In February, visual artist and Silk Road Ensemble member Kevork Mourad visited four Silk Road Connect schools. One of several similar visits throughout the year connecting sixth-grade students, their teachers, and professional artists and musicians, this experience made a lasting impression in our pilot schools as Kevork's drawings came to life in each classroom, inspiring students' own work.
Drawing on his own Syrian-Armenian background and a prior visit from SRC teaching artist Hadi Eldebek, Kevork discussed the importance various Arabic cultures place on music and ornamentation. Accompanied by Lead Teaching Artist Mike Block, who played a Middle Eastern tune on his cello, Kevork drew three designs that blossomed into decorations on an oud. He showed students pictures of ouds, focusing on the "roses" that ornament them, then showed the same designs as used in Armenian architecture. After telling a tragic love story involving an unfinished castle built in the hope of winning a woman's love, Kevork began painting spontaneously and asked the students to think of stories that would connect the three scenes he was illustrating. They told of caravans going into the mountains toward a church (like the one they'd seen in a slide) where men gathered to play music. Then after a quick lesson about symmetry, Kevork guided students in drafting their own oud "roses," which they later finished with their art teachers.
Classes used the visit to explore the concept of storytelling through various art forms and link to their current social studies unit on the Middle East. Teachers responded to the
combination of narrative, music and visual art, because it gave all students creative opportunities to apply what they had learned.
Some surprising and moving connections occurred. At one school, a student who speaks only Arabic, and is often left out of conversations, was able to talk with Kevork, telling him her version of the story as he drew—a turn of events that suddenly placed her, and her ability to communicate, in a different light in her fellow students' eyes.
After Kevork's visit, one child shared an insight about the power of art to bridge cultural divides: "Mr. Mourad made stories from the picture and the story that he told was all true. Also I like that he used a lot of [creativity]. One day I would love to do something like that because if I can draw I can talk about my country and what came from there."
Photographs © Allison Trombley |