announcing . . .
Colorado Center for Divorce Mediation
Kids’ Divorce Art Gallery: Expressive Imagery of Children’s Experience of Divorce.
As with folks of all ages, art can assist children to identify and express their feelings.
Encouraging children to paint and draw about their parents’ divorce or separation validates their experience and emotions. Such art acknowledges the impact of divorce on their life and that of their family.
We’re fortunate to have collaborated with gifted Boulder, Colorado, art therapist Sue Wallingford to design our gallery displaying some really great Colorado kids’ divorce art.
Here, Sue shares her perspective, as an artist and expressive therapist:
For children, like their parents, divorce is often a traumatic and life-changing event. Unlike their parents, however, children often lack the verbal skills or emotional maturity adequately to process their feelings with words.
Art-making is an alternative that allows for the poignant communication of feelings. Art may portray inner thoughts and wishes of children that they can not otherwise easily access or express.
The difficult emotions that often accompany divorce take form in line, shape and color! As a result, children are able to make sense of what is happening in the changing landscape of their family and indeed, their world. Painting, drawing or any other creation of art affords children a way literally to express, see and work through their experience of divorce.
The images presented in this gallery tell children’s stories of divorce. Please listen with your hearts.
— Sue Wallingford, MA, LPC, ATR
Registered Art Therapist, Boulder, Colorado
And so, together with co-sponsor, Divorce in Denver Magazine, we share our Colorado Kids’ Divorce Art Gallery.
So, we invite your submissions! Help us share what kids’ art tells us about children’s experience of their parents’ divorce or separation.
But, first, what is kids’ divorce art? Who can join in?
Divorce Art Gallery Basics
To be featured in our Gallery, your art (or your kid’s art, if you’re a grownup) must be:
- Drawings or sketches or paintings or colorings (flat type art) or photos of 3-dimensional works (clay, paper mache) … but you knew that, right?
- About your family or a part of your family (mom, dad, stepmom, stepdad, sister, brother, stepsister, stepbrother, grandmother, grandfather, even your dog or cat!) and how you feel or have felt when things changed … when your parents separated or divorced. (Or, if you are fortunate and have your parents together, you can submit art of how you imagine it would be if your parents separated or divorced!)
Only some ideas for your divorce art:
- Maybe your divorce art shows your new family situation, such as your new home or homes.
- Perhaps, your art reveals your feelings (sometimes sadness? or confusion? or anger? or joy – to be with your mom or dad or another family member after not seeing them for a while?)
- Your divorce art might just be about how your mom or dad act with each other, or act with you, at least some of the time.
- It could describe a dream about your family in the past, or perhaps even a wish for the future!
These are just some possibilities, but okay, you get the picture (ouch!).
Divorce Art Gallery Exhibitions — By Artist Age
To keep things a bit organized — when we receive enough submissions — your work will be displayed in our gallery with the entries of other kids of your age, in three groups of the following ages (your age, at the time of your artwork’s creation):
- Six (6) years or younger
- Seven (7) years – eleven (11) years
- Twelve (12) years – sixteen (16) years
Sorry, at least as we begin, there’s no space for artwork of “kids” over 16!
How To Exhibit Your Art In The Gallery:
Submit By Email Or Regular Mail
You may forward your art to us by electronic mail or regular mail.
- Send by electronic mail, with the artist information requested below, to [email protected]. Have someone help you scan your artwork and save it in jpg, or gif (standard web-ready) format. (If your artwork is too large to be scanned, perhaps you can use a digital camera to photograph your artwork. Again, save it in one of these formats.) Don’t forget to attach the scanned or photographed file to your email!
- Or, send by regular mail, with the artist information requested below, to:
Colorado Kids’ Divorce Art Gallery
Colorado Center for Divorce Mediation
8704 Yates Drive, Suite 220
Westminster, CO 80031-3682
Please do not bend your artwork, and you must include a self-addressed mailer, folder or envelope with plenty of postage if you wish your artwork returned!
All Art Gallery Submissions Must Include
Include with all submissions (by Email or regular mail), the following six items:
- The artist’s first and last name (although without your parent or guardian’s advance written consent, we will NOT include your last name in any use of your art!)
- The artist’s birthdate and age at the time the artwork was completed
- The medium used (for example, pastels, tempura paint, colored pencils, watercolor, cut paper, etc.)
- Title of artwork (a description of its subject in your own words would “rock,” but is optional)
- Home address, phone number and email address (if you have one) of a responsible party (this information is used to confirm your parent or guardian’s consent, contact you regarding random drawing awards and other notices, and will NOT be shared with anyone else for any purpose without written permission)
- The signature of (or an affirmation in the Email’s text by) a parent or guardian indicating their consent and approval to the submission
What You Promise Us!
By submitting your art to our Gallery, you and your parent or guardian agree to all parts of the following statement:
- I promise that I created these materials at the age listed on my submission, and I have the right to provide them to you for reproduction and display.
- By submitting my artwork or other materials to Divorce Resolutions‘ Kids’ Divorce Art Gallery, I acknowledge I have the consent of my parent or guardian and understand my entry becomes the property of your company. Additionally, if I choose to submit my artwork by regular mail, I agree that your company does not ensure its safe return and that I bear the risk of its loss or damage in the mail or otherwise.
- I grant permission for these materials to be reproduced and publicly displayed at any time by your company, without compensation to me, in any media for noncommercial and commercial purposes.