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Arts & Entertainment

Seniors—and Seniors—Celebrate Unique Friendship

Students from York High School reveal portraits to senior citizens at Lexington luncheon.

Each framed face reflects years of experience and life. Every smile provides glimpses of exuberant personalities. Each pair of eyes conceal wisdom spanning decades.

The portraits of senior citizens from Lexington Square Retirement Community, whether created in acrylic, collage or colored pencil, reveal more than the talent of the artists who created them. They reveal the vibrant lives attached to each of their subjects. 

During a luncheon Thursday at York High School, senior students in the advanced placement art class unveiled portraits of senior citizens they had befriended last fall as part of a community outreach program. Students only had about an hour and a half to interview and photograph their subjects in October. The Thursday luncheon was the first time the senior citizens were able to view the finished portraits.

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The project, created by advanced placement art instructor Amanda Claus, was titled Senior Citizen Portrait and focused on building friendships between students and senior citizens from Lexington. Claus wanted to combine a community element with the art program.

This is the fourth year Claus has given her students the opportunity to reach out to someone they normally would not. The program has grown in recent years due to York Principal Diana Smith’s involvement. Her own parents reside at Lexington. 

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Claus believes senior citizens have a lot to offer, especially to young people about to experience life on their own for the first time. Claus, who was raised by her grandparents, said it is important to forge relationships with those who can offer words of encouragement and wisdom.

“Everyone needs to have someone else in life who’s in a different place with great perspective they can share with us,” Claus said.

Though the end product is a beautiful portrait for the seniors, the most important result is the friendships. Many past students maintain connections with the senior citizens. 

Students and seniors spoke to one another Thursday with such ease, it appeared their friendships spanned decades, not mere months. Many spoke of shared interests, such as gardening, travel and painting. Many of these interests appeared in the backgrounds of the portraits. One man's service in the Air Force was depicted by planes. Another portrait included a design that reflected a woman’s extraordinary fashion sense and the blouse she was wearing the first time they met.

Student Samantha Kurdas spoke of the relationship between her subject, Paul Kempf, and his wife, Iva.

“They’re just adorable,” she said. “Paul said, ‘Never go to bed angry,’ as the key to a relationship.” Coming from a couple that has been together for 65 years, everyone should take note.

Kurdas created a sepia-toned portrait of the Kempfs and explained she had gained a lot from her time with them.

“They took chances. That’s what I got out of this experience: to take more chances and to go with my heart,” she said.

Another student, Sara Kloskowski, said that her time spent with Helena Sliva taught her “how to really open up to someone you just met.”

Kloskowski created a portrait of Sliva with the Great Wall of China in the background as an ode to Sliva’s travels.

The luncheon took place in York’s student-run restaurant, La Brigade. Family and Consumer Sciences Department Chairman Wendy Albert helped to make the luncheon possible. Albert’s students prepared and served the multiple-course lunch.

Lexington Square directors also attended the luncheon, as well as Principal Smith and Art Department Chairman Tom Wolfe. Elmhurst Mayor Peter DiCianni also attended to view the portraits.

The portraits will be on display at K & T Colors in the upcoming weeks. Wolfe said it is important for the public to see the portraits and “cherish the seniors in our community.”

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