Artist teaches tolerance through her work

Growing up in Chicago and Hawaii, Jennifer Forman Weinstein often found herself out of the mainstream.

Those experiences helped the Paradise Valley-based artist develop the Face Tolerance program she is sharing with students at the Bright Beginnings Charter School this fall. It's part of a weeklong multicultural celebration going on at the school.

"I lived outside of the south side of Chicago in the '70s and went to Martin Luther King Middle school and was one of the few White people there," Weinstein said. "Then I went to a private Catholic school because the education was better and was one of the few Jews in my class. We moved to Hawaii and I finished high school there.

"There I was the White girl, a haole from the mainland. Through the course of my life, I learned how to get along with everybody. You just have to figure it out. That's why I can relate to the kids because I've lived it."

Weinstein developed the Face Tolerance curriculum for the Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts' 2006-07 Cultural Connections Through the Arts program. She first taught the program at middle school in that city and went on to exhibit the finished project at the center. Since then she has also taught the curriculum at her former high school in Hawaii and Chandler's Jewish Community Center earlier this year.

The Face Tolerance program, taught over the course of several weeks, teaches lessons of acceptance. Weinstein and the students talk about the subject and do exercises, such as brainstorming on words related to tolerance and keeping journals to chronicle their thoughts on the subject.

All of this leads to the children making masks, which they decorate with their interpretations of the concepts they've learned. The youngsters start this process by making casts of each other's faces.

"You really get to know a person when you touch their face," Weinstein said.

The children are free to make the masks as they see fit, but they must incorporate at least one piece of mirror in their mask.

"The mirror is the most important element in the mask," Weinstein said. "When you go to the exhibit, you will see your reflection in each one of those masks. It shows that we're all part of each other."

The project at Bright Beginnings is still in its early stages as the students won't begin making their masks until the middle of next month. They hope to be able to exhibit the masks at the Vision Gallery in downtown Chandler during the city's Multicultural Festival in January.

"We periodically bring in artists to share with the kids," said Bright Beginnings art instructor Tracy Crocker. "Most of the students doing this will be going to junior high next year. This is a wonderful program to help prepare them for that."

Weinstein likes to talk to the students about the ripple effect when it comes to tolerance. That's why her personal mask includes a tear drop - to symbolize how a small drop in a pool of water can spread.

"With that little drop of water, it spreads throughout the world," Weinstein said. "Through their art, they'll be able to communicate their own feelings on tolerance. It's very powerful and it works."

Paradise Valley sculptor Jennifer Forman Weinstein with a mask she created.