Australian Photographer and digital artist Karen Alsop, the founder of Story Art, has her heart in the right place this holiday season. Hoping to spread some cheer to sick children and their families, Alsop has started The Christmas Wish Project. With just her trusty camera, Photoshop, and help from jolly old Saint Nick, Alsop artistically transports children spending their holidays in the hospital to cozy Christmas scenes and magical Winter Wonderlands.
Bright and early on November 29, 2016, Alsop visited Monash Children’s Hospital in Melbourne, Australia. There, she and her team of elves began to organize festive photo shoots for the children. In an empty room, they constructed a green screen-equipped “Christmas studio.” Families were then invited into the makeshift studio, where their little ones would be treated to a sweet shoot with Santa Claus. (If children were unable to make it to the studio, their Santa sessions would take place right in their rooms.)
Once all of the pictures were taken, Alsop—a Photoshop wiz—worked her magic to transform the hospital snapshots into storybook scenes where snow falls on cobblestoned streets, reindeer roam free, and medical equipment vanishes. She and her team then framed and wrapped the wondrous works of art, and delivered them to the children and their families.
If that hasn’t already brought a tear to your eye, Alsop’s poignant project description just might. “Christmas is a joyful time, a time I love to celebrate with my family, but not everyone has that blessing,” she states on her website. “I’ve always felt for the children in particular who are unable to leave the hospital during this season because at a time when the world is joyful, their pain is even more evident. I wanted to give them a gift that brings hope and I wanted to free them, at least in a creative sense, from their IV lines, monitors, from the confines of the hospital ward and the reality of their situation. My main aim was to rekindle their faith of what the future holds for each of them.”
You can learn more about the precious project on the Story Art blog.
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h/t: [PetaPixel]