Hi, my name is Alice Di Certo, I work at Tacoma Community College, and I have started a new series of photographic portraits of children and young adults (kindergarten to high school age, depending on the availability and parental permission) who have been bullied in school. My goal is to produce more awareness of this growing problem and, through my images, empower these young and brave youth who, on a daily basis, have to defend who they are, who or what they like, and how they feel. I plan to produce a series of large color prints or, if possible, backlit transparencies, or other luminous prints to shine a light on these kids’ beauty and strength. Each portrait will be accompanied by a description of what the youth has been through and the actual documentation of the bullying (e.g. printouts of cyber-bulling, nasty notes left in lockers, or objects of torment). Children that are bullied are often considered by their peers as “others,” weird, and freaks. This project will help separate bullied from the classifications bestowed on them by their peers as I depict them for who they are, focusing on their strength and making their outer beauty, in addition to their inner beauty, literally glow. A few things the families and kids would be made aware of is that the photos, and stories of the kids' experience will be public: · exposed in an art gallery (and maybe in the future somewhere else? Tacoma Public schools? offices?) in October 2013 · maybe covered (surely not in details) and possibly reproduced (the photos) in some art section of local news papers and magazines · mentioned in TCC or Tacoma Art Commission's website (though they told me they would possibly blog about me as an artist and briefly about the project in general rather than the kid's story) Please contact me if you know a child (with parent's permission) or young adult who would be interested. Thank you! Alice