KNME video produced by Josh Keenan
 

ALBUQUERQUE — In the United Kingdom, it’s not uncommon to see little "Don’t Forget Africa" signs in every other shop window. And anyone who watches BBC News  is aware of the broad coverage that British network affords to African issues. Africa, it seems, is part of the nation’s daily dialogue.

Not so in America.

But a young Albuquerque woman, along with a dozen dedicated colleagues, just might have made up for the rest of the nation in putting together the immense exhibit of handmade cradles now being shown through Saturday in downtown Albuquerque.

Naomi Natale and her group of volunteers are not only raising awareness about the staggering number of children in Africa orphaned by violence, disease and poverty; they are raising money for the orphans as well.

A companion online auction of the pieces has been extended to Friday because of the high volume of people coming to the exhibit, up to 250 a day, Natale told the New Mexico Independent. 

She said it took three people working constantly for three months just to install the cradles in what is likely one of the largest exhibits of art ever assembled in the city. And the work is stunning in its power.
More than 500 men, women and children created 550 cradles out of scrap and recycled materials  to place in the show. An entry fee of $100 a cradle was asked of the exhibitors, who often raised the money by holding awareness parties of 10 friends, each of whom would contribute $10 to the cause.

Albuquerque artist Louisa Barkalow told the Independent she doesn’t usually do political artwork, but produced a cradle because The Cradle Project was an idea "that’s so powerful. Everybody was so moved."

"I worked on my cradle for three months. I don’t usually spend so long on a project, but I kept coming back to it. I know other artists who got involved in this who feel the same way."

 

Barbara Sundberg, also of Albuquerque, doesn’t consider herself an artist, but noted that Natale’s Web site invitation said anybody who wanted to participate was welcome. Sundberg, a quilter, made two cradles, one an old doll’s cradle in which she put a quilt she had "had forever," the other an old French laundry basket for which she made a quilt and pillow.

"I just thought it was a great project," Sundberg told the Independent. "It’s something very important we don’t think about in America. We don’t think about the impact of poverty around the world and the impact of war on children."
 

"My Sweet Baby’s Cradle" by Louisa Barkalow. (Photos by Denise Tessier)

For three years, it has been a consuming passion for Natale, who conceived of the idea after traveling to Kenya to photograph children when she was just out of college. The photographs Natale took in Africa can be seen on the Web site for the Cradle Project.

In a letter she wrote in 2006 to artists and others to drum up support, she wrote:
 

For most of my visit I traveled with an order of Sisters who were working with orphaned children. The journeys that I took with them — moving from one orphanage and slum to the next, across the entire country — exposed me to one of the most staggering and horrifying realities affecting Africa today — the orphan crisis.

During one of these visits I was told the story of two brothers who had lived in Kibera, the second largest slum in Africa. Both brothers were graced with amazing creative talents — one could build small airplanes out of scrap metal that would actually fly (!) and the younger brother was an exceptional sculptor; at the age of 8 he would sculpt anything requested of him for merely a shilling, only to destroy it and start over for his next amazed customer.

By the time Natale had heard of these brothers, they had gone missing and were feared dead.

 

Like so many millions of other anonymous and gifted children living in the slums of Africa, their potential as thriving and creative citizens of our global community slipped unnoticed and unnurtured through the falling sands of time.

 

 

Natale’s vision was to stage a fund-raising exhibit using empty cradles and falling sand as symbols for the lost potential of these children.
 

A child at Albuquerque's Marie Hughes Elementary School made this cradle to benefit African orphans.

A child at Albuquerque’s Marie Hughes Elementary School made this cradle to benefit African orphans.

The only requirement was that cradles be built of scrap or recycled materials — and the diversity of ideas in the exhibit is surprising. One cradle is made entirely of light bulbs; another is a nest of barbed wire filled with iridescent butterflies from a Catholic mission orphanage in Africa. One bassinet of sticks and Coke bottles, oddly enough, brings to mind an image of baby Moses afloat on the Nile.

A cradle of stained glass is embedded with baby bracelet beads spelling out the words "Suffer the Little Children," combining beauty and tragedy. One cradle is covered in plastic, the dolls and toys inside suffocating in shredded paper. Each cradle deserves a second look in order to fully absorb its message — and to discover its source materials. There are spines, pelvises, an old tire, a nest of sticks with bullet casings in the yolk of a broken egg.

Natale herself contributed a chain-link escape ladder, hung to resemble a cradle shape, called "For the Sanctity of Childhood."’

In one corner the exhibit includes a sculpture that drops a wall of sand, a backdrop for the dozens of cradles spread in the vast and empty top two floors of the Sunrise Bank Building, 219 Central NW, downtown.

Originally the exhibit was to be housed in the Albuquerque’s railroad backshops, which are slated for preservation as a Wheels Museum. But just four months before the show, after more than two years of work, the project was booted out when a film company expressed an interest in using the unique space, a setback that was well-publicized. 

"At first, it was pretty devastating to lose that space," Natale said this week. But she said the new space was a "complete donation" by Jerry and Lynn Mosher of the Downtown Lofts LLC, which plans to build lofts in the upper floors of the bank where the exhibit is now located.

"It’s centrally located, we were able to have the exhibit longer, and we just felt incredibly welcome there. At the other space were were fighting and fighting and didn’t feel welcome."

 She says the railroad backshops served their purpose during the marketing process and then drew attention to the Cradle Project attention when the space was lost. It was appropriate in a way, Natale says, "being orphaned ourselves for about a month."

 The two floors of about 8,000 square feet each "worked out to be just right" in terms of size. Plus, the project was able to have "an amazing reception on the rooftop" when the exhibit opened, which Natale said drew 2,000 people. "We wouldn’t have had that" at the Barelas railway site.

To launch the project, Natale secured a grant from the Firelight Foundation, which is selling a book of the Cradle Project art, proceeds of which also go to orphans and other vulnerable children in Africa.

As Elizabeth Mataka, U.N. Special Envoy on AIDS in Africa, wrote in a testimonial for the exhibit:

 

"Now more than ever, we need the work of these artists. We need them to do what artists have done since ancient times — to move and inspire us, to help us see difficult problems in a new way."

 

"When the bough breaks …" by Michael Flynn Moffatt, made of bosque ground litter.

 

The Cradle Project is open from 1 to 5 p.m. Thursday through Saturday and is free. Its final day is Saturday.