Gabrielle’s Story “I am because you are, and because we are, I am.” -Ubuntu/Zulu Philosophy I came from parents who discovered in the mid-1960s that love transcends skin color. My mother and father, one from a small farming town in Iowa and the other from Cabrini-Green projects in Chicago, endured trials and tribulations together because of […]
Read ArticleKelli’s Story Painting is my livelihood…and at one point I fought it tooth and nail. Now don’t get me wrong, art has resonated in me always. I remember spending hours as a little kid taking chunks of tree bark and whittling them into shapes on the rough surface of the sidewalk, my days punctuated by more cat […]
Read ArticleJeff’s Story I first learned how to draw cartoons by studying the comics section of the Sunday World-Herald. I would spend hours on the living room floor, or in my bedroom, sheets of paper and pens and crayons spread around me, trying my best to recreate Snoopy, Charlie Brown, and the many other characters that populated the Sunday Funnies. […]
Read ArticleBrad’s Story When I was a kid my parents always said, “If you love what you do for a living you’ll never work a day in your life.” To me, a child only concerned with Spider-Man, G.I. Joe and who would win if they ever had to battle, that sounded wonderful. I was 12 when […]
Read ArticleSuzanne’s Story The Decisive Moment (with apologies to Henri Cartier-Bresson.) As the daughter of an art teacher, I grew up surrounded by art books. My childhood summers were spent pouring through them, marveling at the velvet cushioned swing featured in Fragonard’s The Swing (which differed substantially from the splinter-inducing apparatus in Lincoln’s Pioneer Park) and staring in guilty fascination at […]
Read ArticleBart’s Story Art is my life. It always has been, whether I knew it or not. According to my biological mother, I’ve been drawing ever since I could hold something in my hands, yet ironically; I was the only one out of my brothers that wasn’t drawing on the walls. Growing up I knew I could draw […]
Read ArticleMorgan’s Story Growing up, my brother Dylan played the guitar and bass and was in several bands. I went to all of his shows and was always excited to watch him and his friends perform. I soon realized that I wanted to do the same thing because it looked like so much fun. I started […]
Read ArticleS.R.’s Story How many times have I thought, That’s not what I meant or I don’t know what you mean? I ask because I don’t know. I have such a hard time making sense of things. So I write, and I revise. What I mean: I grew up with books. They were my best friends—and […]
Read ArticleDeborah’s Story It all began while standing in line, with hundreds of others, outside the most beautiful pink building I had ever seen. I didn’t know where we were going or why we were there. I just knew it had to be very special since I was dressed in my pink mohair (Sunday!) coat and […]
Read ArticleMike’s Story In my time as the managing director of the Nebraska Shakespeare Festival, I was fortunate to witness countless examples of how the arts transcend the creative experience to touch and affect the rest of our lives—and, how public funding for the arts makes that possible. Each night, I witnessed three to five thousand […]
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