Please give generously to our ArtWavEs Mission here:
Marya Mann, Ph. D.
Program Director for Pacific ArtWavEs Nourish the Children (AWE)
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