Fourteen monumental faces of heroes who have promoted peace around the world through the protection of human rights were unveiled at the reception of the “Peace Advocates” art exhibit Sept 11th at the Human Rights Education Institute.
The creator of these faces, Rachel Dolezal, is an NIC adjunct art professor of Survey of Art, classes. She has been an artist for 13 years, the visual director for HREI and is currently a professor at Eastern Washington University. Thirty-year-old Dolezal was born and raised in Troy, Mont.
When asked why she chose Mahatma Ghandi, Cesar Chavez and 12 others, Dolezal said they had “very little compromise: and they “protected human rights.” Another reason for choosing these advocates was because of their consistency with their advocacy, she said.
Dolezal’s 14 peace advocate murals are 12 feet tall. Her familiarity with the abstract shapes and lines of a person’s face are what enable Dolezal to look at a picture and then proceed by painting it on a wall from memory.
The 14 faces on the walls at the exhibit are of Ghandi, Chavez, Bella Abzug, Noam Chomsky, Carly Zalenski, Helen Cadicott, Archbishop Oscar Romero, Howard Zinn, Aung San Suu Kyi, Rigoberta Menchu-Tum, Thich Nhat Hanh, Kofi Annan, Rachel Korri and Ingrid Washinawatik El-Issa.
These caricatures were all painted freehand and “with a can of paint and brush.” It took 40 to 48 hours to paint all 14 people. She stated that she used high-gloss black paint to simplify their faces and truly represent their personalities.
“You need relationships between what these people do and the world,” Dolezal said. “Can we have peace without tranquility or without justice? It’s always the right time to do the right thing. And the only way to have peace is to extend love.”
Many said that coming to this lively, happy exhibit and looking at the faces on the walls gives a truly remarkable understanding of what peace is. The personalities of the faces shine through the expressions of the peace advocates quite clearly. Each expression, whether it is a smile or frown, makes a person want to know what they are thinking. Many questions come to mind. How did one person change the world and how did he/she make it better for us?
The only way to answer this question is by reading the advocates’ statements and the biographies below their faces.
The interaction between those who attended was that of old friends meeting again, sharing smiles and new knowledge.
