Picture Brightens for Troubled and Abused Children

In June, Los Angeles photographer Deanne Shartin was asked to shoot pictures of a group of children, patients at UCLA Medical Center, for a brochure for a hospital support group, The Kids’ Benefit. The brochure was to promote the sale of Christmas cards designed by children in the hospital.

Shartin, who has taught art to kids for many years, noticed how these children perked up when they posed for her, and how interested they were in touching the camera and finding out how it worked. That experience inspired her to come up with a plan to work one-on-one with seriously ill children confined to the hospital, teaching them how to take pictures and accompanying them as they explored and photographed the hospital environment that engulfed them.

Within a week of that photo session, Shartin was doing that at UCLA, and the nonprofit Hot Shots program was born. Since October, she has also worked with teen-age runaways and abused, abandoned and neglected children between ages 5 and 17 through the nonprofit Free Arts for Abused Children, which brings its services to children’s facilities throughout Los Angeles County.

“I see the joy that it brings the kids, and how it can enhance them,” Shartin said. “Working one-on-one with them is something they really need. Placing a camera in kids’ hands brings the tender, courageous parts of them out. It is a means of expression, of their special insight and their special way of experiencing their environment.”

Continually impressed by the images her young pupils capture--”Often kids take pictures I would be thrilled and proud to have taken,” she said--Shartin has organized a show of their work at French Roast, a coffeehouse in Brentwood.

Fourteen black-and-white photographs--ranging in subject from the landscape of UCLA’s Botanical Gardens and the sculpture in its sculpture garden to a dollhouse and a hospital room scene--hang together on one wall, accompanied by statements the young people have made regarding their photo opportunities, and their lives in general.

Tina, 10, who photographed trees, writes: “When I take pictures like this it makes me think I’m hundreds of miles” away from all her troubles.

“These kids have had really tough experiences. They are all survivors, strong little kids,” Shartin said. “They inspire me on many levels--artistically, psychically, spiritually. I see doing this for a long time. It comes from my heart more than anything I’ve ever done.”

“L.A. Children’s Artwork” is open 6:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Mondays through Fridays, 6:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturdays and 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Sundays through April 15 at French Roast, 11753 San Vicente Blvd., Brentwood. Call (310) 820-1883.

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PHOTO FACES: At the Gallery of Contemporary Photography, the show “Portraits” brings together thoughtful visions of familiar and unfamiliar faces by five contemporary photographers. All of them are regular contributors to major magazines.

“These are people who set parameters of what a portrait is in the ‘90s,” said Rose Shoshana, the gallery director.

Glen Erler’s sepia-toned gelatin silver prints manifest impressionistic views of performers such as k. d. lang, Lenny Kravitz and Sam Phillips. Melodie McDaniel captured a sense of singer Suzanne Vega and actor Steve Buscemi in black-and-white prints. But it is her images of women we don’t know in the “American Foundry Series” and “Jake”--which contemplate variations on standard notions of female sexuality--that give one a lot to think about.

Antonin Kratochvil’s moody, grainy black-and-white prints take us to Poland, to Checkpoint Charlie, East Berlin (1990) with actress Jessica Lange and to the Paris Cafe in West Berlin with German actress Marianne Sagebrecht. In contrast, his image of film director Pedro Almodovar sitting at the Cafe Terraca in Madrid with a few pairs of high heels strewn on the table is clear and crisp.

Max Aguilera Hellweg’s portraits include an unusual color print of film director Martin Scorsese, a film noir-ish take on men in the streets of Rome, and a warm, loving tribute to “Dianna, Oaxaca, Mexico.” Shoshana said he photographed “Los Pantalones,” of four pairs of pants hanging in a window, because he saw four people in them.

The subjects of Frank Ockenfels’ artfully designed black-and-white prints--including writer Peter Matthiessen, film director Spike Lee and Natalie Merchant of 10,000 Maniacs--look directly back at him. “He challenges them to show who they are,” Shoshana said.

“Portraits” is open 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays through April 14 at Gallery of Contemporary Photography, 2431 Main St., Santa Monica. Call (310) 399-4282.