Face This: Artists help Indonesian kids renovate their school by designing T-shirts

posted by Robyn Pitts July 17, 2019

In July 2019 in Rotterdam, street artists from the US, UK, Australia and Holland teamed up with nine children from a school in Lombok, Indonesia to help renovate their classrooms. By using children’s drawings made by the pupils, the artists exclusively designed a T-shirt for the Face This Foundation. The Dutch charity will use the proceeds of the tees to renovate the school building where the children learn, which was heavily damaged after the earthquakes in Lombok in August 2018.

In April 2019, a group of nine pupils from Lombok took action to rebuild their school by doing what they love: drawing. Although most parts of their village, including their school are still wreckage, the children created drawings about the places in their village which they love most. While drawing they were able to escape reality for a moment. However, these drawings might end up changing that reality forever, as they’ll raise funds to renovate their school.

In order to achieve this, nine incredible street artists from all over the world volunteered to help transform the drawings into exclusive T-shirt designs. Although they had never collaborated with children before, the artists including Jon Burgerman, Mike Perry, Supermundane, Tyler Spangler, Bodil Jane, Mark Conlan, Hedof, Kyle Steed and Jamie Browne found creating their Face This T-shirt an inspiring and refreshing collaboration.

On the collaboration process with his student Kartini, Jon Burgerman states: “There is no right or wrong in art work. Drawings get my attention when you sense that they are honest and have no pretentions. That’s why I like Kartini’s drawings so much. Her drawing contains all these aspects. It is really beautiful, every little line and shape tells me something; it is open. Kartini knows very well how to depict her favourite place. That is very nice.”