When 11-year-old Samuel Song saw his artwork on the atrium wall, he approached it with a coy grin.
“I’m kind of embarrassed,” Song said. “But also proud.”
Song’s painting of a rainbow, with a closed door in the middle, took second place in the elementary school category for the University of Rochester Medical Center's health equity art contest.
The contest was created by the Office of Health Equity Research, now part of the Center for Community Health and Prevention, as a way for the Office to get more familiar with the needs of the community and provide children with a creative way to express what “health equity” meant to them.
“When I made it, I was thinking that all people should be allowed to be different and still get proper health care,” Song said about his illustration. “The door shows that we haven't yet accomplished that.”
Song's colorful painting is among the two dozen submissions of art made by K-12 grade students in the region. The winning art pieces are now on display in the atrium at UR Medicine Saunders Research Building.
“This was meant to really make contact with the most vulnerable in our region to really get down into the depths of what matters to those who are impacted the most by the inequities that we see all around us,” said Edith Williams, director of the CCHP. “That's why we chose to first contact children and involve them in this conversation.”
Thirteen-year-old Jeremiah Jenerson also used nature to interpret health equity. His pencil drawing of a tree with transparent roots won first place in the middle school division.
“The steps to achieving equity, I see them as seeds or roots to becoming equity,” Jenerson said about the message behind is artwork. “The tree represents the finished product — almost — and the roots are how we get there.”
Jenerson said he did some research about health equity before creating his tree and has gained a better understanding of its value.
“People don't have the resources to attain good health care,” he said. “Or maybe some people are denied good health care because of different things that are out of their control, so I believe that it's very important.”
Williams said it was pivotal for the children’s artwork to be on display in an area with heavy foot traffic and a great vantage point.
