Horse in the Garden

By Kris Smith

I bought this huge canvas 2 years ago at a Goodwill store for $10. It was so large that I had a friend with a truck come and pick it up. I thought this would be a great canvas to paint something on, so I painted the whole thing white and told my daughter she could draw anything she wanted on it. My daughter quickly decided that there should be a horse and she began the drawing. I really thought she would paint it also but she didn't. We kept it that way for 2 years - just a pencil drawing of a horse on a huge white canvas on our wall.

After moving it around a few times we lost our excitement over it and it ended up in our basement.

A few weeks ago there was an opportunity in our community to do something creative with young people. At first I was thinking face paintings and drawings... but then I remembered this huge canvas in the basement. I lugged it, an easel and a bunch of acrylic paint over to Anson B. Nixon Park in Kennett Square and set up. I spent about 3 hours with kids who one by one randomly approached my canvas and asked me if they could paint on it.  I wasn't sure how this would go over since paint is a messy thing... but the parents walked their kids right over and encouraged them to participate.

There were kids of various ages and heights available to help complete the painting. They drew with oil pastels, scribbled, doodled and painted with brushes. The thing that was neat was: they all had the vision that my daughter had... it was a horse running wildly -- they just placed it in a garden of color and motion. The creative process allows a person to visualize and dream... you could see it in their eyes...This activity was important to them. It was one of those things that inside I always thought would be a neat thing to do, but actually doing it was most rewarding. The painting is now in my dining room where it fuels our creative forces!