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Dear Mrs. Youssef,

In September 2003, Zelie will have been studying art with you for five years. I would like to tell you of some of the changes we have seen in this time. She certainly has developed technical skill in several different mediums, including pencil, pencil crayon, watercolour and oil paints. She has developed appreciation for art which she never had before. She is able to look critically and constructively at many various venues that use art. (For example, the stage setting of a play, or the organization of a window display in a store.) Not only is she able to point out strong and week points of particular pieces of art, but she is able to back up her point of view with logical reasons. Comments I have heard vary from ideas about composition, to perspective to realism style to use of color and hue to develop particular specific aspects of a picture.

When she first came to you and asked to take art lessons, she was interested in being able to draw what her eyes saw in front of her. As she has learned to do this, her ideas of art have expanded and now she is adding her own feelings to her work. She has stated to me that when she dose art it “puts her in the right space”. She occasionally has had difficulty getting herself organized to go to her lesson, but invariably when she has had a lesson when she felt like that, she said to me after, “I am glad I went, I feel much better and more centered for having gone.” She states that she is both tired mentally, but creatively satisfied and energised after a lesson.

Zelie is learning many things from these lessons, which carry over into other aspects of her life. She is learning how to complete a task to the best of her ability. She is learning the discipline to look critically at her work, to walk away when it is frustrating and return to finish it. She is learning that a piece of art is never finished, but at some point one must say” enough” and let it go. (That is, dealing with perfectionism). She also is learning that one must be in the correct frame of mind, or “zone” to be creative. She is learning over time how to get herself into that space.

The mentor-ship you have given her is much more than just “lessons” Mentor-ship implies an interrelationship which benefits each individual in a unique way. We hope you have gained from the relationship with her as well.

As parents, we are pleased to see Zelie developed a skill in an area which she can continue to grow as far as her imagination leads her. If she desires and continues this as a career, that is wonderful, but that choice is entirely up to her. It is important for her to have an activity that she enjoys that she must learn discipline (that is, mental training) to excel at. This is what art provides her. That she has such a good mentor is a wonderful added bonus.

Marilyn Berube

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