June 3, 2013
Last year at this time, Kids Company, a charitable organization in the UK, working with severely abused and traumatized children and youth, put on a highly lauded art exhibition called Child Hood, the Real Event at the Royal Academy of Arts. The artwork from over 1000 children included paintings, poetry, and sculpture depicting the painfully troubled lives the young artists lived on the streets of London.
Consider this review of the exhibition by Florence Waters in The Telegraph.
Many traumatized and abused children exhibit extraordinary artistic talent, and much of the art exhibited speaks to the suffering and unbelievable violence these children endured. For instance, one room in the exhibition, the Pink Room, featured a sculpture of a girl lying on a bed, her body cracked in places, beneath a hanging mobile decorated with mens’ shoes.
Kids Company uses a wraparound model in its work with abused and neglected children and youth, providing therapy, social support, education, and living facilities. Its mission includes the goal of influencing other organizations around the world to adopt its model. Like a nonprofit organization in the United States, Kids Company is funded by private donations and government funding.