“With the recent financial cutbacks in education, the first disciplines to go are the arts,” said Frank Liu, “yet there’s a proven relationship between the ability of children to learn and exposure to the arts. The arts are the last things that should go.”
Liu is referring to Houston’s public school system and its recent funding reductions. In most cases, the arts were the first on the chopping block, while it’s statistically confirmed that participation in the arts improves academic performance.
Liu, a Houstonian and recent University of Pennsylvania grad, is taking action. He partnered with the Museum of Cultural Arts Houston (MOCAH), the Houston Ballet, the Back Porch Players, and the Conrad Johnson Music Foundation to bring arts to the children of B.K. Bruce Elementary in Houston’s Fifth Ward.
Liu created “Culture Camp.”
The Fifth Ward is located on the northeastern side of downtown and remains a desert of abandoned industrial property. Here, poverty is the norm. With its acres of dilapidated structures and smattering of housing projects, the area has been overlooked by many for years.
However, a glimpse of Houston’s future can be found here. At B.K. Bruce Elementary, the children are exploding with enthusiasm, energy and undeveloped talent. Bruce, Liu decided, was the perfect place to introduce Culture Camp.
Through the camp, third, fourth and fifth-grade students in Bruce’s summer school were introduced to dance, visual arts, music and theater. In the first three weeks, 35 students moved through a rotation of the four disciplines. In the last two weeks, the children settled into a specialty of their own choosing to prepare for a final performance.
At the culmination of Culture Camp, the students produced a showcase that included all the disciplines. The theater group re-interpreted “Romeo and Juliet.”The dance students performed a set from “The Nutcracker,” and music students left the audience breathless. Several hundred family members and neighbors came to watch the art unfold.
And art it was. In the priceless performance of “Rome and Juliet,” lines shifted between Shakespearian English and modern English, the little actors and actresses changed costumes and characters with flare — wigs and wardrobe flying. Music and dance student kept the audience on its feet cheering, while big, magnificent mosaics created in the visual art rotation filled the performance hall.
The enthusiasm and pride of the parents in the audience was surpassed only by the apparent joy of the children themselves.
But it wasn’t easy. It took all the kids a lot of hard work and practice to make it happen, and all had to develop untapped skills to get it done.
For example, on the first day of camp, music instructor Claude Robinson spent hours teaching scales. During the final performance, his children collectively played rousing renditions of “Crazy Train” and “La Bamba” and two songs they wrote themselves called “Culture Camp” and “Bruce Blues.”
“I have seen the kids grow a lot in these weeks,” said Lauren Anderson. “This camp was fantastic for them.”
Anderson is an education outreach associate for the Houston Ballet, and one of Houston’s real treasures. Dancing with the Houston Ballet since she was seven, Anderson is recognized as the country’s most distinguished African American ballerina.
“Culture Camp changed these kids’ perceptions of what they could accomplish. They came in with reservations about themselves and left with expectations for themselves. It was incredible,” Anderson concluded.
“If we choose to stand on the sidelines, many of the kids in our schools will grow up in an educational system without arts,” said President of MOCAH, Reginald Adams.
MOCAH is a nonprofit cultural arts organization that has worked overtime to keep the arts alive. The agency has produced more than 120 community-based art projects and engaged more than 16,500 at-risk youth in 40 local schools.
“When we provide our children with opportunities to exercise their creativity,” Adams continued, “We’re helping them develop decision-making skills. It encourages critical and analytical thinking, helps kids with problem-solving, and the challenges they’ll face as adults. They learn to see the world through a multi-faceted lens. That’s the power of art,” he concluded.
Liu realizes that there are many schools in our community with needs. His objective is to build a network of partnerships and sponsors to produce the model of Culture Camp many times over.
Liu enlisted the financial support of InTown Homes, a highly regarded, local real estate development company, to underwrite the expenses associated with Bruce’s camp. He also partnered with Zenfilm, a local film company renowned for its creativity, to produce a documentary on the birth of the camp so that other communities can mirror the effort.
As the final performance drew to a close, the Prince in “Romeo and Juliet” took center stage and spoke the last lines of the play directly to the audience. The crowd was silent.
“For never was a story of more woe, than this of Juliet and her Romeo,” the fifth grader’s solemn voice droned.
The youngster then laughed and yelled, “Peace out! I’m’ going to college!” and skipped off the stage.
The crowd roared.