Help us reach 500,000 kids with our Peace Pals Global Exchange! Your generosity helps create a ripple of peace across the globe!
I liked doing the Peace Pals postcard project because I got to let out my inner self and just do what I'm best at - art work. It was also a great opportunity to show off my art. Peace to everyone!
Kendal S.
Age 11, 4th grade
Grass Valley, California
I love your Peace Pals idea and would think kids would love to participate--I know sharing this project with my grandchildren was an honor!! They may actually grow up owning the possibility of peace, and projects like this can only further that possibility.
Lynn K. Artist, Grandmother, volunteer
Shaker Hts, Ohio
Collaborators
Laura Louise Aleo
Laura Aleo is a 30 year-old visual artist originally from Boston, MA. As a prolific artist her entire life, Laura has a background in welding, textile & design, clay, painting, and sketching. Having recently focused her creativity on illustration and logo design, Laura has been a key contributor in the design and creation of the Create Peace Postcard project’s slogans and continues to support the development of the Peace Pals Global Exchange. She now manages and sells her greeting cards, illustrations and logos under the name, "Illustrations By Lo." Laura is currently enrolled in a design/animation program at City College in San Francisco.
Freedom Bean
Freedom Bean is a passionately creative visual artist, performer, and teacher. Freedom has studied at the San Francisco Art Institute and The Experimental Performance Institute where he earned his Performing Arts degree in 2005. For the last several years Freedom has worked in community theatres and teen centers assisting in art projects, acting classes and songwriting workshops. Free’s philosophy is that by expressing themselves through different artistic mediums (painting, performing, songwriting) children become more confident and find their unique role in the world. www.freedombean.com
Nicole Rodriguez
Nicole Rodriguez believes art is life. She has a background in Buddhist studies from Naropa University where she integrated the spiritual practice of loving kindness into her passion for visual art and performance. Having grown up in a family of artists who made art a medium for change in the movement toward equality in the US, Nicole is an inspired and active teacher of the power of self-expression. Nicole has worked with kids for over eight years as a nanny, preschool teacher, and teaching art as a way to awaken cooperation, self-expression, and self-worth through creativity. Nicole also runs her own mural painting business working with kids to help bring art into peoples homes and businesses. She is committed to bringing leadership skills to kids through art projects as a way to contribute to peace on earth. www.motifmurals.com
David Stern-Gottfried
After working in entertainment technology for five years, David temporarily left the Bay Area to travel and volunteer in Latin America painting murals and sharing his passion for community art wherever he went. Coordinating with non-profits in Nicaragua, Bolivia and Ecuador, David orchestrated several large community murals with hundreds of children. His enthusiasm for public art landed him work with the Philadelphia Mural Arts Program in the summer of 2008 where he painted with the city's top muralists on five mural projects. David taught high school youth as well as visited the state prison to work with men involved in the mural program. He is now facilitating Banners painting workshops and murals with the C. P. P. in his commitment to bringing large- scale community arts projects to youth throughout the Bay Area. His purpose is to make art happen. www.davesg.com
Todd Berman
Todd Berman is a San Francisco artist who travels the world and his local community, sketchbook in hand. His art reflects the colorful eccentricity bound within moments and individuals; depicting scenes of people coming together to improve their surroundings. Todd's work encourages participation by asking people to create small, personalized drawings from which he collages into larger collaborative art works. Working as a public school substitute teacher in San Francisco’s eclectic Mission District neighborhood, Todd creates scenes that capture a chaotic sense of community and collaboration in bright, expressionistic drawing, painting and collage. Named San Francisco County 2006 Bike Commuter of the Year, Todd also uses his two wheels to bring his art to events, parks, and schools. He has a BA in Public Policy from Brown University and continues his arts education through programs at U.C. Berkeley Extension and the San Francisco Art Institute. An archive of Todd's artwork can be found at TheArtDontStop.org. New drawings and stories from his recent trip around the world are unfolding at Ephemerratic.com.