For HNOC’s 2024 Student Writing Contest, we invited students from across the country to create colorful identities for the mysterious subjects in the 26 portraits featured in our « Unknown Sitters » exhibition! After receiving hundreds of entries, we selected three winners across three age categories.
Today, we are excited to feature « Rising Writer » by Ellie Dilligan, an 8th grade student at Morris Jeff Community School in New Orleans, who is among our middle school winners. Ellie wrote this humorous short story in response to the portrait « Man Among Leaves » painted between 1945 and 1950 by Howard Newton Reeve. The real life identity of this « sitter » was recently revealed to be horticulturist Henry Kraak by a relative who visited the exhibition. We thought it was fortuitous that both Henry and his alter-ego « Wallace Von Moneybags » were gardeners!
Plan your visit to « Unknown Sitters »: https://www.hnoc.org/exhibitions/unknown-sitters
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Video narrated by HNOC Interpreter Kurt Owens
Man among leaves, 1945–1950, painting by Howard Newton Reeve. HNOC, 1996.88
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