My current Project Title:
The Art of Growing Up
About me - current project:
Margaret Lampert is a photographer based in Cambridge Massachusetts. Growing up on a dairy farm north of Boston with two very visual parents, she was influenced by art and the natural world in equal measure. Margaret studied Art History & English and just after graduating college she began working in the department of Prints, Drawings & Photographs at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. Here, while assisting the acting curator of the photography collection, Margaret fell in love with the medium and, with little technical knowledge but a head full of pictures she set out to become a photographer. Through apprenticeships and workshops she honed her skills and has been making pictures ever since. With her background in fiction writing and art history, and a deep curiosity in human nature, Margaret seeks to create visually and emotionally compelling narratives through portraiture and landscape.
THE ART OF GROWING UP is a documentary short shot in Sacramento, featuring six local teens and tweens:
“We have ideas, and they need to be implemented,” says a teenage girl named Marissa. Marissa is one of six subjects in Margaret Lampert’s new documentary short film, THE ART OF GROWING UP, which offers an evocative glimpse into the hearts and minds of today’s youth. Divided into five loosely themed chapters, the film has all the Lampert signatures—lush lighting, bright faces, and abiding authenticity.
The theme for the documentary arose out of a conversation with her niece, a mother of three. “I found myself asking her, ‘How do you talk to your kids about what’s going on in the world? How do you explain to them what we can’t even understand ourselves, and make them feel protected?’” says Lampert. Her niece’s answer—“The conversations are so difficult but so necessary. These kids are inheriting all of our mistakes but they give me a profound sense of hope".
Over the course of several months, Lampert went about putting all the pieces together to compose the ten-minute film that features Carlos, George, Madeline, Marissa, Sienna, and Zoe, who share in depth about their inner lives, including their aspirations, struggles, interests, and worries. All six of the California-based teens and tweens are invested in how the course of history continues, speaking about equality and social justice issues they seek to engage with, while also displaying a deep awareness of how their own wellbeing affects their ability to be changemakers. The lens lingers on the more vulnerable moments, and the subjects don’t shy away—they are there to share.
Many have learned the same lesson Lampert has: that making art is a powerful aid in changing yourself and the world. The film shows the teens at work—painting, making jewelry, writing music—and talking about why they find refuge in creative practice. “The process of creating something allows me to put that thought and energy into something else,” Sienna explains. “Then I’m able to release it, let it go.” For George, closely examining his features to paint a self-portrait was an exercise in self-acceptance.
“These kids, like all kids, are going through a lot,” says Lampert, who happily dug into the interview process, continually refining her questions so that a certain level of conversation could be nourished. “I’ve always thought that what sets my work apart is the amount of trust people have in me, and I really felt that trust as we were making this film—more than I ever have.
In the end THE ART OF GROWING UP has accomplished exactly what I had hoped it might: to give us all a sense of hope for the future.
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