Louisvillians Who Tell the Truth

Maryhurst School is in direct partnership with Maryhurst who has served and cared for abused and neglected children for 167 years. Maryhurst itself cares for more than 600 children each year through a residential treatment program for teenage girls, community based group homes for teen girls and boys, therapeutic foster care services and after-school programs for at-risk youth. Maryhurst School is a JCPS school who educates those teens approximately 100 plus students a year all teen girls. 

Maryhurst Schools Mind’s Eye Art Club members had the opportunity from October 4, 2011 through November 14, 2011 to participate in an art project called Louisvillians Who Tell the Truth and work with artist Annette Cable  from the Louisville Visual Arts Association’s Open Doors Program.  This particular art project was inspired and based on portraits by Robert Shetterly who was so grief-stricken over the September 11, 2001 tragedy in New York that he painted a series of 100+ portraits of Americans he hopes will remind people of the “courage, self –sacrifice and humility.” Portrayed are the citizens who he thought represented people who told the truth in American communities such as Dorothea Lange and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. On October 26, 2011 members of the club meet and interviewed Mr. Shetterly while he was visiting Louisville for the opening of an exhibit of his work at the Kentucky Center for African American Heritage. The teen girls were inspired by his words and paintings.  

Prior to their introduction to Shetterly, 8 of our own community leaders came to Maryhurst and were interviewed by the seven members of the art club. The art club photographed the community leaders, which were transformed into portraits, much like Shetterly’s works. Each member shot photos and created a painting of the following community leaders, to whom we are most thankful for their time and great work in our community:

Dawne Gee – Television News Anchor

Ed Hamilton – Louisville Artist

Jack Trawick – Executive Director, Center for Neighborhoods

Dr. Ricky Jones – University of Louisville Professor

Judy Schoeder – Neighborhood Activist, Metro United Way

John Yarmuth – Kentucky Congressional Representative

Nathalie Andrews – Founder Portland Museum

Judy Lambeth – Executive Director, Maryhurst

A special thanks goes out to the Norton Foundation for funding this Open Doors project