15 JUNE 2009. At a recent meeting of the Santa Fe Gallery Association, ARTsmart, a 50lc3 organization, announced the winner of the "Art Changes Lives," Santa Fe Gallery Association Scholarship. “The competition was very stiff this year,” said Latricia Gonzales-McKosky, SFGA president. “There were several students whose work was outstanding and deserving, however, Corey Mandel stood above the crowd.”

Corey (left), who is a senior at Monte del Sol Charter School, received the $4,000 scholarship and will be using it to pursue the arts at Bennington College, Vermont, beginning in September 2009. (See additional photos at Scholarship.)

Corey’s exemplary high school career includes volunteering for Fine Arts for Children and Teens, a program in which he participated in elementary and middle school. “I encourage the kids to express themselves on paper so that they can feel safe to be who they are,” he says.  As a participant in the Sustainable Global Leadership Alliance, Corey says he became “passionate about making a difference in the world through his art.” Through the SGLA program he traveled to India for three weeks and did service work, witnessing extreme poverty and environmental destruction of the land, which has become a theme in his recent drawings. “I was motivated to spread awareness through my artwork,” he says of the nonprofit organization he and his friends founded to create T-shirts with positive messages and images. All of the organization’s profits go to Free the Children, which is devoted to stopping child labor around the world. Additionally, Corey was employed for two years as the comic artist for Generation Next in The Santa Fe New Mexican newspaper. “Through humor I wanted to bring to light school issues and teen challenges,” he says, concluding,  “I use art as a means of self-inquiry, expressing what I can’t say through words. Art is grounding and empowering, and every picture captures a unique part of me. It is a universal language that all people can feel.”

The ARTsmart Scholarship was initiated in 2006 and is currently under endowment at the Santa Fe Community Foundation. “We are very enthusiastic about the selection of Corey as the recipient of the scholarship,” says ARTsmart President Connie Axton. “Corey gives vision to the mission of the scholarship as expressed in its title, namely,  Art Changes Lives.”

ARTfeast 2009, which took place in February, once again raised funds earmarked specifically for the scholarship endowment. This year’s donation of $8,925 brings the total scholarship giving to $54,925. In addition to awarding this year’s scholarship recipient, ARTsmart also awarded a $1,000 scholarship to the 2008 recipient, Elena Valdez, who is attending the University of New Mexico, and a $1,000 scholarship to the 2007 recipient, Da Young Jung, who is attending the New York School of the Visual Arts. In a letter to ARTsmart, Da Young noted her appreciation as follows:

"Here I was, from a small town in New Mexico, from a low-income family, going to school in New York trying to be a cartoonist.  I felt the world was against me, and I was ready to call it quits. But then I thought of my family who is excited to see me pursue my dream. And the people who have invested in my dream. If it wasn’t for the support of ARTsmart, I would not have stood firm against all the stress, pain, and tears. Your trust is my greatest strength in suppressing doubts and finding the courage to step forward. The scholarship doesn’t simply mean financial aid–it means people who believe in me when I can’t even believe in myself. From the very bottom of my heart, thank you for your trust."